I had a good idea and now I have to do something about it.
I suggested to the Hack4Dean group (soon to be DeanSpace) that a Movable Type sidebar for MT webloggers would be a useful alternative to the full Drupal site they are developing.
So here's where I started when I saw that I needed help.
Google Search: "Movable Type" "Howard Dean"
Turns out Rick Klau set up the official Dean blog using MT. Here's his personal site:
Howard Dean in 2004 ::: A weblog by Rick Klau
UPDATE: And will this Dean thing be a sidebar or a plug-in? I don't know enough about all this yet. But I'm looking at this site for MT plug-ins:
He created the Macintosh computer. And he's a wild man.
ACM: Ubiquity - A Conversation with Jef Raskin
(via Bruce Sterling's weblog, Schism Matrix)
Sam Churchill at Daily Wireless is keeping up the posts on municipal wireless clouds. Here's his latest:
DailyWireless - More City Clouds
And he includes a link to an hour-long radio program on Wi-Fi:
94.9 KUOW: Seattle's NPR News and Information Station - Your Wireless Future
Ari Hershowitz at NRDC has been busy on this. Also check out his letter on the case.
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Dam appeal for privy council
"The privy council, the final court of appeal for Commonwealth countries, will be asked today for an injunction to stop a dam being built in Belize, the first time an environmental case has reached this level.
Detractors say the dam will provide only a small part of the electricity the country needs but destroy the best habitat for such endangered species as jaguars and tapirs, and nesting trees for the last 200 scarlet macaws in the country."
The Zapatistas have made more announcements this past week than in the last year (see this CNN.com story and this one in the San Francisco Chronicle). Today's announcement promises shortwave radio broadcasts to support the cause. They will start August 9th.
Mexican rebel movement announces radio broadcasts
"The announcement was part of a general invitation to a three-day party Aug. 8-10 that the Zapatistas plan in the village of Oventic, a few miles north of here."
And which side do I come down on? Let's check out both for the time being.
Small Times: GREENPEACE WADES INTO NANO DEBATE WITH REPORT THAT CALLS FOR CAUTION
From a cult to a movement. A report on the World Transhumanist Association conference at Yale University and the issues it raised.
The Village Voice: Features: Cyborg Liberation Front by Erik Baard
Okay, I'm a child of the Sixties. They have weblogs and websites now, in addition to radio.
Phil Austin's Blog of the Unknown
Inside the mind of Firesign Theatre
NPR : Firesign Theatre, Now Playing on NPR
From Alfonso, an article in Reforma on thermoelectric plans in Mexico. Towards an energy assessment of Boca del Cerro dam plans.
reforma.com --- Amagan parar termoeléctrica
Having too much fun on Cushing's Island, Maine, to sit at the computer. Thanks to Jason, Sue and Evan.
Here's a good page describing the RSS spec.
Technology at Harvard Law: RSS 2.0
Reuters AlertNet - UN rights envoy attacks Guatemalan dictator ruling
Nothing really new here, but it is a good summary of the situation in the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve, where illegal settlers and Zapatistas oppose eviction efforts by the government, Lacandon Indians, and Conservation International.
Rain forest sits at the center of Chiapas standoff | csmonitor.com
On his third appeal, Gen. Efrain Rios Montt has been granted the right to run for president of Guatemala.
Reuters AlertNet - Guatemala court lets ex-dictator run for president
From Ari at NRDC:
> Dear Friends of the Macal River Valley,
>
> Get your tickets for London: the Chalillo dam will be on trial before
> the highest court in the Commonwealth this month, the Privy Council of
> London, which has its hearings in a small hall near 10 Downing Street.
> The court date is tentatively set for July 30 and BACONGO has a truly
> stellar team of attorneys to argue the case. (continues below)
> The case against the dam has gotten stronger, and now has become a fight
> over the most basic of human rights: the right to a fair public hearing,
> and the right to equal protection of the law--i.e. a foreign billion
> dollar corporation should not have more rights than a citizen of
> Belize. Belize's government, in a move decried by local media as the
> policy of Fortis' Banana Republic, bulldozed a new Act through
> parliament that purports to make the dam legal, no matter what any court
> says. The law is unconstitutional, and may provoke a constitutional
> crisis, if Fortis acts upon it. The questions about individual
> enrichment in this scheme loom greater, and the international community
> will be investigating this dam not only as an attack on the environment,
> but on the rule of law, and on good governance.
