Green Energy – Go Lean…Caribbean

Tag: Green Energy

‘Climate Change’ raging Worse for some compared to others

Posted on September 20, 2020 in Ethos, Industries, Planning, Social

Go Lean Commentary

We are all in this together! – popular fallacy for global problems

This is not true for Climate Change. Some communities are on the frontlines; some communities take all the beatings, while some other communities are unscathed.

Inequality rules the day!

This writer recently repatriated back to the Caribbean (Bahamas) in 2019 and have consistently endured power utility bills of US$900 to US$1,100 during the summer months. “Our A/C never goes off”.

Most residents in Caribbean communities cannot afford this actuality. This is not about enjoying; this is about enduring.

This has always been true in society: There are the Haves and the Have-Nots. But what is emerging in the Climate Change eco-system, is not just the individual inequalities, but rather the national inequalities. Some countries have suffered pangs of distress from Climate Change … some countries have-not.

Though we have experienced and expressed these distresses, this is not our thoughts alone …

No, the highly-regarded New York Times has recently published their own formal journalistic depiction of this assertion. See that story highlights here:

Title: A warming world
In the past 60 years, every decade has been hotter than the last, and 2020 is on track to be among the hottest years yet. But the burden of extreme heat is not shared equally — it’s significantly worse for people at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder.

Extreme heat can exacerbate poor health, ravage crops and make it dangerous to work outside. And in many parts of the world, simple ways to alleviate those effects — like water, or electricity for fans and air-conditioners — are a luxury.

Somini Sengupta, The Times’s international climate reporter, and a team of photographers have a new story that documents how rising temperatures are affecting people across multiple continents.

Excerpts
The agony of extreme heat, though, is profoundly unequal.
This Is Inequity at the Boiling Point

It was a record 125 degrees Fahrenheit in Baghdad in July, and 100 degrees above the Arctic Circle this June. Australia shattered its summer heat records as wildfires, fueled by prolonged drought, turned the sky fever red.

For 150 years of industrialization, the combustion of coal, oil and gas has steadily released heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere, driving up average global temperatures and setting heat records. Nearly everywhere around the world, heat waves are more frequent and longer lastingthan they were 70 years ago.

But a hotter planet does not hurt equally. If you’re poor and marginalized, you’re likely to be much more vulnerable to extreme heat. You might be unable to afford an air-conditioner, and you might not even have electricity when you need it. You may have no choice but to work outdoors under a sun so blistering that first your knees feel weak and then delirium sets in. Or the heat might bring a drought so punishing that, no matter how hard you work under the sun, your corn withers and your children turn to you in hunger.

It’s not like you can just pack up and leave. So you plant your corn higher up the mountain. You bathe several times a day if you can afford the water. You powder your baby to prevent heat rash. You sleep outdoors when the power goes out, slapping mosquitoes. You sit in front of a fan by yourself, cursed by the twin dangers of isolation and heat.

Extreme heat is not a future risk. It’s now. It endangers human health, food production and the fate of entire economies. And it’s worst for those at the bottom of the economic ladder in their societies. See what it’s like to live with one of the most dangerous and stealthiest hazards of the modern era. …

Heat waves are becoming more frequent in Athens. It’s toughest in the city’s treeless, concrete neighborhoods.

… Mr. Hotak was 16 when he left his home in the Sholgara district of Afghanistan, the only one among his 11 brothers and sisters to do so. After one failed attempt to enter Europe and two years in a refugee camp, he was granted asylum in Greece. That’s when he arrived on the rooftop refuge with a friend, in the crowded warrens of Kolonos, a working class Athens neighborhood where many migrants have settled.

The city has grown hotter by the decade. According to temperature records kept by the National Observatory of Athens, there were fewer than 20 hot days (with temperatures over 99 degrees Fahrenheit, or 37 Celsius) from 1897 until 1906. By the mid-1980s, there were still fewer than 50 hot days per decade. From 2007 to 2016, though, the number had risen to 120 hot days. …

In Athens, heat waves have increased fivefold over the last century. Diminished rains and longer dry seasons are destroying Guatemala’s farmlands, where Indigenous farmers could see crop yields fall sharply. In Nigeria, hotter nights make it easier for mosquitoes to breed, increasing the risk of mosquito-borne diseases. And in the United States, heat kills older people more than any other extreme weather event, including hurricanes.

We spoke with Somini about what she described as “one of the most profound inequities of the modern age.”

“I have seen over the last couple of years the impact of what is truly a global problem,” she said. “We know that high heat and humidity is a dangerous combination for health, agriculture and economies of whole regions — nearly everywhere around the world, heat waves are more frequent and longer lasting than they were 70 years ago.”

What do experts recommend to combat rising temperatures?

“Draw down the combustion of fossil fuels,” Somini said. “The world is capable of getting off coal in many instances, capable of vastly reducing the burning of oil and gas.”

But the world also has to adjust to the extreme heat we’re seeing already, she said. That includes making water, air-conditioners and fans more accessible, and planting trees to bring down temperatures in cities.

“It could also mean adjusting things you might not immediately think of, like labor laws so people don’t have to work for hours under the blistering sun, agricultural changes in farming methods or what is grown in what place to adapt to higher temperatures,” she said.

“In short, it requires doing everything pretty differently.”

In other climate news:

Government scientists updated their forecast for the remainder of the Atlantic hurricane season, predicting “one of the most active seasons on record.” Climate change appears to be making hurricanes more intense and destructive.

Source: posted August 6, 2020; retrieved September 14, 2020 from: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/08/06/climate/climate-change-inequality-heat.html

Go Lean Commentary continues …

What’s next for the Caribbean? While excessive heat and the need for air-conditioning is critical, the pang of distress that impacts us most severely is that of hurricanes. Remember Irma, Maria or Dorian …

Hurricanes are worse; more frequent and more powerful. In fact for 2020, the meteorological officials have ran out of names to assign for this year’s Atlantic Hurricane season. They are now assigning the Greek alphabet as hurricane names; think Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, Epsilon, etc.. Here is the actuality of the Alpha Storm here:

Subtropical Storm Alpha (2020)
… a very unusual subtropical cyclone that made landfall in Portugal, the first ever recorded occurrence for the country. The system was also the easternmost-forming Atlantic tropical cyclone on record in the basin, exceeding the previous record of Tropical Storm Christine in 1973.^[1] The twenty-fourth cyclone and twenty-second named storm of the extremely active and record-breaking 2020 Atlantic hurricane season, Alpha originated from a large non-tropical low that was first monitored by the National Hurricane Center on 15 September. Initially not anticipated to transition into a tropical cyclone, the low gradually tracked south-southeastward for several days with little development. By 18 September, the low began to separate from its frontal features and exhibited sufficient organization to be classified as a subtropical cyclone as it approached the Iberian Peninsula, becoming a subtropical storm later that day. Alpha made landfall just north of Lisbon, Portugal during the evening of 18 September, becoming the first recorded landfalling (sub)tropical cyclone in mainland Portugal.^[2] Alpha was also the third confirmed (sub)tropical cyclone landfall in mainland Europe, following a hurricane in Spain in 1842 and Hurricane Vince (as a tropical depression) in 2005. Alpha rapidly weakened and became a remnant low early on 19 September.

There is no denying, this is all relative! Imagine a necessary ingredient for managing snow removal in society: rock salt. If there was a shortage of rock salt, countries nearer to the Arctic and Antarctic poles would be more directly affected. It does not snow in the tropical regions, near the equator, so these would be disaffected.

Well, the opposite is occurring; there are shortages – like precipitation, cool breezes, shady trees – and dire consequences (drought, forest fires, storms, flooding, rising sea levels, etc.) being endured in the tropical regions and the communities closer to the poles are less affected. (Note: Melting glacial ice does have universal effects with rising sea levels; think Canada).

The dire consequences of Climate Change are not equally shared. This actuality has fostered the threat of Climate Refugees or Migrants – people leaving one part of the planet – think: deserts of the Middle East and North Africa – to seek refuge in lesser affected locales, like Western Europe and North America.

Ready or not, climate migration is now also acute here in the Caribbean. Societal abandonment had previously been identified as the most dire threat to Caribbean society. The 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean opens with this declaration:

There is something wrong in the Caribbean … instead of the world “beating a path” to these doors, the people of the Caribbean have “beat down their doors” to get out.

So first there was the brain drain (college educated population), but now we are noticing the rest of society also taking leave:

Overseas Territories – i.e. Puerto Rico, USVI, Aruba, St. Martin, Martinique, Bermuda, Caymans, etc. – have no hope of retaining young people.
- High School Graduation on Friday; flights to the colonizing Fatherland on Saturday.
Independent countries emigrate through legal (family sponsor-ships) and illegal means (trafficking).

As stated in the opening, we are not all in “this” together! There are the “Haves and the Have-Nots”. This is the new normal; we must adapt to this new reality; see the VIDEO portrayal in the Appendix below. This is a consistent theme in many previous Go Lean commentaries; see a sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19347	Go Green … Caribbean … finally
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18182	Disaster Relief: Helping, Not Hurting
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12949	Grow Up Already! The Caribbean must manage Charities ourselves
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12068	Abating Climate Change – Ready to reboot, reform and transform
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10895	Not expecting the relief and refuge only from others – Readying Ourself
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9455	Fix Climate Change – Yes, We Can
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7103	COP21 – Caribbean lands acknowledges ‘Climate Change’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5462	American Red Cross raised $500 million for Haiti but kept most of it
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3432	OECS diplomat has dire warning for the Caribbean looking for hand-outs

Our choices are that simple: prepare for Climate Change or watch our people migrate away from the homeland to foreign shores where the dire effects are lessened. While all humans are created equal, all people do not get equal treatment from … Mother Nature. Some people get more hot and wet than other people, yet they may not be able to afford the physical relief.

Even air-conditioning may not be equally accessible to everyone – we need cooperative refrigeration.

There are strategies, tactics and implementations to abate Climate Change and relieve the dire consequences for people and property. We can … must endure this new normal. This is how and why we can make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 13):

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————–

Appendix VIDEO – Refugees Are Fleeing Climate Change – https://youtu.be/nIlMHFwC1MM

The YEARS Project
Tens of millions of people could be displaced by climate change by the end of this century. Climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer explains why that matters, why he supports the right to migrate, and what governments need to do to prepare.
This story is part of Covering Climate Now, a global collaboration of more than 250 news outlets that aims to strengthen coverage of the climate crisis.

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Disaster, Greece, Green Energy, Model

Abaco, Bahamas – Losing the Battles on Two Fronts

Posted on September 19, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Locations, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

At the beginning of World War II, it became obvious, very early, that Germany was going to lose. Why?

Because they had to fight battles … alone … on two fronts:

On the West, against the Allied Forces (Britain, French, Americans, etc.)
On the East, against the Communist-bloc, the Soviet Union (Russia, and 15 unified republics).

That was a strategic and tactical disadvantage for Nazi Germany! Time was to catch up with them eventually.

There is a parallel situation today in the Caribbean, in the Northern Bahamas community of Abaco in particular. They have battles on two fronts: A hurricane and a pandemic.

Climate Change – infused storms like Hurricane Dorian in September 2019
At 16:40 UTC on September 1, Dorian made landfall on Great Abaco Island in the Bahamas, with one-minute sustained winds of 185 mph (298 km/h), wind gusts over 220 mph (355 km/h), and a central barometric pressure of 910 millibars (27 inHg),^[26][27] as Dorian reached its peak intensity during landfall.^[28] Storm chaser Josh Morgerman observed a pressure of 913.4 mbar (26.97 inHg) in Marsh Harbour.^[29] Dorian’s forward speed decreased around this time, slowing to a westward crawl of 5 mph (8.0 km/h).^[28] At 02:00 UTC on September 2, Dorian made landfall on Grand Bahama near the same intensity, with the same sustained wind speed.^[30] Afterward, Dorian’s forward speed slowed to just 1 knot (1.2 mph; 1.9 km/h), as the Bermuda High that was steering the storm westward weakened. Later that day, the storm began to undergo an eyewall replacement cycle to the north of Grand Bahama; the Bermuda High to the northeast of Dorian also collapsed, causing Dorian to stall just north of Grand Bahama.^[31][32] Around the same time, the combination of the eyewall replacement cycle and upwelling of cold water caused Dorian to begin weakening, with Dorian dropping to Category 4 status at 15:00 UTC.^[33] Due to the absence of steering currents, Dorian stalled north of Grand Bahama for about a day.^[34][35] – Wikipedia
Pandemic – Coronavirus COVID-19
Consider the actuality of life in the Bahamas during this crisis as related in a previous blog-commentary; (this reporting describes the situation on the ground in the Bahamas as miserable):
- Jobs are affected – most private businesses, including tourist resorts, are closed or curtailed.
- Retail food prices increase because of higher inventory-carrying costs.
- Hospitals and public safety institutions are overwhelmed with COVID cases: testing, tracing, therapeutics and terminal patients.
- Government Shutdown – No administrative processing, at all; no passport processing, no business registrations, etc.

Abaco is failing miserably on both fronts. It is not wise to bet that they will win, overcome, survive or thrive. 🙁

These are not just our thoughts alone; see these 2 articles here depicting the acute crisis on the ground in Abaco:

Title # 1: Everything Is Not Okay in the Bahamas… Not by a Long Shot – Surfline
By: Matt Pruett
For those who don’t regularly deal with natural disasters like hurricanes, earthquakes, wildfires or tornadoes, it’s easy to think of these violent events as one-offs, cosmic flukes, and after a year or so passes, old news. When in reality, the devastating effects from these catastrophes can last many, many years after the initial deathblow, and casualties continue to stack.

It’s been a little over a year since the prolonged and record-breaking Category 5 Hurricane Dorian blasted the Bahamas with 185mph maximum sustained winds — effectively become the most intense tropical cyclone to ever strike the islands, the costliest event in Bahamian history with $3.4 billion in damage, and the worst natural disaster in the country’s history — leaving at least 70,000 people homeless and 74 dead (although the exact death toll is unknown, as 245 people were still missing as of April 2020).

But there is compassion, especially from Floridian surfers who’ve been island-hopping this area for generations. And with compassion comes aid, and with aid comes relief, and with relief comes recovery. At least that’s what we hope.

“There are very few moments in life when we as individuals have the opportunity to do something larger than ourselves and help,” explains acclaimed filmmaker Wesley Dunham-Brown, who co-created the surfing documentary films Peel: The Peru Project and Chasing Dora before starting his own production company, Arora Entertainment. “I believe this is what we were ultimately put on this planet to do. When Hurricane Dorian decimated the Bahamas, and more specifically the area of Hope Town, it gave us the opportunity to do just that. Our small group of passionate filmmakers at Arora Entertainment went down to help these people, tell their incredible stories of loss, grief, love and compassion and share their unrelenting faith, will and perseverance to see the Bahamas rebuilt.”

Respected for their storytelling techniques, industry contacts, and ability to spread awareness, Brown and his directorial partner Bobby Pura were hired by Hope Town Rising — a grassroots initiative of the Community Assistance Foundation focused on supporting and rebuilding Elbow Cay — to focus their lenses on this devastated area in the way of a full-length documentary, “This is Hope Town.” The film shadows a close-knit community of Bahamians as they join together to work around-the-clock in terrible conditions to rebuild their lives, while recounting the damage, emotional toll and physical wreckage in heart-wrenching interviews. Brown and Pura immediately tapped longtime Bahamas traveler and professional surfer Cory Lopez to serve as ambassador for the mission.

“I spent a lot of time in the Bahamas over the years,” says Cory. “I started going there when I was a kid, and one year Andy [Irons] and I spent six weeks there. So I have a lot of great memories from the place. Looking at how big that storm was, I expected it to be bad. And of course I heard stories and saw pictures of how bad it ended up being. But once you get down there and actually see the severity of it, a year later… it’s catastrophic, man. It’s been such a slow process of removing debris off the island while getting supplies that are needed — and food — on to the island. And unfortunately with COVID-19, it’s just been a double-whammy for those people. At this rate it’ll take two to three years to rebuild, five years to bring this place back.”

“With disasters like this, it’s like a lot of people will donate right away, but then three months later there’s another disaster somewhere else in the world,” Cory adds. “So hopefully this film will bring another boost of money to the Bahamian people. And they were very grateful that we went down there to give them a voice and bring attention to the problems they’re facing.”

“This is not simply a documentarian journey, it’s a human journey,” Brown continues. “One that demonstrates to the world that we all possess the power to affect change, and a human responsibility to assist those in need wherever they may be. This is our time and opportunity to change things for the people of Hope Town, and to show the world what the people of the Abacos, and those who are doing everything in their power to help them, are truly made of.”

For more information, to watch the movie or to make a donation, visit Hope Town Rising.

Source: Posted September 12, 2020; retrieved September 19, 2020 from: https://www.surfline.com/surf-news/everything-not-okay-bahamas-not-long-shot/95982

————

VIDEO – This is Hope Town Trailer – Extended Cut (3:34) – https://youtu.be/CfqqaHzFO_A

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Title # 2: Abaco in “precarious situation” with COVID, ongoing reconstruction — says MP
NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Central and South Abaco MP James Albury said because the construction industry represents a major hotspot for COVID-19, Abaco is in a “precarious situation” as reconstruction forges on.

Infections on the island continue to rise, albeit more slowly in recent weeks.“It’s something that is on everyone’s mind, including my own,” Albury told Eyewitness News.

“We’re in a very precarious situation and trying to handle that as well as handle reconstruction of course, is a double whammy that is really keeping us on the back foot. We’re pushing forward as much as possible, but there is always a danger there in terms of a resurgence.Abaco has the third-highest number of infections in The Bahamas with 104 infections as of yesterday, trailing Grand Bahama (607) and New Providence (2,186).

The island remains in recovery mode more than a year after deadly Hurricane Dorian decimated many of its once-thriving communities.

Amid the height of lockdown and curfew measures nationwide, exemptions were made for reconstruction of the island, a major undertaking, to continue.

The MP said while it is hoped a rapid increase is avoided, “realistically, if it does happen it will require a lot more effort on behalf of the health team”.

He said an increase in cases and exposures also challenges residents, many of whom remain in alternative housing and tents.

“Even quarantining is difficult for lack of available housing, so it is a big concern and it is certainly nothing to take lightly,” Albury said.

“It is certainly nothing that we can afford to sleep on.” Albury said while new infections per appear to have somewhat slowed “things can change tomorrow”.

“We’re at [over] 100 cases spread out through several areas — Moore’s Island, Sandy Point, and some of the cays as well — so we have a bit of a spread of cases, and we’re dealing with a disaster already within a disaster,” he said.“It’s a very challenging position for the health team on the ground, so I do give them kudos.

“I think they have been working very hard to make sure that testing and monitoring is going on.”

Asked about compliance with emergency protocols on the recovering island, Albury said: “There are always going to be people who try and skirt around the law or skirt around the laid out protocols, but it’s something that Abaconians are taking very seriously.

“…Those members of society who are not really complying of course are going to face the end of the law on that.

Of the total cases on Abaco, 25 were recorded in the last two weeks.

In the two weeks prior, 35 cases were recorded.

This means in the last month, Abaco has more than doubled its cases — from 44 on August 20 to 104 yesterday.

During the first wave, which spanned mid-March through the end of June, Abaco recorded zero cases.

Moore’s Island in the Abacos recorded its first few cases on July 23.

Two days later, a case was recorded on Great Guana Cay in the Abacos.

And on July 28, mainland Abaco recorded its first case.

Source: Posted EyeWitness News – September 18, 2020; retrieved September 19, 2020 from: https://ewnews.com/abaco-in-precarious-situation-with-covid-ongoing-reconstruction-says-mp

The Abaco chain of islands are a beautiful part of the Bahamas archipelago – the natural beauty flourishes. The Bahamas has been rocked by the pandemic but the country was in crisis even before COVID-19; this was due to structural deficiencies that were exacerbated by Agents of Change like Climate Change, globalization, technology and an Aging Diaspora. So the cupboards are now bare; this makes relief and refuge from these recent crises (COVID-19 and Dorian) untenable. Crisis within a crisis; failure on top of failure.

This theme – Bahamian Deficiencies – aligns with many previous commentaries; see a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19327	‘Missing Solar’ – Inadequacies Exposed to the World
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18266	After Dorian, ‘Fool Me Twice’ on Flooding
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18038	Bahamas 2019 Self-Made Energy Crisis
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18011	Regulating Plastics in the Bahamas – So Little; So Late
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17992	What Went Wrong? Losing the Best; Nation-building with the Rest
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17118	White Paper: A Nation in Chaos
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16645	Economic Dysfunction: Bad Partners – Cruise Lines Interactions
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13856	Economic Dysfunction: Baha Mar – Doubling-down on Failure
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12911	Bahamian Diaspora: Not the ‘Panacea’

But we are here to explain, not just complain.

So the problems in Abaco are bigger than just COVID, bigger than just Dorian. The systematic defects are still present and still impacting the viability of this community for the future. There is the need to reboot the Abaco eco-system.

How?

The 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean identified the root causes of Caribbean communities’ dysfunctions and presented viable solutions: strategies, tactics and implementations. But it cautioned that the remediation work is not easy; it takes heavy-lifting. The book decomposed the societal engines to these sub-categories: economics, security and governance. Then it proposed confederating the 30 member-states of the Caribbean region so as to better leverage the solutions across a wider base – 42 million people – as opposed to just the small populations of many of the Small Island Development States. This is true for sparsely populated Abaco – 10,000-ish population; before Dorian; well before some documented defection-abandonment. Abaco is just a skinny string in the fabric of the regional society.

This is the urging right now; we need more than a string; we need to make the “rope” of our society stronger and better. We must … confederate, collaborate, collude, consolidate and convene:

Many strains of strings in a rope make it stronger. – The Bible Ecclesiastes 4:12

The mono-industrial engine of tourism-alone must be retired. This community – Abaco – must diversify, whatever it takes.

So the certainty of Abaco’s failure, does not have to be so certain; it can be averted. Learning the lessons from ill-fated Nazi Germany, Abaco, the Bahamas and the entire Caribbean need a more structure alliance (allied nations) fighting along-side them for victory.

Yes, we can! Confederation – this is how … we can make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Bookof Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Bahamas, Disaster, Green Energy, Transform

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Keep the Change: Hope for the Environment

Posted on April 22, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Change is unavoidable; the world will change, whether we want to or not.

Some changes will be good; some bad. Some change will be a reaction in response to other actions or events. When good reactionary change emerge to protect from an existential threat, then that is a good change.

We need to Keep that Change.

There is an existential threat today; there is a crisis: Coronavirus – COVID-19; we have reacted accordingly. Our reactions have been positive and beneficial for our environment. Though we needed to make these changes proactively; we should just be happy that the changes have happened anyway.

This highlights a problem we have had all the while with mankind; the problem is … man.

And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. – The Bible; Genesis 1:26 King James Version (KJV)

Unfortunately, we have not done a good job in exercising this dominion over the earth.

Until 2 months ago, the great existential threat to human existence was Climate Change. Now the greatest threat is Coronavirus – COVID-19.

Hooray for the planet, as COVID-19 is only a threat to mammals (mankind, mostly) and not the fauna nor flora nor any “creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth”. While mankind has been dealing with this pandemic, we have done very little damage to the environment – Yippee!!

In fact, we have gotten a chance to see how to abate the existential threat of Climate Change. It is simple:

Less fossil fuel consumption.

While this had previously been theorized, today it is proven valid!

Hooray for science.

See this article-VIDEO here depicting the positive cleaning effect that has manifested as a result of the 2-month reduction in fossil fuel consumption:

Title: Wildlife in streets, less pollution in big cities: Earth looks different on Earth Day 2020
By: Jay Cannon
As we commemorate the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, this year’s event is unlike any other we’ve experienced.

While much of the globe hunkers down at home or in quarantine during the coronavirus pandemic, society looks quite different than it did on April 22, 1970 – or even April 22 of last year, for that matter.

Amid closed restaurants, quiet office buildings and canceled sporting events, the new normal has had its fair share of environmental effects, with some areas in the U.S. reporting significant improvements in air quality.

Animals have taken advantage of the absence of humans in some areas, too. Several lions were caught sunbathing on the road of a closed national park in South Africa. Meanwhile, penguins and dogs roamed through a nearly empty aquarium, leading to some incredible cross-animal interactions.

Here’s a look at some of the unique effects that coronavirus has had on our environment.

Source: Retrieved April 22, 2020 from: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2020/04/22/earth-day-2020-pollution-down-empty-highways-animals-major-cities/3002480001/

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VIDEO – Coronavirus: Wild animals wander through empty, lockdown towns – https://www.usatoday.com/videos/news/have-you-seen/2020/04/01/coronavirus-wild-animals-wander-through-empty-lockdown-towns/5102987002/

Posted April 22, 2020 – Wild Animals around the world have been spotted checking out urban spaces as humans lock down to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

What does the Caribbean need to do to Keep the Change:

Promote a greener economy, with jobs in renewable energy.

That’s it; let’s get started, as we reflect on this monumental Earth Day 2020 – the 50th iteration of this recognized and celebrated day.

See how this directive was urged by António Guterres, the Secretary-General of the United Nations. See the story here:

Title: UN Secretary-General urges Climate Action in Coronavirus Recovery
APRIL 22, 2020 – On the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, António Guterres, the secretary-general of the United Nations, had a message for the world: We face not one, but two global threats.

“We must act decisively to protect our planet from both the coronavirus and the existential threat of climate disruption,” said Guterres …

… in a Video message.

The message, however, wasn’t that of hopelessness — the world has a chance to come together and fight both crises.

“We need to turn the recovery into a real opportunity to do things right for the future,” he said.

Restrictions aimed at reducing the spread of the novel coronavirus have drastically changed our lives and economies, creating a unique opportunity for us to invest in more sustainable societies.

The secretary-general offered some “climate-related actions to shape the recovery and work ahead.”

Guterres suggested directing coronavirus relief money into a greener economy, with jobs in renewable energy. Since taxpayer money helps businesses stay afloat in the economic downturn, the money should go toward more resilient and eco-conscious businesses.

“Public funds should be used to invest in the future, not the past,” said Guterres.

In the U.S., experts predict that the recent stimulus bills will only be temporary fixes, and we’ll need more policy changes by September to help us climb out of this recession. But as Guterres explains, since we’re already in the recession, we must take this opportunity to make our economy and energy systems more sustainable, reduce emissions and slow global warming.

Climate change will have economic consequences. We can expect billions of dollars in natural disaster damages, healthcare for pollution-related illnesses and unstable access to affordable food. But a lot of that cost can be prevented.

If we shift to renewable energy now, we can mitigate climate change and protect jobs in the energy industry when the oil runs out. Renewable energy is even cheaper once the infrastructure is in place.

To kick off a greener economy, Guterres recommends ending fossil fuel subsidies and taxing polluters to hold them accountable for their damage. He also recommends that climate risks be incorporated into economic systems like the stock market.

Above all else, the U.N. asks us to put aside our national affiliations and come together as people of Earth.

“Greenhouse gases, just like viruses, do not respect national boundaries,” said Guterres. “On this Earth Day, please join me in demanding a healthy and resilient future for people and planet alike.”

As the U.N. encourages us to invest in a healthy, resilient and sustainable economy, we can individually speed up the process by voting for leaders who prioritize the planet. Learn more at Earth Day Network’s Vote Earth campaign.

Source: https://www.earthday.org/un-secretary-general-urges-climate-action-in-coronavirus-recovery/

The foregoing refers to the reality and actuality of this Coronavirus crisis. Every month, the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean presents a Teaching Series on a subject germane to Caribbean life. For this April 2020, our focus is on the actuality of the Coronavirus crisis and how some changes have been forced on our society. But being forced to change is not always bad; some good can come from it. This is entry 1-of-5 for this series, which details the kind of changes that we want to keep, not just for the global society but specifically here in the homeland.

Yes, we can … Keep the Change.

All the entries in this month’s series are cataloged as follows:

Keep the Change – Lower Carbon Consumption abating Climate Change
Keep the Change – Working From Home & the Call Center Model
Keep the Change – Schools – Primary to Tertiary – making e-Learning work
Keep the Change – Basic Needs: Cannot just consume; we must produce as well
Keep the Change – Mono-Industrial Economy: ‘All eggs in 1 basket’

There are no Ands, Ifs or Buts …

… we need to do a better job of protecting our environment and optimizing our Carbon Footprint with Greenhouse gases. We needed to do this anyway but involuntarily we have been forced to comply these past months.

Once this crisis has past, is it possible to still consume less carbon? Indeed …

… this was the mandate of 2015 Paris Accord, – to lower global carbon output so as to abate Climate Change. There is now new hope. (Previously, in the 1990’s, the world came together, instituted and effectively complied with an accord to abate “Acid Rain”).

Our plan – strategies, tactics and implementations – must be ready for the Caribbean region … for Green Energy!

The points of reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines for Green Energy have been further elaborated upon in many previous blog-commentaries; consider this sample:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19351	‘Missing Solar’ – Moral Authority to “Name, blame & shame” big polluters
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18228	The Science of Power Restoration after catastrophic natural disasters
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17280	Way Forward – For Energy: ‘Trade’ Winds
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16361	5 Years Later – Climate Change: Coming so fast, so furious
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14832	Counter-culture: Manifesting Change – Environmentalism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14174	Canada: “Follow Me” for Model on ‘Climate Change’ Action
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13985	EU Assists Barbados in Renewable Energy Self-Sufficiency
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12724	Lessons from Colorado: Water Management Arts & Sciences
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10367	Science of Sustenance – Green Batteries
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9455	Fix ‘Climate Change’ – Yes, We Can
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7056	Electric Cars: ‘Necessity is the Mother of Invention’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5155	Tesla unveils super-battery to power homes with Green Energy options
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4897	US Backs LNG Distribution Base in Jamaica for cleaner energy options
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4587	Burlington, Vermont: Model city to be powered 100% by renewables
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=915	Go Green … Caribbean

Change … proactive or reactive – we will take it.

No one wanted the COVID-19 crisis – people have died and economies are wreaked – but if we are forced to change our carbon-consumption bad habits because of these external factors then we must “take the win”; our environment is a beneficiary.

A crisis is a terrible thing to waste!

This is serendipity – a good consequence from a bad incident. See these textbook definitions here:

Noun – Dictionary.com

an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident.

good fortune; luck

Noun – Merriam-Webster

the faculty or phenomenonof finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for

This is also true for the advocacy of this Go Lean movement; we have always asserted that only at the precipice will people change; this pandemic is definitely a precipice – so let’s cement these changes. Let’s get the returns on our investments; and recovery from our sacrifices. This is how we can make progress and make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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‘Missing Solar’ – Moral Authority to “Name, Blame and Shame” the Big Polluters – Encore

Posted on March 4, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Strategy

The Bahamas, finally installing solar arrays, wants to send a message to the world – Big Polluters in particular – that societies can transform to alternative energy sources, use less fossil fuels and abate Climate Change.

Go on and preach …

It is good that the Bahamas is making this pursuit, as a formal government initiative – it’s about time! Actually it’s past time; (see the Alternate VIDEO below).

Unfortunately, the Bahamas is so tiny – 400,000 people compared to the 7,700,000,000 global population (.0052%) – that they are not even a “pimple on the back-side of the beast” that is the world’s large population centers.

But, as related in a previous blog-commentary on December 19, 2018 by the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean, small countries have “No Moral Authority” to preach to these Bigger Nations unless they themselves comply with the best-practice of using renewable energy.

“Welcome to the fight Bahamas”; now that you are taking serious the need to deploy “Solar Micro-grids”, you can stand on the soapbox and point at others. Only with these installations can you “name, blame and shame” the Big Polluters – think China, India and the USA. This was alluded by the the US-based media-television-network CBS , in their titular news magazine show 60 Minutes, in this story this week. See the VIDEO here of the 60 Minutes report:

VIDEO – Bahamas installing solar power after storms – https://www.cbsnews.com/video/bahamas-hurricanes-power-grid-solar-60-minutes-2020-03-01/

60 Minutes
Posted March 1, 2020 – A tiny country in “Hurricane Alley” is trying to be an example to the world after Category 5 storms demolished parts of its electrical grid. Bill Whitaker reports on the Bahamas’ adoption of solar energy.
Click on PLAY Button to watch; expect commercial advertising before and during.
——————-
Alternate VIDEO
60 Minutes’ first report on solar energy, in 1979
More than four decades ago, 60 Minutes reported, “Solar energy may be an idea whose time has come for all of us.” Today, the Bahamas is turning to solar arrays to restore power after Hurricane Dorian
Click here to see that 1979 VIDEO: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/60-minutes-1979-solar-energy-report-2020-03-01/

That Sunday March 1, 2020 report revealed that:

The solar systems are now cheaper than diesel power options.
The Bahamas goal is to produce 30 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2030.

How about more … in less time.

Yes, we can …

We must “fight like our lives depend on it”. The technology is here now to produce all the energy from renewable sources for households, or businesses, or government buildings, or schools.

Do you see the trending here? We must all do something … now. What are we waiting for? The will? Well, the Bahamas seems to now have the will …

… and the way.

… and the motivation – Category 5 hurricanes are a “clear and present danger”.

This is an appropriate time to Encore that previous blog-commentary from December 19, 2018 – 9 months before that devastating Category 5 Hurricane Dorian made landfall in the Northern Bahamas. Now that this is March 2020, there is the opportunity to look back at the previous submission and echo an encore appeal “we must fight like our lives depend on it”. This desperation was depicted in this 60 Minutes story. This entry is 3-of-3 in that “Look Back“. The other entries are cataloged as follows:

60 Minutes Story – Bahamas Self-Made Energy Crisis
60 Minutes Story – Go Green … finally
60 Minutes Story – Moral Authority to “Name, Blame & Shame” the Big Polluters

See the Encore of that December 19, 2018 blog-commentary here-now:

———————

Go Lean Commentary – 5 Years Later – Climate Change: Coming so fast, so furious

A little less conversation, a little more action – Elvis Presley song

3 years ago – Paris COP21 – the world came together and devised a plan to tackle the global threat of Climate Change. This year, many of the same players came back together to implement the actions.

So we went from “planning the plan” to now “planning the action”.

This is a slow-motion response to a fast-moving threat.

This commentary is the second of a 4-part series – 2 of 4 – from the movement behind the Go Lean book in consideration of the 5 year anniversary of the book’s publication. The theme on these 4 submissions is “5 Years Later and what is the condition now“. The focus here is on the Agents of Change that the book identified: Globalization, Climate Change, Technology and the Aging Diaspora.

The first entry in this series asked the question: “Have the problems lessened, or have they intensified?

The answer is so emphatic! Climate Change has been all the rage in these 5 short years. The fast-and-furious threat is more than just academic; this is real-life and real-bad; especially for us in the Caribbean.

The other commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:

5 Years Later: New Post Office Eco-system – Globalization issues ‘loud and clear’ now.
5 Years Later: Climate Change – Coming so fast, so furious.
5 Years Later: Technology – Caribbean fully on board.
5 Years Later: Aging Diaspora – Finding Home … anywhere.

The Go Lean book was written 5 years ago as a 5 Year Plan to reform and transform the Caribbean region. Had the plan been adopted by the regional stakeholders, then the Agents of Change would have been better addressed. The plan, or roadmap, to introduce and implement the Caribbean Union Trade Federation is still rearing to start; and while we cannot single-handedly solve Climate Change, we can better prepare the region for the heavy-lifting involved. The book describes the community ethos to adopt plus the many strategies, tactics and implementation that need to be executed.

After the 2013 publication of the Go Lean book, many countries came together for COP21 (December 2015), also known as the Paris Accords. As alluded to above, this year’s follow-up, Katowice (Poland) 2018 had a few less participants for this “put speech into action” plan. See the news article about COP24 here:

News Title: Nations agree on rules for implementing Paris climate agreement
Sub-title: Nations dragged a deal over the line Saturday to implement the landmark 2015 Paris climate treaty after marathon UN talks that failed to match the ambition the world’s most vulnerable countries need to avert dangerous global warming.

Katowice, Poland – Delegates from nearly 200 states finalised a common rule book designed to deliver the Paris goals of limiting global temperature rises to well below two degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit).

“Putting together the Paris agreement work programme is a big responsibility,” said COP24 president Michal Kurtyka as he gavelled through the manual following the talks in Poland that ran deep into overtime.

“It has been a long road. We did our best to leave no-one behind.”

But environmental groups said the package agreed in the Polish mining city of Katowice lacked the bold ambition needed to protect states already dealing with devastating floods, droughts and extreme weather made worse by climate change.

“We continue to witness an irresponsible divide between the vulnerable island states and impoverished countries pitted against those who would block climate action or who are immorally failing to act fast enough,” executive director of Greenpeace Jennifer Morgan said.

The final decision text was repeatedly delayed as negotiators sought guidelines that are effective in warding off the worst threats posed by our heating planet while protecting the economies of rich and poor nations alike.

“Without a clear rulebook, we won’t see how countries are tracking, whether they are actually doing what they say they are doing,” Canada’s Environment Minister Catherine McKenna told AFP.

At their heart, negotiations were about how each nation funds action to mitigate and adapt to climate change, as well as how those actions are reported.

Developing nations wanted more clarity from richer ones over how the future climate fight will be funded and pushed for so-called “loss and damage” measures.

This would see richer countries giving money now to help deal with the effects of climate change many vulnerable states are already experiencing.

Another contentious issue was the integrity of carbon markets, looking ahead to the day when the patchwork of distinct exchanges — in China, the Europe Union, parts of the United States — may be joined up in a global system.

“To tap that potential, you have to get the rules right,” said Alex Hanafi, lead counsel for the Environmental Defense Fund in the United States.

“One of those key rules — which is the bedrock of carbon markets — is no double counting of emissions reductions.”

The Paris Agreement calls for setting up a mechanism to guard against practices that could undermine such a market, but finding a solution has proved so problematic that the debate has been kicked down the road to next year.

‘System needs to change’

One veteran observer told AFP Poland’s presidency at COP24 had left many countries out of the process and presented at-risk nations with a “take it or leave it” deal.

Progress had “been held up by Brazil, when it should have been held up by the small islands. It’s tragic.”

One of the largest disappointments for countries of all wealths and sizes was the lack of ambition to reduce emissions shown in the final COP24 text.

Most nations wanted the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to form a key part of future planning.

It highlighted the need for carbon pollution to be slashed to nearly half by 2030 in order to hit the 1.5C target.

But the US, Saudi Arabia, Russia and Kuwait objected, leading to watered-down wording.

The final statement from the Polish COP24 presidency welcomed “the timely conclusion” of the report and invited “parties to make use of it” — hardly the ringing endorsement many nations had called for.

“There’s been a shocking lack of response to the 1.5 report,” Morgan told AFP. “You can’t come together and say you can’t do more!”

With UN talks well into their third decade sputtering on as emissions rise remorselessly, activists have stepped up grassroots campaigns of civil disobedience to speed up action on climate.

“We are not a one-off protest, we are a rebellion,” a spokesman for the Extinction Rebellion movement, which disrupted at least one ministerial event at the COP, told AFP.

“We are organising for repeated disruption, and we are targeting our governments, calling for the system change needed to deal with the crisis that we are facing.”

Source: AFP – France24 News Service – Posted December 16, 2018; retrieved December 18, 2018 from: https://www.france24.com/en/20181215-cop24-poland-climate-summit-deal-paris-climate-agreement-negotiations-un-environment

—————-

VIDEO # 1 – Nations agree on rules for implementing Paris climate agreement – https://youtu.be/SBUZS3cl2X0

FRANCE 24 English
Published on Dec 17, 2018 – Nations dragged a deal over the line Saturday to implement the landmark 2015 Paris climate treaty after marathon UN talks that failed to match the ambition the world’s most vulnerable countries need to avert dangerous global warming.

Visit our website: http://www.france24.com

FRANCE 24 live news stream: all the latest news 24/7 http://f24.my/YTliveEN

Category: News & Politics

———————

VIDEO # 2 – UN climate talks: ‘A transition to a greener economy is possible’ – https://youtu.be/qqbQ1hyWc_Y

FRANCE 24 English
Uploaded on Dec 15, 2018

Subscribe to France 24 now: http://f24.my/youtubeEN

FRANCE 24 live news stream: all the latest news 24/7 http://f24.my/YTliveEN

Visit our website: http://www.france24.com

Category: News & Politics

One notable absentee from Katowice has been the United States of America. This is due to the sad fact that the “Leader of the Free World” – a moniker assigned to the US President – is a Climate Change denier. Donald Trump campaigned on his denial and has manifested his dismay with subsequent actions. His blatant disregard was previously detailed in a prior Go Lean commentary from June 1, 2017, as follows:

Its June 1st, the start of the Hurricane season. According to Weather Authorities, it is going to be a tumultuous season, maybe even more destructive than last year….

Thanks Climate Change.

What hope is there to abate the threats from Climate Change?

Thanks to the Paris Accord, there is now hope; (we remember the effectiveness of the accord to abate “Acid Rain”).

But wait! The American President – Donald Trump – announces that he is withdrawing the United States from the Paris Accord. WTH?!?!
…

The Caribbean status quo is unsustainable under the real threats of Climate Change. The region must reboot, reform and transform. We must do the heavy-lifting ourselves; we cannot expect relief and refuge from others, like the American Super-Power. We must find and “sail” under our own power. 🙂

The Caribbean is more on the frontlines of Climate Change distress than the US – think hurricanes. We do not have the luxury to deny, defer and dispute. We must “batten down the hatches” and prepare for the worst. (Many claim this is also the disposition of many American destinations, think California forest fires). So we must take the lead ourselves for our own relief!

The Caribbean frontlines have been depicted in many previous Go Lean blog-commentaries. Consider the sample – as follows – highlighting some of the many Climate Change-infused storms that have impacted our region and others over the short timeframe – 5 years – since the publication of the Go Lean book:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15996	Good Governance: Stepping Up in an Emergency October 2018 Trinidad heavy rains – not associated with a hurricane.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14925	‘Climate Change’ Reality!? Numbers Don’t Lie There is no longer any doubt, the Numbers don’t lie: the earth has had 400 straight warmer-than-average months.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13391	After Maria, Failed-State Indicators: Destruction and Defection Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico and other Caribbean islands. 1 year and a half later, recovery is still slow and frustrating. Islands like Dominica, are still struggling to recover; Ross University fled there to go to Barbados.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12996	After Irma, Failed-State Indicators: Destruction and Defection Hurricane Irma devastated Caribbean islands, like Saint Martin.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12977	After Irma, Barbuda Becomes a ‘Ghost Town’ Climate Change threats are real for the twin-island nation of Antigua and Barbuda. Barbuda is no more, after Hurricane Irma.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12924	Hurricane Categories – The Science Category 5 Hurricanes – Once rare; now normal and common.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12879	Disaster Preparation: ‘Rinse and Repeat’ Hurricane Harvey proved that even the advanced democracy of the USA is not ready.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12834	Hurricane Andrew – 25 Years of Hoopla Climate Change disasters are not new; 1992 storm was an eye-opener.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7896	The Logistics of Disaster Relief “Preparing for the worst” means being more efficient and technocratic.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7449	‘Crap Happens’ – So What Now? Hurricane Wilma brought chaos to this city’s economic engines in 2004.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6189	A Lesson in History – ‘Katrina’ is helping today’s crises There are many lessons learned from this 2005 American disaster.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4741	Vanuatu and Tuvalu – Inadequate response to human suffering Lessons learned from these small Pacific Islands climate failures.

So it has been 5 years since the publication of the Go Lean book. Climate Change was identified as an Agent of Change that the region was struggling with and losing. Since then, conditions have worsened. The book asserts that the entire region must unite in order to “hope for the best and prepare for the worst”. The “hope” is really a call to action, that the regional neighbors would confederate and join in to the global campaign of mitigating and abating Climate Change. This aligns with the first pronouncement (Page 11) of the opening Declaration of Interdependence:

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

The Go Lean book – a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) – presents a 370-page roadmap for re-booting the economic, security and governmental institutions of the 30 member-states in the Caribbean region, especially in light of the realities of Climate Change. While this is a global battle, we, the Caribbean member-states, are on the frontlines, so we must be doubly prepared for the surety of destruction from this threat. We must do our share and “Go Green” to arrest our own carbon footprint. We must not be hypocritical as we call on the Big Polluting nations to reform – we must reform ourselves, so as to have moral authority.

As detailed in a previous blog-commentary, the dire effects of Climate Change may be irreversible after the next 12 years, if we do not work to abate this disaster. So we must fight!

This is an inconvenient truth: We must fight like our lives depend on it. A product of these COP24 Katowice Accords, is now definitive plans and rules for implementing abatements around the world; carbon footprints must be reduced … globally, now!

A change has now come to the Caribbean region. This is Climate Change and it is not a good thing. Now is the time for a permanent union to provide efficient stewardship for our economic, security and governing engines. All regional stakeholders – the people and governing institutions – are hereby urged to lean-in to the empowerments described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. Yes, we can … make our region, these islands and coastal states, better places to live, work and play.

There is the successful track record of abating environment pollution: remember Acid Rain in the 1990’s. So despite the doom and gloom, mitigation and abatement of Climate Change is conceivable, believable and achievable. 🙂

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

Download the free e-book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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‘Missing Solar’ – Go Green … finally – Encore

Posted on March 3, 2020 in Implementation, Industries, Strategy, Tactical

The sun-drenched tropical Bahamas has inadequate infrastructure to provide electricity efficiently and effectively. Then when storms come – they are in Hurricane Alley – the delivery challenges become even more overwhelming.

This is a familiar assertion for the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. On May 15, 2014, this commentary proclaimed to the region that it was time to ‘Go Green’. That previous blog made an economic appeal, as opposed to environmental. Needless to say, the Bahamas did not heed that sage advice. Well, they are listening now. This week, the US-based media-television-network CBS reported, in their titular news magazine show 60 Minutes, on the progress that this island-nation is making to deploy solar-panels-based Micro-Grids.

Better late than never …

Had these systems been in place since 2014, the restoration after 2019’s Category 5 Hurricane Dorian would have been less painful. See the VIDEO here of the 60 Minutes report:

VIDEO – Bahamas installing solar power after storms – https://www.cbsnews.com/video/bahamas-hurricanes-power-grid-solar-60-minutes-2020-03-01/

60 Minutes
Posted March 1, 2020 – A tiny country in “Hurricane Alley” is trying to be an example to the world after Category 5 storms demolished parts of its electrical grid. Bill Whitaker reports on the Bahamas’ adoption of solar energy.
Click on PLAY Button to watch; expect commercial advertising before and during.

Is it too little too late now? Let’s hope not.

There is one more Big Issue that the Bahamas Government will have to deal with, as reported in the VIDEO:

The Bahamian Government pays $400 million dollars on diesel fuel to keep its power plants operating and they pass that cost on to the consumers.

The Finance-Treasury-Revenue departments in this country will have to prepare for new revenue streams beyond Fuel Surcharges. But alas, since 2014, this country has implemented Value-Add Tax regime. So it is easier to tweak the revenue streams.

So … go on Bahamas, install your Solar Micro-Grids … at government establishments, commercial enterprises and even residential homes. Yes, we can.

This is an appropriate time to Encore that previous blog-commentary from May 15, 2014 – 6 years ago; (better late than never). Now that this is March 2020, there is the opportunity to “look back” at the Bahamas in the wake of the issues raised by the 60 Minutes story: the Go Green movement is not so new; this common-sense best-practice was not so common in the Bahamas specifically or the Caribbean as a whole. Now, we must not miss our chance to reform and transform.

This entry is 2-of-3 in that “Look Back“. The other entries are cataloged as follows:

60 Minutes Story – Bahamas Self-Made Energy Crisis
60 Minutes Story – Go Green … finally
60 Minutes Story – Moral Authority to “Name, Blame & Shame” the Big Polluters

See the the May 2014 Encore here-now:

———————

Go Lean Commentary – Go Green … Caribbean

Go ‘Green’ …

Get it? A simple play on words; Green instead of Lean. The word Green is more than just a color; it is a concept, a commitment and a cause. This is the same with ‘Lean’; for the purpose of this effort, ‘lean’ is more than just a description, it’s a noun, a verb, an adjective and an adverb. It is also a concept, commitment and cause in which the entire Caribbean region is urged to embrace; or better stated: “lean in”.

What is the motivation behind the ‘Green’ movement? Love for the Planet; many proponents feel that man’s industrial footprint has damaged the planet and the atmosphere, causing climate change, due to the abundance of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Early in the book, Go Lean…Caribbean, the pressing need to be aware of climate change is pronounced in the Declaration of Interdependence (Page 11), with these words, (the first of many “causes of complaints”):

Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

Stop yawning!

For many, an advocacy to save the planet is a bore. But if we are not mindful of these issues we could face serious consequences.

Now a new motivation has emerged: saving money. Since energy costs has skyrocketed beyond the rate of inflation, adapting to more clean/green energy options has proven to be more cost effective.

Power generation from the sun or wind (free & renewable sources) is far cheaper than generation based on fossil fuels. (Even the fossil fuel of natural gas is cheaper than oil or coal).

The motivation behind the Caribbean “Lean” movement is also love, love of the homeland. This point is detailed in the book Go Lean… Caribbean, a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). This Go Lean roadmap has 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy.
Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The following two news stories relate to this effort to optimize “green” energy options in the region:

1. Op-Ed Title: Green Energy Solutions Could Save the Caribbean $200 Million

By: Jun Zhang, Op-Ed Contributor
(04/11/2014) HIGH ENERGY costs are the Achilles heel of the Caribbean.
More than 97 percent of this region’s electricity is generated from fossil fuels and many islands devote a hefty portion of their GDP to fuel imports.

On some Caribbean islands, electricity bills can soar up to six times higher than in the United States, which creates a burden for many local businesses. At the same time, these islands are vulnerable to the environmental impacts associated with fossil-fuels, including air pollution, rising sea levels, and coral bleaching.

Reducing the reliance on fossil fuels and supporting cleaner, more efficient energy production is critical to helping island economies grow sustainably. But many companies face hurdles in accessing credit to invest in clean energy.

That’s where the banking sector can play an important role.

The International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank Group and the largest global development institution focused exclusively on the private sector, is developing a regional programme to help local financial institutions provide the credit needed for companies to adopt more energy efficient practices and utilize cleaner energy sources.

This in turn can help reduce costs – and environmental footprints -for Caribbean hotels and other businesses.

At a recent seminar in Kingston, IFC presented a market analysis of sustainable energy finance opportunities in Barbados, Belize, Jamaica, Grenada, and St. Lucia.

It found that energy demands in the Caribbean are expected to double by 2027. Continued dependence on fossil fuels is likely to exacerbate pollution and other environmental impacts, while diverting significant resources from these economies. But there are upsides as well.

According to the analysis, incorporating energy efficiency measures across these five countries over the next few years could save approximately US$200 million. For example, solar water heaters offer a ready solution to water heating in the Caribbean. Barbados has already installed more than 50,000 solar water heaters, saving the country some US$6.5 million a year on oil imports.

Caribbean countries could also benefit from water efficiency measures. Right now, anywhere from 25 to 65 percent of clean water is lost in inefficient water distribution systems, which also results in lost energy due to unnecessary pumping.

Some entrepreneurs say the tide is beginning to turn, but the financial sector needs to catch up.

“Businesses are already starting to shift to more energy efficient technologies,” said Andre Escalante, founder of Energy Dynamics, a Trinidad based company that helps hotels and other businesses adopt new energy-saving technologies. “However, financial institutions in the region are still reluctant to provide credits to implement new technologies that they may not be familiar with.”

IFC intends to close this knowledge gap by advising local financial institutions to help them meet the financing needs of sustainable energy projects. IFC also plans to work with energy service companies and equipment vendors to help them understand how to best structure projects for financing.

In the Dominican Republic, IFC helped Banco BHD become the first financial institution in the country to offer a credit line to finance sustainable energy projects. Over two years, BHD provided US$24 million in financing for projects that are bringing more cost-efficient energy solutions to the Dominican Republic, from natural gas conversion to solar energy.

“We’ve seen first-hand how sustainability adds value, be it by helping hotels cut their energy costs or by financing solar energy solutions for businesses,” said Steven Puig, General Manager of Banco BHD. “In fact, BHD intends to implement energy efficiency measures and install solar panels on each of its 43 stand-alone bank branches. So far, with IFC’s support, four offices have done this, which resulted in US$43,000 in savings each year as well as reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.”

Sustainability presents challenges for businesses, but also wide-ranging, evolving opportunities — especially as the cost of renewable energy technologies goes down. The private sector is well suited to innovate and leverage new technologies to turn challenges into opportunities.

(Jun Zhang is IFC’s Senior Manager for the Caribbean. IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is the largest global development institution focused exclusively on the private sector).

————

2. Title: Solar Car-Charging Station Opens in Grand Cayman

By: Alexander Britell
(05/05/2014) It may be the Caribbean’s most abundant resource, but in a region where energy costs are oppressive, solar energy isn’t used nearly enough.

That’s starting to change, though, and it got a significant boost last week with the opening of the Caribbean’s first-ever solar-powered car charging station.

The station is viewed to be one of the first standalone, public solar car-charging stations in the Caribbean, a place for electric-powered cars to come and top off their energy supplies.

“We started about a year ago and now it’s finally up and operational,” said John Felder, CEO of Cayman Automotive, which partnered with Philadelphia-based U-Go Stations on the project. “I don’t know of any solar panel charge stations for electric cars.”

While the stations won’t be used for complete charges, an hour spent charging at the station will provide about 20 percent of an electric car’s power supply.

Felder, who is the leading distributor of electric cars in the Caribbean, said the region’s electric car movement was already expanding.

“I’m now in the Bahamas, in Jamaica, in Bermuda,” he said. “The Aruban government called me last week and they want me to move to start doing electric cars there.”

Indeed, Aruba has been at the forefront of the regional green energy movement, with plans to have 100 percent renewable energy by the year 2020.

Barbados opened its first solar car-charging station in 2013 at the Wildey Business Park.

The new Cayman station, which is located at Governors Square, is one of six electric charging stations on the island.

“I can see in the next 10 years that 30 to 40 percent of the cars on the roads will be electric vehicles,” Felder said.

Something that could help that measure regional is the lowering of import duties on 100 percent electric cars, Felder said.

Cayman’s government lowered its duty from 42 percent to 10 percent, which is now the third-lowest in the region, although many islands lag behind in that regard.

“The government is promoting [electric] and that’s why they reduced the duty to 10 percent,” he said.

The electric movement on Cayman got an similarly big boost earlier this year when Grand Cayman’s Budget Rent-a-Car announced plans to offer 100 percent EV vehicles on the island.

Caribbean Journal News Source (Articles retrieved 05/14/2014) a. http://www.caribjournal.com/2014/04/11/op-ed-green-energy-solutions-could-save-the-caribbean-200-million/ b. http://www.caribjournal.com/2014/05/05/solar-car-charging-station-opens-in-grand-cayman/

Photo Credits:
a. Jennifer Hicks, Forbes.com Technology Contributor: Field with six 850 kW turbines in Cuba’s Holguín Province
b. Cayman Automotive: The first ever public, commercial solar car charging station in Grand Cayman

This Go Lean/CU roadmap recognizes that modern life has expanded the definition of basic needs to now include food, clothing, shelter and energy. And thusly the book proposes many solutions for the region to optimize energy …

generation
distribution
consumption

No “stone is left unturned”. Go Lean posits that the average costs of energy can be decreased from an average of US$0.35/kWh to US$0.088/kWh in the course of the 5-year term of this roadmap; (Page 100). A 75% savings is not a yawn, this should keep you alert!

The two foregoing articles relate to new ‘green’ power generation initiatives in different Caribbean member-states.

These initiatives took some effort on the part of the community and governmental institutions. We commend and applaud their success and executions thus far. But there is more heavy-lifting to do. Help is on the way! The Go Lean roadmap details a series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster the progress in the wide fields of energy generation, distribution and consumption. The following list applies:

Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Regional Taxi Commissions	Page 25
Community Ethos – Non-Government Organizations	Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Negotiations	Page 32
Anecdote – Pipeline Transport – Strategies, Tactics & Implementations	Page 43
Strategy – Harness the power of the sun/winds	Page 46
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 82
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Energy Commission	Page 82
Anecdote – “Lean” in Government – Energy Permits	Page 93
Anecdote – Caribbean Energy Grid Implementation	Page 100
Implementation – Ways to Develop Pipeline Industry	Page 107
Implementation – Ways to Improve Energy Usage	Page 113
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Public Works	Page 175
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Monopolies	Page 202

Energy needs are undeniable. The world is struggling with this issue.

Fulfilling those needs is easier said than done; and thus a great opportunity for the lean, agile operations envisioned for the CU technocracy. “It’s good to be green!”

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people, business, institutions and governments, to lean-in for the optimizations and opportunities described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean.

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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‘Missing Solar’ – Inadequacies Exposed to the World – Encore

Posted on March 2, 2020 in Economics, Ethos, Government, Locations, Tactical

The Bahamas has inadequate infrastructure to contend with the realities of modern life. This is all too familiar to the people in the Bahamas.

This is also familiar to the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. On August 15, 2019, this commentary scolded the stakeholders in the Bahamas for their inexcusable inefficiency and ineffectiveness with their infrastructure and Public Works. Now last night, the US-based media-television-network company CBS exposed these inadequacies for all the world to see in their titular news magazine show 60 Minutes.

Eat Crow Bahamas!

What’s more, the actuality of Hurricane Dorian came along and made the bad Bahamas energy delivery even worse. See the VIDEO here of the 60 Minutes report:

VIDEO – Bahamas installing solar power after storms – https://www.cbsnews.com/video/bahamas-hurricanes-power-grid-solar-60-minutes-2020-03-01/

60 Minutes
Posted March 1, 2020 – A tiny country in “Hurricane Alley” is trying to be an example to the world after Category 5 storms demolished parts of its electrical grid. Bill Whitaker reports on the Bahamas’ adoption of solar energy.
Click on PLAY Button to watch; expect commercial advertising before and during.

That report revealed that:

The Bahamian Government pays $400 million dollars on diesel fuel to keep its power plants operating and pass that cost on to the consumers.
“They pay 3 to 4 times the rate that people pay in the mainland US”.

In addition, in another Go Lean commentary, it was reported that the World Bank revealed that 61 percent of college-educated citizens of the Bahamas have fled this homeland for foreign destinations. Is there any surprise? This failure to deliver basic services in an efficient and effective manner is a contributing Push factor why people leave.

There is no mystery! Now the Bahamas is trying to “play catch-up” and deploy Solar Micro-Grids. Yippee!!

This is an appropriate time to Encore that previous blog-commentary from August 15, 2019 – during the ‘Dog Days of Summer‘; (remember this was 2 weeks before Category 5 Hurricane Dorian made landfall). Now that this is March 2020, there is the opportunity to look back with 20/20 Perfect Hindsight Vision at the issues raised by the 60 Minutes story – there are many. This entry is 1-of-3 in that “Look Back“. The other entries are cataloged as follows:

60 Minutes Story – Bahamas Self-Made Energy Crisis
60 Minutes Story – Go Green … finally
60 Minutes Story – Moral Authority to “Name, Blame & Shame” the Big Polluters

See the first Encore here-now:

———————

Go Lean Commentary – Nassau’s 2019 Self-Made Energy Crisis

It is seriously Hot-Hot-Hot out there …

So there is no intent here to be “cold and callous” … (callous = ‘feeling no emotion’).

But the Bahamas’s capital city – Nassau – is having an energy crisis right now:

The local power generation utility (Bahamas Power & Light or BPL) is not producing enough electricity to meet the needs of the community, so they have to load-share and force black-outs/brown-outs around the island to try and facilitate some delivery some time to all their customer base. They do not want to show favoritism to one group over another, so they are leveraging the load-sharing tactic on everybody. So now instead of some people being happy and some being angry, they have obtained universality …

… everybody is angry!

———-

VIDEO – B.P.L. Load Shedding Update – https://youtu.be/fW8JGGnlvzQ

ZNSNetwork
Published on May 15, 2019

Category: People & Blogs

Additionally, see this portrayal in this news article here (and the Appendix VIDEO below):

Title: BPL causing ‘chaos’
By: Jasper Ward, The Nassau Guardian Staff Reporter

Super Value food stores are taking a significant hit as a result of protracted power cuts, according to its owner Rupert Roberts.

Roberts said about six Super Value locations are impacted by outages daily and the company has spent around $100,000 recently on replacing equipment damaged by the outages.

He described the outages as “a nuisance” and said they create “chaos”.

“This BEC (Bahamas Electricity Corporation) crisis is more than a crisis, it’s chaos,” Roberts said at the Nassau Street store.

“It’s costing us $250,000 a year from burning up our equipment.”

He said, “I suppose our biggest concern is burning up equipment.

“…[We] burn up a $10,000 or $20,000 air conditioning [unit and] we’re always burning up compressors. We’re using up spares so fast and we’re doing emergency imports.

“Fortunately, we’re able to get them in within three or four days without flying them in. But I noticed on Saturday we had a diary case down because we’re waiting on the compressor that burned out. That’s the biggest problem.”

Roberts said it will cost about $10,000 to replace a compressor in the dairy case at the Nassau Street location. He said it is unlikely that case will be operational before Saturday.

Roberts said dairy sales were up 14 percent before the case was damaged.

Since it was damaged, sales have gone down 17 percent, he said.

Roberts said the company has twice the amount of equipment needed “because of the serious problem” of the outages.

Although the food store chain is facing challenges with the outages, Roberts said the company is “managing quite well”.

“We’ve been in this business over 50 years and we’ve had power problems for the last 50 years,” he said.

“So, we learned how to cope. We don’t run out of fuel. Years ago, when I first started in the industry, we had generators because of hurricanes but for the past 25 years we’ve had to have generators because of power outages.”

For nearly two months, communities on New Providence have experienced hours-long blackouts as part of Bahamas Power and Light’s (BPL) load shedding exercise.

Over the last few weeks, BPL has conducted nearly four-hour-long load shedding.

On Sunday, BPL Chief Executive Officer Whitney Heastie said he could not guarantee an end to load shedding exercises in the immediate future, describing BPL as being “on a cliff”.

Heastie said BPL needs 250 megawatts of generation in order to meet the summer demand.

However, it is currently running on 210 megawatts, including 105 megawatts of rental generation.

Heastie said the 40-megawatt shortfall has led to load shedding across New Providence.

Source: Posted by The Nassau Guardian daily newspaper on August 13, 2019; retrieved August 14, 2019 from: https://thenassauguardian.com/2019/08/13/bpl-causing-chaos/

The need to explain that our statement is not “cold and callous” is due to the fact that the appearance is that “we” are ‘kicking the people when they are down’ when we make this assertion:

This energy crisis for Nassau is Self-Made!!

Wait, what?!

This is a matter of infrastructure and Nassau has had an inadequate infrastructure for a while. In fact, since the 1970’s residents on this island of New Providence (NP) have been encouraged to buy bottled-water and not consume the ‘tap’ water.

All of this is evident of the lacking municipal infrastructure. In fact, this is reminiscent of the US City of Flint, Michigan. Their infrastructure has become defective and the people there has to resort to bottled water. In Flint, that problem has now persisted for 4 years. In Nassau, it has been 40 years. (See an excerpt of our 2016 blog-commentary on the Flint crisis in the Appendix below).

Yep, self-made!

This is a BIGGER issue than water or electricity; this is an issue of the Social Contract.

The 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean (Page 170) defines the Social Contract as the informal arrangement where citizens surrender some of their freedoms and submit to the authority of the State in exchange for protection of remaining natural and legal rights. This is why the State, in this case, the Commonwealth of the Bahamas, is allowed to operate monopolies for the water and power utilities. But any failures in these Social Contract deliveries causes repercussions and consequences. For example people leave and abandon their homeland. This relevance was detailed in a previous Go Lean commentary from July 28, 2015:

The issue of Caribbean citizens abandoning their homelands is one of the more dire threats to societal life in the region. Why do they do it?

“Push and Pull” reasons!

Push
Conditions at home drive Caribbean citizens to take flight and find refuge elsewhere. Many times these conditions are economic (jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities), security and governance related, but there are other reasons too; consider discriminations due to ethnic diversity or other lifestyle choices.

Lastly, there is the new threat of Climate Change. While this is a threat for the whole world, the Caribbean is on the frontline. Though there is some debate as to the causes of climate change, there is no question as to its outcome: temperatures are rising, droughts prevail, and most devastating, hurricanes are now more threatening. A Caribbean elevation plan must address the causes of climate change and most assuredly its consequences. …

Now, the anecdotal experience is that there is a need to mitigate excessive heat in the region for an even longer season. How do we mitigate excessive heat?

Air conditioning!

But this cure may at times be worse than the disease.

Air conditioning requires even greater energy consumption, (the Caribbean has among the highest energy costs in the Western Hemisphere); the Go Lean book posits that the average costs of energy can be decreased from an average of US$0.35/kWh to US$0.088/kWh in the course of the 5-year term of this roadmap; (Page 100).

In addition, the release of Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC’s) in the air-conditioning process is a contributor of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

The status quo needs remediation!

The Bahamas should have remediated these infrastructural problems years ago – the price is too high to allow it to linger. In addition to the societal abandonment threat; there are life-and-death issues associated with convalescing citizens needing continuous power supply – see photo here:

That’s the problem, now what is the solution?

In addition to the voluminous number of blog-commentaries on infrastructure – see this recent submission from July 26, 2019 – the Go Lean book presented strategies, tactics and implementations that must be pursued, not just for the Bahamas, but for the whole Caribbean region – all 30 member-states. In fact, the book presents one advocacy (Page 176) specifically focused on Public Works, entitled: “10 Ways to Impact Public Works“. These “10 Ways” include the following highlights, headlines and excerpts:

1	Lean-in for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The CU is chartered to unify the Caribbean region into one Single Market of 42 million people across 30 member-states, thereby re-engineering the economic engines in and on behalf of the region, including a currency & monetary union. This new eco-system allows for the design, funding and construction of Public Works and Infrastructural projects. The federal agency within the CU’s Department of the Interior has the scope for the Caribbean much like the Corps of Engineers has for the US. (Plus the CU will collaborate with the US Corps for projects related to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands). There are a number of inter-state projects that must be coordinated on the federal level. There will also be projects that are “Too Big for One State” that will be facilitated by the CU. In addition, all CU efforts must comply with the Art in Public Places mandate, so sculptures and statutes will be embedded in projects or the project itself can be a work of art (bridges, water towers, building architecture). For existing projects that fail due to financial shortfalls, the CU will accommodate dissolution or reorganization in the federal courts, bringing balance to the process to all stakeholders.
2	Union Atlantic Turnpike
3	Pipelines and PCP (Pneumatic Capsule Pipeline)
4	Regional Power Grid The CU will facilitate the installation of a regional power grid, and power sharing between member-states, with underwater and above-ground high-intensity wiring to alternate energy plants: wind/tidal turbines, solar panel & natural gas.
5	Self-Governing Entities (SGE)
6	Enterprise Zones
7	Empowerment Zones
8	Monopolies The UN grants the CU the monopoly rights for an Exclusive Economic Zone, so the focus must be on quality delivery. The CU plan is to liberalize management of monopolies, with tools like ratings/rankings against best practices. Plus technological accommodations for ICT allows for cross-competition from different modes (satellite, cable, phone).
9	Cooperatives The CU will task utility cooperatives with the delivery of some public utilities such as Air Chillers; Refrigerated Warehouses to its members. This strategy shares the cost of the “Works” installation across the full co-op membership.
10	Capital Markets A single market and currency union will allow for the emergence of viable capital markets for stocks and bonds (public and private), thereby creating the economic engine to fuel growth and development. This forges financial products for “pre” disaster project funding (drainage, levies, dykes, sea walls) and post disaster recovery (reinsurance sidecars).

The Go Lean book doubles-down on the concept of leveraging across a larger population base so that BIGGER infrastructure projects can be facilitated in the region – on land or in the waters – see Photo here. Imagine large arrays of solar panels, wind turbines, tidal generators, geo-thermal energy captured at the volcanic hot zones, and even Natural Gas as a cleaner-cheaper fossil fuel. These energy options are realistic and should be available to us now in the Caribbean, so they should be explored and deployed. This, a regional power grid, is the energy prime directive for this Go Lean movement.

This theme – exploiting alternative options for the economic, security and governing empowerments in the region – aligns with many previous Go Lean commentaries; see a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17925	‘We’ have repeatedly failed the lessons from ‘Infrastructure 101’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17280	Way Forward – For Energy: ‘Trade’ Winds
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13985	EU Assists Barbados in Renewable Energy Self-Sufficiency
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12994	The Science of ‘Power Restoration’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12466	12 Caribbean Member-states have ‘Volcanic Energy’ to Exploit
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10367	The Science of Sustenance – Green Batteries
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5155	Green Energy Solution: Tesla unveils super-battery to power homes
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4897	US Backs LNG Distribution for Caribbean Energy Solutions
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=915	Go ‘Green’ … Caribbean

Make no mistake, energy is a basic need!

The failure for a community to have continuous supply of energy is an energy crisis. (This means you Bahamas).

Enough already!

Now is the time for all Caribbean stakeholders to prepare for the empowerments of Green-Energy solutions. It is past-time for a regional power grid:

generation – Green options (solar, wind turbines, tidal, geo-thermal and natural gas)
distribution – Underwater cables to connect individual islands
consumption – efficient battery back-ups for home deployments.

These changes are coming … one way or another.

For you government revenue institutions who may be overly dependent of fuel taxes and surcharges – you are hereby put on notice:

Changes are afoot. We will succeed; we will make our Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work and play.

🙂

About the Book

The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

——————–

Appendix VIDEO – Another B.P.L. Blackout – https://youtu.be/fOT0gfvSchM

ZNSNetwork
Published on Jul 2, 2019

Category: People & Blogs

——————–

Appendix – Excerpts from previous Commentary: Flint, Michigan – A Cautionary Tale – January 19, 2016

[The City of] Flint serves as a “cautionary tale” for other communities near “Failed City/Failed State” status. From this perspective, this community may be a valuable asset to the rest of the world and especially to the Caribbean.

The publishers of the book Go Lean…Caribbean are here in Detroit to “observe and report” the turn-around and rebirth of the once-great-but-now-distressed City of Detroit and its metropolitan areas, including Flint. (Previous commentaries featured the positive role model of the City of Ann Arbor).

What happened here?

According to the Timeline in the Appendix, Flint, MI suffered this fate as a chain reaction to its Failed-State status. Outside stakeholders – Emergency Managers – came into the equation to execute a recovery plan with focus only on the Bottom-Line. The consideration for people – the Greater Good – came second, if at all. They switched water sources, unwisely!

The assertion of the Go Lean book is that the Caribbean region can benefit from lessons learned from Good, Bad and Ugly governance. The book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The Go Lean book and related commentaries call on citizens of the Caribbean member-states to lean-in to the empowerments described in the roadmap for elevation. This will require a constant vigil to ensure the Greater Good as opposed to personal gains.

…

See VIDEO here of the story in the national media …

VIDEO – Citizens’ Anger Continues Over Toxic Water in Flint, Michigan – http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/citizens-anger-continues-toxic-water-flint-michigan-36348795 –

…

This tragic story – cautionary tale of Flint – is an analysis of failure in the societal engines of economics, security and governance. These 3 facets are presented in the book Go Lean … Caribbean as the three-fold cord for societal harmony; for any society anywhere. The Caribbean wants societal harmony; we must therefore work to optimize all these three engines. As exhibited by Flint, this is easier said than done. This heavy-lifting is described in the book as both an art and a science.

The focus in this commentary is a continuation in the study of the societal engine of governance; previously, there was a series on economics and one on security. This commentary though, focuses on the bad eventually of Social Contract failures. The Social Contract refers to the unspoken expectations between citizens and the State. In many cases, State laws limit ownership of all mineral rights to the State; so citizens will be dependent on State systems to supply water. In the case of Flint, the City’s Water and Sewage Department has a monopoly; this supply is the only option for residents!

The Go Lean book describes “bad actors” wreaking havoc on the peace and security of the community. The book relates though that “bad actors” are not always human; they include bad events like natural disasters and industrial spills. Plus, actual “bad actors” may have started out with altruistic motives, good intentions. This is why the book and accompanying blogs design the organization structures for the new Caribbean with checks-and-balances, mandating a collaborative process, because sometimes even a well-intentioned individual may not have all the insight, hindsight and foresight necessary to pursue the Greater Good. This the defect of the Michigan Emergency Manager structure; it assigns too much power to just one person, bypassing the benefits of a collaborative process. This is one reason why this review is important: power corrupts…everyone … everywhere.

…

We must do better, than Flint! (Flint must do better; too many lives are involved).

We know that “bad actors and bad incidences” will always occur, even in government institutions, so we must be “on guard” against abusive influences and encroachments to Failed-State status. The Go Lean roadmap calls for engagement and participation from everyone, the people (citizens), institutions and government officials alike. We encouraged all with benevolent motives to lean-in to this roadmap, to get involved to effect a turnaround for the Caribbean Failed-States.

Our Caribbean stakeholders deserve the best … from their leaders. 🙂

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After Dorian, The Science of Power Restoration – Encore

Posted on September 8, 2019 in Government, Implementation, Industries

The Caribbean is in crisis now; our region has just been devastated by Hurricane _______; it has wreaked catastrophic havoc in certain destinations: __________.

The foregoing was an exact sentence composed in September 17, 2017 in a previous blog-commentary. We are able to repeat this phrase again and again and fill in the blanks with the name of the storm and locations. This is the reality of Caribbean tropical life, while arguably the greatest address in the world, the ever-present threat of hurricanes is our annual reality.

So the version of the foregoing sentence for September 2019 is as follows:

The Bahamas is in crisis now; our region has just been devastated by Hurricane Dorian; it has wreaked catastrophic havoc in certain destinations: the Bahama islands of Great Abaco and Grand Bahama.

The current situation on the ground is miserable. As always, there is an urgent need for infrastructure to be restored:

Power
Water
Telephone
Transportation

The recovery from this storm, as always, starts with the restoration of electrical power. There is an Art and a Science to this functionality. Let’s focus on the science; see the Encore of that previous blog-commentary

The science is the same since Hurricane Irma 2 years ago. See the Encore here-now:

—————

Go Lean Commentary – After Irma, The Science of Power Restoration

The problem with hurricanes – and there are many – is that it takes a long time for the storm preparation and response (relief, recovery and rebuilding). On average, the storm’s preparation takes 3 days; this includes provisioning, installing protective shutters, hoarding water and gasoline. The response on the other hand can take days, weeks, months and dread-to-say, years.

The most uncomfortable part of the storm response is undeniable waiting for electrical power to be restored.

In general, the good-bad-ugly scale of memories of previous storms tend to be tied to the length of time it took for power to be restored. The peak of the hurricane season is the very hot months of August/September; there is the need for air-conditioning.

The Caribbean is in crisis now; our region has just been devastated by Hurricane Irma; it has wreaked catastrophic havoc in certain destinations: Barbuda, Saint Barthélemy, Saint Martin, Anguilla, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Florida. Consider the encyclopedic details in Appendix A below and these questions:

How long did/will it take for power to be restored now after Hurricane Irma?
How can we reform and transform our Caribbean communities to ensure the efficiency of ‘Power Restoration’?

There is an art and science to the subject of ‘Power Restoration’; actually mostly science. The ‘art’ applies to the efficient deliveries of the management of the restoration process. The science considerations are extensive, starting with the entire eco-system of energy deliveries. As related in a previous blog-commentary …

… no one doubts that the inventory of basic needs include “food, clothing and shelter”. But modernity has forced us to add another entry: “energy”. In fact, the availability and affordability of energy can impact the deliveries of these order basic needs.

… In our region, energy costs are among the highest in the world. The book Go Lean… Caribbean relates (Page 100) how the Caribbean has among the most expensive energy costs in the world, despite having abundant alternative energy natural resources (solar, wind, tidal, geo-thermal). The Caribbean eco-system focuses on imported petroleum to provide energy options and as a result retail electricity rates in the Caribbean average US$0.35/kWh, when instead it could be down to US$0.088/kWh. …

With such a 75% savings … there is definitely the need to adapt some of the scientific best practices for energy generation and consumption. In a previous blog-commentary, it was confessed that one of the reasons why people flee the Caribbean region, is the discomforts during the summer months … hot weather, and the lack of infrastructure to mitigate and remediate the discomfort, is identified as one of the reasons for the brain drain/societal abandonment.

One motivation of the movement behind the book Go Lean… Caribbean – available to download for free – is to facilitate a turn-around of economic, security and governing engines of the Caribbean region to do better with power generation, distribution and consumption. The Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). This Go Lean roadmap has 3 prime directives:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

This commentary continues the 4-part series – this is 3 of 4 – on the Aftermath of Hurricane Irma. There are a lot of mitigation and remediation efforts that can be done to lessen the impact of this and future storms. There are lessons that we must consider; there are reforms we must make; there are problems we must solve. The full list of the 4 entries of this series are detailed as follows:

Aftermath of Hurricane Irma – America Should Scrap the ‘Jones Act’
Aftermath of Hurricane Irma – Barbuda Becomes a ‘Ghost Town’
Aftermath of Hurricane Irma – The Science of Power Restoration
Aftermath of Hurricane Irma – Failed State Indicators: Destruction and Defection

Despite the manifested threats of Climate Change-fueled hurricanes, we want to make the Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work and play. This is going to take some heavy-lifting to accomplish, but we can be successful. Yes, we can. This quest is detailed early on in the Go Lean book’s Declaration of Interdependence, as follows (Page 11 – 13):

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xix. Whereas our legacy in recent times is one of societal abandonment, it is imperative that incentives and encouragement be put in place to first dissuade the human flight, and then entice and welcome the return of our Diaspora back to our shores. This repatriation should be effected with the appropriate guards so as not to imperil the lives and securities of the repatriated citizens or the communities they inhabit. The right of repatriation is to be extended to any natural born citizens despite any previous naturalization to foreign sovereignties.

The Go Lean book asserts that Caribbean stakeholders must find a Way Forward; they must institute better systems, processes and utilities to deliver electrical power (energy) despite the reality of hurricanes. Though power will go off – electricity and water is a bad combination – ‘Power Restoration’ must be a priority. Therefore Caribbean communities must adopt different community ethos, plus execute key – and different – strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to reform and transform.

This Way Forward must therefore fulfill these 2 requirements:

Flood Management and Control

According to a previous blog-commentary: “there is a thesis that flooding could be prevented. Yes, indeed! This is the experience and historicity of the Dutch people, the European country of the Netherlands or Holland.”
Even in the low-lying American city of New Orleans, Louisiana there is the practice of pumping out excess water to mitigate and remediate flooding; see this depicted in the VIDEO in Appendix B below.
Implementation of a Caribbean Regional Power Grid

Power distribution is important for any mitigation-remediation plan. The problem with hurricane toppling trees and power lines is unavoidable – it is what it is – a better solution is to deliver electricity underground or underwater, as illustrated in the above photo. The Go Lean roadmap calls for an extensive smart Power Grid and a region-wide Utility Cooperative. This would allow for alternate power generation and electrical distribution. See sample of an underground/underwater “Power Cable” product depicted in the VIDEO in Appendix C below.

Many other communities have done a good job of optimizing their electrical utility grid. They execute strategies, tactics and implementations to mitigate the risk of power outages; then remediate any crises with technocratic deliveries to facilitate ‘Power Restoration’.

There will be heavy-lifting for our Caribbean region to have this disposition. The Go Lean roadmap details that heavy-lift, describing the community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to foster progress for Caribbean energy distribution, our own Regional Power Grid. The following list of entries in the Go Lean book highlights this theme:

Community Ethos – Lean Operations	Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments	Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives	Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future	Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Negotiations	Page 32
Anecdote – Pipeline Transport – Strategies, Tactics & Implementations	Page 43
Strategy – Harness the power of the sun/winds	Page 46
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy	Page 82
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Energy Commission	Page 82
Anecdote – “Lean” in Government – Energy Permits	Page 93
Implementation – Regional Grid as Economies-of-Scale benefit	Page 97
Anecdote – Caribbean Energy Grid Implementation	Page 100
Implementation – Start-up Benefits from the EEZ	Page 104
Implementation – Ways to Develop Pipeline Industry	Page 107
Implementation – Ways to Improve Energy Usage	Page 113
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Public Works	Page 175
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives	Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Monopolies	Page 202
Appendix – Underwater High Intensity Power Lines	Page 282

The experience of enduring hurricanes is never pleasant. As such, we do not invite people to fly down from northern locations to pass storms with us. In fact, when there is a Hurricane Watch, the practice is to evacuate tourists and visitors. We evacuate our high-risk residents as well; (kidney dialysis patients, senior citizens, anyone that cannot endure the loss of electronic-based health instruments). This is a best-practice.

Why do we only evacuate just a limited group from the islands?

We assume that everyone else can endure.

Hah, lol …

But actually, with such high post-hurricane abandonment rates, as reported previously, it is obvious that everyone loses patience. So any improvement in the ‘Power Restoration’ experience would be a win-win; it would improve our communities’ endurance and make our Caribbean homeland better places to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

———–

Appendix A – Hurricane Irma Devastation

In Barbuda, Hurricane Irma caused catastrophic damage on the island; it damaged or destroyed 95% of the island’s buildings and infrastructure, leaving Barbuda “barely habitable” according to Prime Minister Gaston Browne. Everyone on the island was evacuated to Antigua, leaving Barbuda uninhabited for the first time in modern history.^[3]
In St. Martin, on 6 and 7 September 2017 the island was hit by Hurricane Irma (Category 5 at landfall), which caused widespread and significant damage to buildings and infrastructure. A total of 11 deaths had been reported as of 8 September 2017.^[12][13] France’s Minister of the Interior, Gérard Collomb, said on 8 September 2017 that most of the schools were destroyed on the French half of the island. In addition to damage caused by high winds, there were reports of serious flood damage to businesses in the village of Marigot. Looting was also a serious problem. Both France and the Netherlands sent aid as well as additional police and emergency personnel to the island.^[14][15][16] The Washington Post reported that 95% of the structures on the French side and 75% of the structures on the Dutch side were damaged or destroyed.^[17][18] Some days after the storm had abated, a survey by the Dutch Red Cross estimated that nearly a third of the buildings in Sint Maarten had been destroyed and that over 90 percent of structures on the island had been damaged.^[19] Princess Juliana Airport was extensively damaged but reopened on a partial basis in two days to allow incoming relief flights and for flights that would take evacuees to other islands.^[20]
In Anguila, the eye of the storm pass over it on September 6. Many homes and schools were destroyed, and the island’s only hospital was badly damaged.^[163] The devastation was particularly severe in East End, where the winds uprooted scores of trees and power poles and demolished a number of houses. … One death was reported on the island.^[163] According to [sources], Anguilla’s economy could suffer at least $190 million in losses from the hurricane.^[129]
Puerto Rico avoided a direct hit by the Category 5 Hurricane Irma on September 8, 2017, but high winds caused a loss of electrical power to some one million residents. Almost 50% of hospitals were operating with power provided by generators.^[133]
Damage in the British Virgin Islands was extensive. Numerous buildings and roads were destroyed on the island of Tortola, which bore the brunt of the hurricane’s core.^[172] Irma’s effects in the U.S. Virgin Islands were most profound on Saint Thomas. Due to its normal reliance on electricity from Saint Thomas, the island [of St. John] was left without power.
In the Florida Keys, the hurricane caused major damage to buildings, trailer parks, boats, roads, the electricity supply, mobile phone coverage, internet access, sanitation, the water supply and the fuel supply. … As of 6:41 p.m. EDT on September 10 over 2.6 million homes in Florida were without power.^[232]

———–

Appendix B VIDEO – Here’s how the pumps in New Orleans move water out during heavy rainfall – https://youtu.be/hZvGVUZi9FU

Published on Mar 30, 2017 – WDSU News: Pumps Work During Thursday’s Flooding

———–

Appendix C VIDEO – ABB launches world´s most powerful extruded HVDC cable system –

Published on Aug 21, 2014

ABB Power Grids

525 kV voltage (previous highest installed 320 kV) sets world record more than doubling power flow to 2600 MW (from 1000 MW) and extending range to 1500 km for more cost effective, efficient and reliable underground and subsea transmission while keeping losses to below 5 percent. Major breakthrough for applications like underground HVDC transmission, sub-sea interconnections, offshore wind integration etc. More information: http://new.abb.com/systems/high-volta…

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More Storms: Rinse and Repeat – Encore

Posted on September 3, 2019 in Government, Strategy

I have friends …

… that live in North America and Europe. They always ask about visiting the many beautiful islands of the Caribbean. I strongly urge them to come on down and “be our guest“; to consume our hospitality, enjoy our culture, food, spirits, cigars, festivals, fishing, resorts and cruises.

But, I caution them: Do not come between August 15 and September 15; this is the peak of our mean season! This is when we Rinse and Repeat.

This has often been the case over the years – see Table 1 below – and this is true this year as well. The Bahamas just endured Category 5 Hurricane Dorian and now … there are other storms on the radar screen, in the vicinity. See photo here:

Rinse and Repeat is more than just a shampoo instruction, it is what we endure in the Caribbean region every year during Hurricane Season. Lastly, it is also the title of a previous blog-commentary from August 30, 2017.

Table 1 – Highest Number of named storm occurrences by month
Month
Month	Storms	Season
January	1	1938, 1951, 1978, 2016
February	1	1952†
March	1	1908†
April	1	1992, 2003, 2017
May	2	1887, 2012
June	3	1886, 1936, 1968
July	5	2005
August	8	2004, 2012
September	8	2002, 2010
October	8	1950
November	3	2005
December	2	1887, 2003
Based on data from: U.S. NOAA Coastal Service Center – Historical Hurricane Tracks Tool
† – Highest number for month by virtue of being only known season to see a storm form

Again, imagine 8 named storms in the same month; that is truly Rinse and Repeat. This is our reality. It is only apropos to Encore that previous blog-commentary here-now:

———–

Go Lean Commentary – Disaster Preparation: ‘Rinse and Repeat’

The reality of Caribbean life: we must contend with natural disasters, not of our making, “again and again”. The situation can be described as “Rinse and Repeat“.

Climate Change is not of our making, but it is our problem. Truth be told, it is not just our problem alone; the whole planet is affected. Right now this moment, the Greater Metropolitan area of Houston, Texas USA is suffering “pangs of distress”; see the VIDEO in the Appendix below.

It is what it is!

Some communities have done a better job than others in preparing for the unavoidable:

“Some communities”? “Better job“? That is not us … in the Caribbean!

As related in a previous Go Lean commentary, our Caribbean region has failed … in our managing this Agent-of-Change:

… we do not have the luxury of “sticking our head in the sand” and pretending that these problems will simply go away. The region has been devastated with this dysfunction and mis-management. Some 70% of Caribbean college-educated citizens have already fled their homelands in an undisputed brain drain. It’s time now to manage change differently than the Caribbean has done as of late. It’s time now to “Go Lean”.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean – available to download for free – serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives for us to do a better job:

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs. This includes an efficient Emergency Management apparatus to ensure business continuity.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies. We can “move” member-state governments simply through funding, rankings and ratings.

The book stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society, for better preparation for natural disasters. Consider the Chapter excerpts and headlines here from this sample on Page 184 entitled:

10 Ways to Improve for Natural Disasters

1	Emergence of the Caribbean Union Lean-in for the Caribbean Single Market & Economy initiative as the Caribbean Union Trade Federation. This allows for the unification of the 30 member-states into one market, thereby spreading the risk and premium base across a market of 42 million people. The Caribbean member-states have Hurricane Katrina styled disasters (relatively speaking) every year.
2	Caribbean Emergency Management Agency – Federal Disaster Declarations Modeled after FEMA in the US, this agency will be charged with the preparation, response and reconstruction for the regions for the eventual manifestations of hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, flooding and other declared disasters, natural and man-made like medical epidemic, drought, pollution, oil spills, terrorism, etc.
3	Support Services for First Responders Training, licensing and standards for Emergency Managers, Paramedics, Firefighters, Search and Rescue resources. For major disasters, some of these resources will come from international origins; they will need the support services (language translation, guides, maps, etc.) and coordination to maximize their results.
4	Animal Partner Training and Development Maintain plantations for the training, development and boarding of “search & rescue” dogs, cadavers dogs and other service animals (horses, mules, pigs, etc.) so that there will be local resources within the region. (We cannot always depend on international responses in light of other regions experiencing their own disasters). These animals need not be owned by any one member-state, they can be on loan from CU resources.
5	Siren Warnings & Notifications The CU will install tornado-style alarms/sirens in all major municipalities. In addition, the CU will implement tsunami warning messaging (emails/text) in coastal areas & seismic meters throughout the region in the affected “fault-line” areas.
6	Airlift & Sealift Authorizations The CU Emergency Management Agency can license, regulate and authorize (air & sea) vessels and vehicles for emergency deployment in a disaster zone, before during and after the disastrous event.
7	JUA-style Insurance Fund The fiduciary management of premiums and claims to allow the immediate response for reconstruction after disasters. These financial services, sidecars traded in markets can be direct or indirect as in reinsurance or insurer-of-last-resort.
8	Economic Crime Enforcement During and After Disasters The CU will police, investigate and prosecute price gouging, insurance red lining and other economic crimes of both the “white collar” and “blue collar” variety. Once a CU-member-state declares a Disaster Emergency, new rules (quasi-Marshall Law) goes into effect. The CU will review and prosecute the actions of civilians and institutions alike.
9	Disaster Declaration Loans Once there’s a Federal Disaster Declaration, the CU will make funds available for low-interest loans for communities to fund reconstructions. With tourism as a major “cash crop” the goal will be to restore the locality as a tourist destination as soon as possible, as even the perception of prolonged disaster damage can affect future bookings and travel plans.
10	Building Codes and Standards Through peer review, the CU will regionalize the standards of building codes to assuage the threat of hurricanes and earthquakes, ensuring a higher survivability rate in the Caribbean islands. Due to economic pressures, when buildings and homes cannot be retrofitted, they will be rated for evacuation during hurricane warnings, or earthquake after-shocks.

The Caribbean must foster a better disaster preparation and response apparatus. We must do it now! Lives are at stake.

Just look at our American neighbors – they are suffering right now in the Greater Metropolitan area of Houston, Texas.

While Climate Change is the underlying Agent-of-Change, it is outside of our control. This does not imply that there is no remediation for Climate Change; there is. In fact …

Fix ‘Climate Change’ – Yes, We Can

We do not have the resources (time, talent and treasuries) to fix Climate Change for the planet ourselves, but we can fix it in our Caribbean region. This is a “Lesson in History” that our community has learned … from back in 1863:

There is an important lesson to learn in considering the history of the American Civil War. The war was fought over the issue of slavery. This was an ugly institution for those condemned as slaves. In the United States, that ugly disposition extended beyond the slaves themselves to the entire Black race. Though individuals could be set free, laws in the country could push them back into slavery without any due process. This was the case with the “Fugitive Slave Act of 1850″. Any Black person could be detained as a runaway slave and returned to any alleged Slave Master in the South; no matter any proof or the truth, or lack there-of. In many jurisdictions, a Black man could not even testify against white people. (This was the basis for the autobiographical book – by Solomon Northup – and movie “12 Years A Slave”).

To be Black in the America of those days, one “could not win, could not break-even and could not get out of the game”. There was no neutral destination in America. The optimal option was the only option, to work towards the end of slavery.

For this reason many Blacks joined the war effort, at great sacrifice to themselves and their community. This was a matter of principle! There is an important lesson for the Caribbean from this history^[1] :

The 54th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry was an infantry regiment that saw extensive service in the Union Army during the American Civil War. The regiment was one of the first official African-American units in the United States during the Civil War.

Remediating and mitigating Climate Change will be a battle. We need our own “Voluntary Infantry“ in this fight.

“We have a dog in this fight” – English language slang.

In the Caribbean, we must confederate and implement the institutions to work to remediate and mitigate Climate Change. We must “join in this fight”; we must Go Green and we must Go Blue. We have to be prepared for natural disasters – they will come … assuredly every season, some Caribbean destination will be impacted. We must be prepared to:

Rinse and Repeat.

If we are ready, to quickly respond, offer relief and rebuild – so as to guarantee the business continuity – we would then do a better job in our quest to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

———–

Appendix VIDEO – Historic flooding inundates Texas, hampering rescue efforts – https://youtu.be/Da-VS39gdfQ

PBS NewsHour
Published on Aug 27, 2017 – Houston’s mayor on Sunday urged his constituents in the nation’s fourth-largest city to stay off roadways as the state of Texas continues to contend with unprecedented flooding from Hurricane Harvey, now classified as a tropical storm. Officials said rising waters would reach catastrophic proportions, with more than 2,500 emergency calls made overnight in Houston alone. Hari Sreenivasan has more.

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Nassau’s 2019 Self-Made Energy Crisis

Posted on August 15, 2019 in Government, Tactical

Go Lean Commentary

It is seriously Hot-Hot-Hot out there …

So there is no intent here to be “cold and callous” … (callous = ‘feeling no emotion’).

But the Bahamas’s capital city – Nassau – is having an energy crisis right now:

The local power generation utility (Bahamas Power & Light or BPL) is not producing enough electricity to meet the needs of the community, so they have to load-share and force black-outs/brown-outs around the island to try and facilitate some delivery some time to all their customer base. They do not want to show favoritism to one group over another, so they are leveraging the load-sharing tactic on everybody. So now instead of some people being happy and some being angry, they have obtained universality …

… everybody is angry!

———-

VIDEO – B.P.L. Load Shedding Update – https://youtu.be/fW8JGGnlvzQ

ZNSNetwork
Published on May 15, 2019

Category: People & Blogs

Additionally, see this portrayal in this news article here (and the Appendix VIDEO below):

Title: BPL causing ‘chaos’
By: Jasper Ward, The Nassau Guardian Staff Reporter

Super Value food stores are taking a significant hit as a result of protracted power cuts, according to its owner Rupert Roberts.

Roberts said about six Super Value locations are impacted by outages daily and the company has spent around $100,000 recently on replacing equipment damaged by the outages.

He described the outages as “a nuisance” and said they create “chaos”.

“This BEC (Bahamas Electricity Corporation) crisis is more than a crisis, it’s chaos,” Roberts said at the Nassau Street store.

“It’s costing us $250,000 a year from burning up our equipment.”

He said, “I suppose our biggest concern is burning up equipment.

“…[We] burn up a $10,000 or $20,000 air conditioning [unit and] we’re always burning up compressors. We’re using up spares so fast and we’re doing emergency imports.

“Fortunately, we’re able to get them in within three or four days without flying them in. But I noticed on Saturday we had a diary case down because we’re waiting on the compressor that burned out. That’s the biggest problem.”

Roberts said it will cost about $10,000 to replace a compressor in the dairy case at the Nassau Street location. He said it is unlikely that case will be operational before Saturday.

Roberts said dairy sales were up 14 percent before the case was damaged.

Since it was damaged, sales have gone down 17 percent, he said.

Roberts said the company has twice the amount of equipment needed “because of the serious problem” of the outages.

Although the food store chain is facing challenges with the outages, Roberts said the company is “managing quite well”.

“We’ve been in this business over 50 years and we’ve had power problems for the last 50 years,” he said.

“So, we learned how to cope. We don’t run out of fuel. Years ago, when I first started in the industry, we had generators because of hurricanes but for the past 25 years we’ve had to have generators because of power outages.”

For nearly two months, communities on New Providence have experienced hours-long blackouts as part of Bahamas Power and Light’s (BPL) load shedding exercise.

Over the last few weeks, BPL has conducted nearly four-hour-long load shedding.

On Sunday, BPL Chief Executive Officer Whitney Heastie said he could not guarantee an end to load shedding exercises in the immediate future, describing BPL as being “on a cliff”.

Heastie said BPL needs 250 megawatts of generation in order to meet the summer demand.

However, it is currently running on 210 megawatts, including 105 megawatts of rental generation.

Heastie said the 40-megawatt shortfall has led to load shedding across New Providence.

Source: Posted by The Nassau Guardian daily newspaper on August 13, 2019; retrieved August 14, 2019 from: https://thenassauguardian.com/2019/08/13/bpl-causing-chaos/

This energy crisis for Nassau is Self-Made!!

Wait, what?!

Yep, self-made!

This is a BIGGER issue than water or electricity; this is an issue of the Social Contract.

The issue of Caribbean citizens abandoning their homelands is one of the more dire threats to societal life in the region. Why do they do it?

“Push and Pull” reasons!

Push
Conditions at home drive Caribbean citizens to take flight and find refuge elsewhere. Many times these conditions are economic (jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities), security and governance related, but there are other reasons too; consider discriminations due to ethnic diversity or other lifestyle choices.

Lastly, there is the new threat of Climate Change. While this is a threat for the whole world, the Caribbean is on the frontline. Though there is some debate as to the causes of climate change, there is no question as to its outcome: temperatures are rising, droughts prevail, and most devastating, hurricanes are now more threatening. A Caribbean elevation plan must address the causes of climate change and most assuredly its consequences. …

Now, the anecdotal experience is that there is a need to mitigate excessive heat in the region for an even longer season. How do we mitigate excessive heat?

Air conditioning!

But this cure may at times be worse than the disease.

Air conditioning requires even greater energy consumption, (the Caribbean has among the highest energy costs in the Western Hemisphere); the Go Lean book posits that the average costs of energy can be decreased from an average of US$0.35/kWh to US$0.088/kWh in the course of the 5-year term of this roadmap; (Page 100).

In addition, the release of Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC’s) in the air-conditioning process is a contributor of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

The status quo needs remediation!

That’s the problem, now what is the solution?

1	Lean-in for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The CU is chartered to unify the Caribbean region into one Single Market of 42 million people across 30 member-states, thereby re-engineering the economic engines in and on behalf of the region, including a currency & monetary union. This new eco-system allows for the design, funding and construction of Public Works and Infrastructural projects. The federal agency within the CU’s Department of the Interior has the scope for the Caribbean much like the Corps of Engineers has for the US. (Plus the CU will collaborate with the US Corps for projects related to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands). There are a number of inter-state projects that must be coordinated on the federal level. There will also be projects that are “Too Big for One State” that will be facilitated by the CU. In addition, all CU efforts must comply with the Art in Public Places mandate, so sculptures and statutes will be embedded in projects or the project itself can be a work of art (bridges, water towers, building architecture). For existing projects that fail due to financial shortfalls, the CU will accommodate dissolution or reorganization in the federal courts, bringing balance to the process to all stakeholders.
2	Union Atlantic Turnpike
3	Pipelines and PCP (Pneumatic Capsule Pipeline)
4	Regional Power Grid The CU will facilitate the installation of a regional power grid, and power sharing between member-states, with underwater and above-ground high-intensity wiring to alternate energy plants: wind/tidal turbines, solar panel & natural gas.
5	Self-Governing Entities (SGE)
6	Enterprise Zones
7	Empowerment Zones
8	Monopolies The UN grants the CU the monopoly rights for an Exclusive Economic Zone, so the focus must be on quality delivery. The CU plan is to liberalize management of monopolies, with tools like ratings/rankings against best practices. Plus technological accommodations for ICT allows for cross-competition from different modes (satellite, cable, phone).
9	Cooperatives The CU will task utility cooperatives with the delivery of some public utilities such as Air Chillers; Refrigerated Warehouses to its members. This strategy shares the cost of the “Works” installation across the full co-op membership.
10	Capital Markets A single market and currency union will allow for the emergence of viable capital markets for stocks and bonds (public and private), thereby creating the economic engine to fuel growth and development. This forges financial products for “pre” disaster project funding (drainage, levies, dykes, sea walls) and post disaster recovery (reinsurance sidecars).

This theme – exploiting alternative options for the economic, security and governing empowerments in the region – aligns with many previous Go Lean commentaries; see a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17925	‘We’ have repeatedly failed the lessons from ‘Infrastructure 101’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17280	Way Forward – For Energy: ‘Trade’ Winds
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13985	EU Assists Barbados in Renewable Energy Self-Sufficiency
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12994	The Science of ‘Power Restoration’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12466	12 Caribbean Member-states have ‘Volcanic Energy’ to Exploit
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10367	The Science of Sustenance – Green Batteries
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5155	Green Energy Solution: Tesla unveils super-battery to power homes
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4897	US Backs LNG Distribution for Caribbean Energy Solutions
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=915	Go ‘Green’ … Caribbean

Make no mistake, energy is a basic need!

The failure for a community to have continuous supply of energy is an energy crisis. (This means you Bahamas).

Enough already!

Now is the time for all Caribbean stakeholders to prepare for the empowerments of Green-Energy solutions. It is past-time for a regional power grid:

generation – Green options (solar, wind turbines, tidal, geo-thermal and natural gas)
distribution – Underwater cables to connect individual islands
consumption – efficient battery back-ups for home deployments.

These changes are coming … one way or another.

For you government revenue institutions who may be overly dependent of fuel taxes and surcharges – you are hereby put on notice:

Changes are afoot. We will succeed; we will make our Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work and play.

🙂

About the Book

Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

——————–

Appendix VIDEO – Another B.P.L. Blackout – https://youtu.be/fOT0gfvSchM

ZNSNetwork
Published on Jul 2, 2019

Category: People & Blogs

——————–

Appendix – Excerpts from previous Commentary: Flint, Michigan – A Cautionary Tale – January 19, 2016

What happened here?

…

See VIDEO here of the story in the national media …

VIDEO – Citizens’ Anger Continues Over Toxic Water in Flint, Michigan – http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/video/citizens-anger-continues-toxic-water-flint-michigan-36348795 –

…

We must do better, than Flint! (Flint must do better; too many lives are involved).

Our Caribbean stakeholders deserve the best … from their leaders. 🙂

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Regulating Plastics in the Bahamas – So Little; So Late – Encore

Posted on August 12, 2019 in Economics, Government, Strategy

Plastics have been identified as “unbecoming” for the Caribbean environment. One country after another is now starting to regulate them and maybe even ban them.

Considering the 500 year history of Caribbean society, plastics are new …

… the proliferation emerged in the last 100 years. But the acknowledgement is now universal that they are destructive for the planet’s landscape and seascape.

While plastics are dutiful, plentiful and cheap, they are strictly optional; there are many viable alternatives; think glass, paper, wood and ceramics.

Here again:

plastic bags ==> paper bags
plastic bottles ==> glass bottles
plastic straws ==> paper straws
plastic cups ==> ceramic cups
plastic stirrers ==> wood stirrers

Plastics may be cheaper than all of these alternatives! But economically, plastics costs more … in the end! This is due to the disposal costs; or worse still: the destruction to the environment.

Caribbean communities that depend on the trade of touristic services must not jeopardize the sand and sea of the region. Tropical beauty is a strong selling point. Same too for the Fisheries.

One country after another is starting to implement regulations to eliminate plastic shopping bags, food utensils, straws and Styrofoam. Last year, August 21, 2018, the movement behind the book Go Lean…Caribbean related the efforts of the Caribbean country of Saint Lucia for their mitigation of plastics and Styrofoam. Now, we see that an additional country, the Bahamas, is also deploying their ban on plastics, starting in January 2020.

In fact, 40 other countries have already implemented such bans.

This is late for the Bahamas to only now be implementing this ban – they have always been vulnerable. In addition to their near-400,000 residents, they also hosts more than 3 million tourists annually (stay-overs and cruise passengers). But the location of the archipelago chain exposes it to unwanted marine debris (plastics) as a result of ocean currents and wave patterns – see the Gulfstream photo above.

The Bahamas is late! They should have been front-and-center with any mitigation efforts.

See this article here that describes the Bahamas plan for January 2020. Notice the emphasis on “plastic bags” and the little focus on other examples of single-use plastics. See the article here:

Title: Ferreira: Bahamas to join more than 40 countries that has banned plastic bags
By: Ginelle Longley

NASSAU, BAHAMAS – Minister of Environment and Housing, Romauld Ferreira, during his contribution to the 2019/2020 Budget debate on Tuesday night, said the Bahamas is expected to join more than 40 countries that have introduced a ban on plastic bags.

The government’s proposed ban on plastic bags is set to take effect in January 2020.

Ferreira said the Government will ensure that the move offers minimal disruption to businesses and their operation. He said his ministry will also inform and educate the public through a number of town hall meetings heading into 2020.

“The ministry’s education is also advancing the message of a healthier Bahamas through this initiative as the improper use of plastics is associated with various forms of environmental pollution and environmental degradation, which ultimately affects an individual’s health and well-being,” Ferreira said.

The proposed ban comes on the heels of several warnings issued by local environmental and climate experts who have stressed that non-biodegradable products such as plastic bags and Styrofoam have contributed to environmental issues.

Director of Energy and Environment with the Bahamas Chamber of Commerce, Debbie Deal, told Eyewitness News Online Wednesday that back in April 2018, the Ministry of Environment signed a Memorandum of Understanding with The Bahamas Chamber of Commerce, to ensure that businesses would be prepared for enforcement of the 2020 ban.

Deal said the implementation of the ban should not be an issue.

“VAT was [pushed] from 7.5 to 12 per cent and on July 1, 2019 it came into effect. We as a people were able to make that transition in a month’s time, so I personally think that a year and 9 months is sufficient to make that transition,” Deal said.

Meanwhile, Trevor Davis, the co-owner of Quality Home Center on Blue Hill Road said as his business prepares to replace plastic bags with reusable shopping bags, the move, while costly, will bring down the cost of bags for business owners as the new bags are reusable.

Source: Posted June 12, 2019; retrieved from: https://ewnews.com/ferreira-bahamas-to-join-more-than-40-countries-that-has-banned-plastic-bags

While we applaud the Bahamas for this tardy effort; it must be acknowledged that it is: so little; so late!

It is very apropos to Encore that previous blog-commentary from August 21, 2018. See that blog-commentary here-now:

——————–

Go Lean Commentary – Plastics and Styrofoam – A Mitigation Plan

So where do all the used plastics – and Styrofoam – go?

In a landfill …

… and may not degrade for a thousand years!

But for the ones that end up in the water (oceans and seas), they too do not degrade. They linger, pollute and disrupt eco-systems.

No one can just “stick their head in the sand”; this issue must be addressed, the crisis must be assuaged, the threat must be mitigated. See this crisis as depicted in this VIDEO here:

VIDEO – How Much Plastic is in the Ocean? – https://youtu.be/YFZS3Vh4lfI

It’s Okay To Be Smart

Published on Mar 28, 2017 – What can you do to make the oceans plastic-free?

Ocean plastic pollution is a massive environmental problem. Millions of tons of plastic waste enter the ocean every year, even plastic that goes in the trash can often ends up in the sea! This week we learn about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and look at the dangers ocean plastic poses to ocean animals. Plus, a few tips for you to reduce your own plastic use!

Sample Resources

Plastic Oceans Foundation: http://www.plasticoceans.org/

United Nations “Clean Seas” program: http://www.cleanseas.org/

Ocean plastic pollution resources from Monterey Bay Aquarium: https://www.montereybayaquarium.org/c…

Category: Education

Welcome to the Caribbean! We are 30 member-states in an all-coastal region – with many archipelagos (i.e. the Bahamas alone features over 700 islands). We have a lot of waterways and seascapes to contend with … and manage! So this global problem of plastics and Styrofoam is a local problem too.

Think global; act local!

What are we doing in our Caribbean region to mitigate the problem of plastics and Styrofoam? One member-state, St. Lucia, has proposed something; see the full news story here:

Title: Saint Lucia to ban Styrofoam and plastics

August 13th, 2018 – Saint Lucia plans to phase-out Styrofoam food service containers and plastics, both plates and cups, beginning December 1, 2018, with a total ban on their importation before the end of next year.

The announcement came in a statement from Minister of Education, Innovation, Gender Relations and Sustainable Development, Doctor Gale Rigobert.

Rigobert said the Government of Saint Lucia is cognizant of the negative impact on the environment and human health from food service containers made from Polystyrene and Expanded Polystyrene, also known as Styrofoam, along with Plastics.

However, she observed that the administration recognises that the healthier alternative to these products, such as biodegradable and compostable food service containers, are more costly.

” We are doing our very best to alleviate this issue,” the minister explained.

She disclosed that over the last few months, the Department of Sustainable Development, in partnership with other key agencies such as the Saint Lucia Solid Waste Management Authority, the Department of Finance, the Ministry of Commerce and the Customs and Excise Department, has been working towards the development of a strategy to eliminate single use plastics, polystyrene and expanded polystyrene from the Saint Lucia market.

“To date, we have completed fiscal analyses, conducted a survey of the key suppliers of these products and we have also identified suppliers of the biodegradable and compostable food service containers, all this to ensure that Saint Lucia creates the enabling environment to facilitate this process,” Rigobert stated.

She explained that in light of this, the Department of Sustainable Development will be taking a phased approach to facilitate a smooth transition for all stakeholders.

“The phase-out, along with a ban on the importation of Styrofoam food service containers, and plastics, both plates and cups, will commence December 1, 2018 with a total ban culminating by November 30, 2019:”

Rigovert revealed that in order to ensure adequate sensitisation, the Department of Sustainable Development will continue its campaign to educate the general public on the options they have available to them during this phase.

“With respect to plastic bottles, discussions are ongoing with major stakeholders to finalize legislation that would curb and control their use,” the minister noted.

“I encourage you to join the fight to reduce your dependency on single use plastics and Styrofoam by utilizing re-useable bottles, food containers, cutlery and shopping bags. Let us act responsibly in our everyday consumption and production,”Rigobert stated.
Source: St. Lucia Times – Daily Newspaper – Posted 08-13-2018; retrieved 08-21-2018: https://stluciatimes.com/2018/08/13/saint-lucia-to-ban-styrofoam-and-plastics/

This problem is bigger than just the Caribbean member-state of St Lucia. They did not start this fight; nor can they finish it. This is BIG Deal that is too big for any one member-state or the full Caribbean region alone. This will require a global effort, including some Caribbean mitigation!

But here in the Caribbean, we cannot expect others to do all the heavy-lifting and clean-up; we must do our share; clean-up our own environment. This has been a frequent theme by the movement behind the book Go Lean … Commentary – available for download now. In the book, and in previous Go Lean blog-commentaries, it was asserted that we – the Caribbean region – must do our share to “Go Green” so as to assuage our own contributions to global pollution and greenhouse gases; yes, we must keep our own neighborhoods clean and optimize our own industrial footprint, so that we may be less hypocritical – have moral authority – in calling for reform from the big polluting nations. This sample – as follows – depicts some previous blog-commentaries that relates this theme:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14832	Counter-culture: Manifesting Change – Environmentalism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14174	Canada: “Follow Me” for Model on Environmental Action
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12724	Lessons from Colorado: Water Management Arts & Sciences
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12144	Book Review: ‘Sea Power’ – The Need for Good Oversight
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9455	Fix ‘Climate Change’ and other Environmental Issues? Yes, We Can
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2465	Book Review: ‘This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2276	Climate Change May Affect Food Supply Within a Decade
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1656	Blue is the New Green
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=915	Go ‘Green’ … Caribbean

From the foregoing news articles and these previous blog-commentaries, we see the compelling need for a concerted anti-pollution-Go Green effort in our region. We must “Reduce, Re-use, Recycle”. Who will stand-up and lead this charge?

“Here I am, send me” – The Bible; Isaiah 6:8

This is the charter of the Go Lean book. It serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). The roadmap depicts how this federal government is designed to stand-up and lead the charge to assuage and mitigate the threats on Caribbean life. The book identifies a list of crises as Agents of Change that are crippling our way of life. We can add pollution to that list. As a Single Market, we need a regional sentinel to be on guard and to tackle these “plastics pollution” problems.

Why regional?

Because the national effort has been unsuccessful; in many cases, even unknown, unavailable and unfunded.

No, individual member-states will not be able to succeed in this effort; we need a regional effort; it is too big to tackle alone; so we must acknowledge our regional dependency or interdependence to have any chance of success. This vision is embedded in the opening Declaration of Interdependence, pronouncing as follows, (Pages 11, 12):

vi. Whereas the finite nature of the landmass of our lands limits the populations and markets of commerce, by extending the bonds of brotherhood to our geographic neighbors allows for extended opportunities and better execution of the kinetics of our economies through trade. This regional focus must foster and promote diverse economic stimuli.

viii. Whereas the population size is too small to foster good negotiations for products and commodities from international vendors, the Federation must allow the unification of the region as one purchasing agent, thereby garnering better terms and discounts.

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. …

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

The Go Lean book and previous blog-commentaries posit that the “whole is worth more than the sum of its parts”, that from this roadmap disparate Caribbean nations can speak with “one voice” … collectively as a Single Market and be heard. The international community – the big polluters – would therefore have more respect and accountability to our regional Caribbean entity, rather than the many (30) Small Island Development States. But while contributing to the problem ourselves, though on a smaller scale, we cannot just say to these big polluters:

“You break it, you fix it”.

No, we must unite and take our stand in this fight … to mitigate plastics and Styrofoam … and advocate for change!

As related in the Go Lean roadmap, the CU Trade Federation is designed to elevate Caribbean society, but not just against pollution, rather these other engines in the regional construct as well. The roadmap therefore has these 3 prime directives:

Optimize the economic engines of the Caribbean to elevate the regional economy to grow to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
Establish a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines over the seas & land.
Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

So the CU will serve as the regional administrator to optimize the economy, homeland security and governing engines for the Caribbean. These efforts are already important in the fight for Climate Change abatement; so the same can apply for the mitigation of polluting plastics and Styrofoam.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society. This is the heavy-lifting that we must do to sustain our planet, region, island and communities.

We can all do more!

Some hotel resorts in the Caribbean have already embraced the strategy of being early-adopters of plastics-Styrofoam bans. See a related article here from St Lucia:

Bay Gardens Resorts discontinues use of Expanded Polystyrene EPS (Styrofoam) products https://stluciatimes.com/2017/02/17/bay-gardens-resorts-discontinues-use-expanded-polystyrene-eps-styrofoam-products/

Change has come to the Caribbean region. This heavy-lifting is the quest of the CU/Go Lean roadmap; to make the Caribbean region more self-reliant collectively; to act more proactively and reactively for our own emergencies and natural disaster events; and to be more efficient in our governance.

If “plastics pollution” is not arrested, then even more devastating changes will come. So there is the need for our region to establish a regional Sentinel, a permanent union to provide efficient stewardship for our economic, security and governing engines.

Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in to the efforts and empowerments to mitigate and abate “plastics pollution”. It is also time to lean-in to this roadmap described in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. Plastic pollution is a Big Deal. We have other Big Deals too, so as to reform and transform our society. We must make our waterways and homelands better places to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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