OK, now on to writing about Public Menace #1 --trees, of the deciduous variety.
But first this -- I don't know whether anyone took to the podium tonight to laud trees for reducing air conditioning costs. There was an estimate quoted in the Takoma Voice, both online and in the newspaper, that claimed D.C. residents were saving $26 million a yr in lower AC costs because of all the trees in the nation's capital.
Reporting on a symposium held "a few years ago" at Brookside Gardens, a Voice columnist wrote:
"DC's trees filter out 540 tons of harmful air pollutants per year," according to Mark Buscaino, executive director of Casey Trees Endowment Fund. Mark also told us, "DC's trees also give us $26 million in annual air conditioning savings." Trees provide stormwater mitigation. They also offer direct economic and quality of life benefits. For instance, one study showed that urban streets with full tree canopies had more pedestrians. Trees pull people outdoors and subliminally encourage neighborhood interaction, which in turn lessens the local crime rate."Not true. Casey Trees confirmed today that the correct number is indeed the one that has been on their website since before the Voice article was published.
Here's what they say on their site:
Cooling Shade
Cities typically average 10 degrees hotter than suburban areas. Trees provide shade and give off water vapor to cool the city in the summer. Homes shaded by trees have 10-30% savings in air conditioning costs compared to homes without shade. The shade trees of DC save us more than $2.6 million in air conditioning costs per year.Some links for Takoma treenauts:
http://takomaparkmd.gov/clerk/agenda/items/2010/092710-9.pdf Packet for city council worksession is here (includes Tree Commission comments)
Patrick Earle's comments
City staff comments
Arborist's rating of Patrick Earle's tree:
"Note that he scored it a 4 out of 5 on structure, even when a 26" diameter branch was hollow enough to make it fall within a range that made it highly likely to fail," Earle said in an email today transmitting Bolton's scoring.
http://www.eswr.com/docs/tfea/aqweb.htm my air quality chapter for the TFEA
Email sent today to a university expert -- I should probably get his OK before I post all this, but I don't think he'll mind. I've called him "Dr. C------" (or is it Dr. C-----? Gettin' hard to read these dashes.)
Dr. C------:
As requested:
http://www.eswr.com/docs/tfea/aqweb.htm air quality chapter I wrote for the Task Force on Environmental Action report, which is available at that link minus the aqweb.htm (www.eswr.com/docs/tfea) That page also has a lot of links to other documents
www.greenourcity.org is a web page another fellow and I did about the quest to get leaf blowers banned
http://www.eswr.com/docs/tfea/blowersagin.htm a piece I wrote to convince the members of the Task Force that we should recommend banning gas-powered blowers in the city and move twds addressing lawn and garden eqpt's contribution to air quality problems.
http://nrs.fs.fed.us/people/dnowak USFS David Nowak's pagehttp://nrs.fs.fed.us/people/dnowak#pubs w/ publications
http://www.arborday.org/replanting/partnership.cfm Arbor Day Foundation and Forest Service's partnership
http://www.arborday.org/trees/benefits.cfm Benefits calculator from ADF (whoops, nope that's the one for public consumption)
http://www.arborday.org/calculator/index.cfm?utm_medium=TreeGuideMenu%2Bfeature&utm_campaign=TreeCalculator
http://www.davey.com/ask-the-expert/tree-calculator/national-tree-benefit-calculator.aspx probly the same thing from Davey Trees (heavily involved in Arbor Day Fdtn) (I figured out that the serviceberry planted in the right of way near my house is worth $11 yr in benefits.)
If it grows to 9 and a half feet, it'll be worth $24/yr
More to come on the topic of the decades in Takoma Park.
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