>
> Below is an update, written in haste. For more information, contact me
> at ahershowitz@nrdc.org, though I will be in and out of touch this
> coming week. We hope to be updating the www.stopfortis.org site as
> well.
>
> We plan to have a gathering and strategy session for the continuing
> campaign with supporters in London in the days before the
> hearing--please let me know if you are interested in attending, or know
> someone who is.
>
> All the best,
> Ari
>
>
>
>
> Chalillo dam update, Belize
> July 14, 2003
>
> Highest Court to Judge Belize Dam this month: Unconstitutional law
> attempts to support dam construction
>
> Human rights in Belize are on the line, as the case against the
> Canadian-backed Chalillo dam will be heard by the highest court in the
> British commonwealth, the Privy Council in London, at the end of July.
>
> Belizean groups are asking for an injunction to stop dam construction.
> BACONGO, a coalition of Belizean environmental groups, will make its
> case that dam approval was rammed through the environmental approval
> process without a legally required public hearing, and without the basic
> studies of dam geology and archaeology that are required to know if the
> dam design is safe and to know the extent of ancient Maya sites that
> would be destroyed by the project.
>
> In an act of desperation, at the beginning of June, Fortis and the
> government of Belize, rushed through the "Macal River Hydro Development
> Act", also known as the "Fortis-is-above-the-law Act". The Act attempts
> to legalize the dam *despite the ruling of any court*, and "commands"
> BECOL, Fortis' local subsidiary, to build the dam. Experts in England,
> Canada and Belize say the Act is in direct violation of Belize's
> constitution and is likely to be overturned.
>
> Rushing ahead of the court ruling, Fortis has begun construction on the
> dam, even though the rainy season has started, making it a race against
> time, the weather and justice-any tropical storm could wash away
> Fortis/BECOL's structures, posing a safety risk to workers and
> downstream communities, and the court ruling may stop the dam
> construction in its tracks-that is if Fortis obeys the court order.
>
> BACONGO has lined up its legal team in England, including of some of the
> top environmental and constitutional experts. BACONGO and its
> international partners also plan to challenge the new
> Fortis-is-above-the-law Act in international human rights courts.
>
> BACONGO will also attack the economics of the dam-at $30 million US for
> a 2.9 Megawatt capacity project, it is one of lowest value
> hydro-electric dams in the world. Belizeans, who now pay the highest
> rates of electricity in Central America-nearly three times the price
> that their neighbors pay in Guatemala and Mexico-are demanding fair
> electricity rates. The international community is also beginning to
> scrutinize the financial deals behind the project, and follow the money
> trail to the individuals who stand to benefit.
>
Is this a good idea?
Thousands to Cast Ballots by Web in 2004 - EarthLink - Technology News
(via Jim Hightower's Weblog)
Roan McNab sent a long update on the situation in the Maya Biosphere of Guatemala. I have posted it below. (click MORE)
Other posts on this site about Roan's work:
The Daily Glyph: The Battle of El Peru
The Daily Glyph: Destruction of Maya Biosphere
I will follow up on the Rios Montt situation he mentions, and update this entry. Here's today's report from Prensa Libre in Guatemala. Still awaiting a decision.
Greetings from rainy Gainesville. Am here, brief home visit, awaiting
news on the Constitutional Court's decision in Guatemala, on whether the
shameless General and President of the Congress, Efrain Rios Montt, can
run for President in this November's national elections. As the highest
court of the land in Guatemala, many assume that the CC will uphold the
rulings already given in the three lower courts, including the Supreme
Court (CSJ), and the Elections Tribunal (TSE). The decision on this is
supposedly coming out today, this afternoon. May want to check
www.prensalibre.com tomorrow if interested.
The future of the Maya Forest will be affected by this election,
probably more so than any events in Mexico, and certainly even Belize -
even with the big lawsuit now moving to England. Although I fully
support Ari and the efforts of the NRDC, the potential impacts to the
Macal river, and the Maya Mountains section of Belize are miniscule in
scale compared to the impacts of chaos and sheer lack of law in the
Guatemalan section of the forest. We Maya forest lovers need to keep our
eyes on the prize....the big expansive tract that remains. The heart of
the forest, as in Maya times, lies in Guatemala. So this is why we hope
for a serious change in Gov. in Guatemala, in fact, we hope for
something along the lines of what happened recently to Arnoldo Aleman in
Nicaragua.... that the same happens in Guatemala. Fingers crossed. We
recently discovered, for example, that two Alcaldes Auxiliares, the ones
from San Andres (ie containing Lag. del Tigre Nat Park), and the one
from San Luis (South Central Peten), not only have huge agarradas up in
LdT, but are fomenting the invasions into those areas in exchange for
votes, promising to legalize portions of the land cleared for the
invaders - while the rest goes to the scumbag rich terratenientes.
Increasingly, poor campesinos are merely used by rich cattle ranchers to
simply clear land.
There have been a number of stories in the press about the situation in
the Maya Biosphere, esp the area around El Peru where the Macaws nest,
and where Dr. David Freidel has initiated an important archaeological
investigation of this site, which supposedly served as the site from
which Tikal was conquered in an alliance with Teotihuacan in approx 340
AD.
> http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=ourWorldNews&storyID=2986332&
>
>
This link above supposedly leads to an article on the El Peru area, just
north of the San Pedro near Paso Caballos, which contains a majority of
the macaw nests known in Guatemala. we are in a battle to save this
site. Unfortunately, CI-ProPeten, and CI-Canan Kaa'x managed nearly $18
million of AID funds to consolidate the Maya Biosphere, much of it
destined to Laguna del Tigre National Park, with almost NO results to
show for it right now. LdT is total chaos, we are struggling to save
some 30-50,000 Ha of the 289,000 park, the largest park in Central
America. Conservative estimates indicate that at least 70% of the park
burned this year alone! Invaders, armed people, timber traffic, cattle
ranching, mojados, and the Big D word too. All a bummer when it comes to
biodiversity.
So....life in the last 6 months consisted mainly of coordinating a
strategy to save what we can in the El Peru area, while keeping a
watchful eye on the entry of the IDB into Uaxactun via Tikal. This
project, called Mundo Maya, now proposes a $8 million investment in
Uaxactun, paving the road from Tikal for $5.77 million, of course, a
loan to the country of Guatemala. 23 kilometers. The IDB's secret
documents (which we have attained) estimate 30,000 people visiting
Uaxactun in just the first year after paving. In the current climate of
the total lack of the rule of law, we easily imagine the native Uaxactun
people being displaced by a massive influx of tourism
interests...thereby undermining (destroying ?) the local Non-timber
culture which has conserved that area for more than 80 years. What is
worse, is the local people of Uaxactun have not been consulted, desite
IDB claims to the contrary. So we have, at the village's request,
provided them with over 150 copies of the most relevant documents in our
possession. The village recently sent a letter, two letters, to the Pres
of Guatemala, and the pres of IDB, Enrique Iglesias, declaring their
inconformity with the plans, clarifying that they have not been
consulted, and rejecting the road outright. These letters can later be
provided to people who may find them useful.
So, while we struggle to save the parts of the Guatemalan forest most
under pressure (Laguna del Tigre, Lacandon), the threats to the solid,
INTACT, eastern MBR are increasing as the King Vulture IDB/PPP prepares
to land (escorted, shielded, by CI).
In Lacandon, the Guatemalan section continues to become more isolated as
an island of intact, highly diverse, forest surrounded by a rising sea
of humanity. As y'all know, Lacandon is probably the most biologically
diverse part of the Maya Biosphere, due to the presence of water and the
exaggerated relief of the Sierra. An interesting aside, Mac Chapin of
Native Lands came through Flores and the Peten recently, towed by Nacho
March of CI as CI attempts to engage Native Lands in some aspect of
either their Maya Forest Ecoregional Plan (called the CEPF of the 5 Maya
Forest countries, Mex, Gua, Bz, Sal, Hon), or the IDB/Mundo Maya
Initiative of which CI is a partner. Yes, that is not a typo. Now CI
works in Uaxactun, or will be shortly, along with CounterPart
International. CI - "working to conserve Uaxactun through the
development of ecotourism".......I can just see it now.
Pues, