From Earth to Heaven ... by Analogy!

Since I rededicated this blog as "This Sacramental Earth," I've been struggling to come up with a reason why we Catholics in particular, and all Christians in general, ought to think of the natural world as a sacrament: a visible sign of God's invisible grace.

If Mother Nature, through evolution, engendered our material being in the form of species Homo sapiens, then I suppose we can adopt two possible attitudes. One is to think of our material being, and of the material world at large from which it derives, as purely disposable. We can think highly of just the immortal soul which comes to us from God at the time we are individually conceived and returns to God when we die. The rest of our "reality" can be gladly discarded, in this view.

The other possible attitude is to think of our material reality as imbued with God's grace. If we think of it that way, then it would be a desecration, pure and simple, to turn physical Nature into a trash heap as we keep plundering Nature unsustainably in support of our ravenous economic aspirations. If material reality is itself a sacrament, then we ought to be environmentalists instead.

But why should we not visualize our natural, physical being as, ultimately, some sort of waste matter to be tossed onto a figurative slag heap and forgotten after we have gone to our graves?

The reason is simply this: our Nicene Creed says, " ... we look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come."

The word "resurrection" implies ongoing, or restored, corporeality — not just a disembodied soul floating eternally in the beatific presence of God in Heaven after we die. So the life we know today as bodily creatures here on Earth can fruitfully be envisioned as analogous to the promised "life of the world to come."

One specific analogy is the evolutionary succession of species here on Earth. Humankind in particular is the product of a long chain of precursor hominid species, all of which are now extinct. They in effect still exist today, though — in "resurrected" form, as us!

Another analogy with the resurrection our creed promises us after death is the return of temperate climes that arrived after the end of the last Ice Age, during which frigid time the prospects looked dim indeed for our early ancestors' continued survival.

The return of the Earth's fecundity each spring, following the death of green things that accompanies each winter, is yet another natural analogy of the personal resurrection our Christian religious belief promises us.

If we but accept the notion that such Earth-Heaven analogies furnish us with a true "optic" through which to view the credal promise of resurrection life in the Kingdom of God, then the natural world as we know it today automatically becomes a sacramental world. It makes no more sense to plunder and despoil Nature than to neglect the upkeep on our own house or burn it to the ground.

Reaping the Wind ... and Solar, Hydropower, Geothermal, Etc.

My December 2011 electric bill was different than any I've ever paid before: all the electric power came from renewable sources. None came from polluting fossil fuels, such as coal, that add enormously to the carbon load in the atmosphere and the resultant global warming that carbon's greenhouse effect produces.

I'm now buying 100% renewable energy. It comes from Stream Energy.

As a Maryland resident who lives in the service area of Baltimore Gas & Electric, I have the option to stay with BGE's Standard Offer Service (SOS) or to choose from a list of alternate suppliers of electric power. This is due to the fact that Maryland deregulated its electricity market a few years ago, seeking to foster competition that would hold prices down.

I have used two non-BGE suppliers other than Stream Energy, but the "6 Month Fixed Rate Plan - Green and Clean!" contract I now have with Stream Energy is the first that promises its power is "100% Renewable." Stream Energy, along with it's marketing affiliate Ignite, is a Texas company that began selling electric power in Maryland earlier in 2011.

What is "Renewable" Energy and How Much Does It Cost?

Stream Energy's renewable energy, the company says, "comes from a combination of the following sources; solar photovoltaic, solar thermal, wind power, low-impact hydropower, geothermal energy, biologically derived methane gas, fuel cells, biomass energy, coal mine methane, large scale hydropower, waste coal, distributed generation systems, demand-side management, municipal solid waste, generation of electricity utilizing by-products of the pulping process and wood, integrated combined coal gasification technology."

Am I paying a lot more for using 100% renewable energy? Not really. Right now, BGE's SOS electricity charge is 9.037 ¢/kWH, while Stream Energy is charging me 9.39 ¢/kWH. That's 0.351 ¢/kWH more. I used 1713 kWH of electric power on my current monthly bill, meaning my "electric supplier charges" to Stream Energy amounted to $160.85. Had I stayed with BGE, they would have amounted to $154.80. So my "100% renewable surcharge" came to just $6.05.

Buying Renewable Power

Stream Energy serves customers in Georgia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, in addition to its home state of Texas. Chances are, though, that you live in a state Stream Energy doesn't serve.

You may nonetheless live in a state that offers you a choice of electric suppliers, as Maryland does. Some of those suppliers may offer plans that use renewable power sources.

Maryland's deregulated electricity market program is called Electric Choice, and you may have a similar deregulation program in the state where you live. Otherwise, you are locked into a single supplier. Even if you are locked into one supplier, though, it may offer you a range of plans to select from. If so, one or more of its plans may offer some percentage (up to 100%) of its electric power from renewable sources — or, even better, from wind alone.

In general, the more power from renewables, the higher the rate per kilowatt-hour (kWH) will be. If all the renewable power comes from harnessing the wind, the rate per kWH can be expected to be yet higher.

If your state is like mine, signing up with an alternate supplier of electric power is pretty much painless. You can expect to find a list of suppliers that is published online by your state public utility commission (mine is actually a "public service commission"). From the list, you can pick one that suits your needs and visit its website. The website will allow you to sign up, but you may have to confirm your intention to do so over the phone.

Once that happens, you will receive various confirmations in the mail. At the start of the next billing period, the actual switchover will occur. Your next bill after the switchover will come, as usual, from your local electric supplier (in my case, BGE) but it will have a special "electric supplier charges" section somewhere on it. In that section you will see the charges per kWH that will be forwarded to the new power supplier (in my case, Stream Energy). The remaining charges on the bill will go to the local company (e.g., BGE) mainly for "electric delivery service" — the transmission of the electric power from the power grid to your home.

Stream Energy, like most electric power suppliers, offers plans such as the one I am on that impose a fee for early cancellation. I have a six-month plan, so if I were to cancel prior to the end of six months, I'd owe Stream Energy an extra $150. For a slightly higher monthly rate, I could have selected a "month to month" Stream Energy plan instead: 9.9 ¢/kWH for 100% renewable power. Doing so would allow me to switch suppliers at virtually any time, with no penalty.

100% Wind Power

Right at the moment, I have the option to buy "100% Wind" power from BGE Home for 10.2 ¢/kWH. Not to be confused with BGE, BGE Home is a local subsidiary of Constellation Electric, its national parent company. "100% Wind" means all the power comes from wind turbine "farms" like this one:

There are other suppliers presently selling "100% Wind" plans for as low as 9.7 ¢/kWH (the rate quoted by Ambit Northeast right now).

Wind power is, of course, fully renewable. The wind is always blowing somewhere. Wind farms are located where it pretty much blows all the time.

Just 21 months ago, before I began shopping around for a non-BGE electric supplier, I was paying BGE 11.97 ¢/kWH for electric power. Since then, rates have come down a lot for non-renewable and renewable power, but still ... for 2.27 ¢/kWH less than I was paying then, I could be getting electric power that reaps nothing but the wind.

In fact, when my current six-month contract with Stream Energy ends, I expect to go with one of the "100% Wind" suppliers. It will be a nice feeling to know that every time my heating/air conditioning starts blowing air through my house, it will derive from nothing but the winds that blow across America.

Deep Climate Skepticism in Tidewater Virginia

Recently published in The Washington Post, Virginia residents oppose preparations for climate-related sea-level rise details the deep-seated hostility some Virginians have to widespread predictions of global warming that would, scientists say, inevitably cause sea levels to rise, thereby inundating low-lying areas many of them live in:

Located on the Chesapeake Bay between the Rappahannock and York rivers, Virginia's Middle Peninsula seemingly needs to fear rising sea levels not only due to global warming but also due to "post-glacial rebound" — an after-effect of the last Ice Age — and an ancient meteoric impact crater that continues to affect the area nearby.

If global warming is real it will melt the polar ice caps and arctic ice sheets, scientists say, putting more water in the oceans. That's why sea levels can be expected to rise. In fact, global ice melting has already begun — see Study: Ice sheets melting, sea level rising faster than previously thought. But if the surface temperatures of the earth continue to rise due to further global warming, the problem will just get worse.

Yet some Virginians vociferously reject that scenario.

Planners and politicians have been talking up the issue at public meetings, the Post article says, in hopes of generating support for changes such as rezoning local land for use as a dike against rising water. Opponents of the changes have organized themselves and come to meetings intent on shouting down and otherwise resisting the planners.

One of the opposition organizers is Donna Holt, leader of the Virginia Campaign for Liberty, a Tea Party affiliate with 7,000 members. She says a United Nations initiative called "Agenda 21" is behind a global drive for "sustainable development," which she believes is internationalist code-speak for the demise of local governments and individual liberty. The local planners and politicians who want zoning changes for purposes of protecting the counties of Virginia's Middle Peninsula against sea-level rise are, she wold have it, dupes of the international Agenda 21 crowd.

Agenda 21 is "a United Nations environmental action plan adopted in 1992," says the article. Wikipedia says about "Agenda 21"(see this article) that it is ...

... an action plan of the United Nations (UN) related to sustainable development and was an outcome of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992. It is a comprehensive blueprint of action to be taken globally, nationally and locally by organizations of the UN, governments, and major groups in every area in which humans directly affect the environment.

Donna Holt believes, says The Post, that it's just a "shadowy global conspiracy" to take away our liberties. If property owners or local governments don't comply with its mandate for "sustainable development," they'll be in line for international sanctions of some sort.

That's just not so, says Patty Glick, senior climate-change specialist for the National Wildlife Federation, according to The Post. Agenda 21 "has no legal or policy implication for local governments in the United States," she says.

I believe Donna Holt and her fellow climate skeptics are wrong, and that manmade climate change is real. See Global Warming Real After All, Says Former Scientific Skeptic for some of the reasons why I think global warming is a real concern for all of us.

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But I also think that the reflexive hostility to environmental issues that exists on America's political right is a real concern for the rest of us.

Obviously, there will have to be federal (and international) responses to threats of climate change. Regions, states, and local governments, too, will have to get involved. And private industry, as well. And I can't imagine not imposing some sort of carbon tax, someday in the hopefully not-too-distant future.

Why a carbon tax? When we burn fossil fuels such as coal, oil, gasoline, and natural gas, byproducts of the combustion include carbon dioxide and other compounds that likewise contain carbon. They are given off as gases, and they hang around in the atmosphere for decades, providing a thermal insulating blanket to trap the sun's warmth. This is the "greenhouse effect." Carbon dioxide and the other long-lasting gaseous byproducts of fossil fuel combustion are "greenhouse gases."

Taxing the creation of greenhouse gases that contain carbon would stimulate producers of electric power and refiners of petroleum products to invest in alternative, sustainable technologies of energy production.

A carbon tax (or, alternatively, a cap-and-trade system that would likewise impose an extra cost on fossil fuel use) would impose a temporary burden on the economy, though. Down the road, after "green energy" technologies have become the norm, we'd probably have cheaper energy than we have now, but in the meantime, energy costs would go up.

Hence it would make little sense to tax carbon emissions if there were not even greater costs associated with the deleterious effects of global warming — such as much of Virginia's Middle Peninsula going under water.

So I definitely urge my fellow voters to take the threat of climate change seriously and not see it as a Trojan horse for internationalist conspiracies and scientific hubris.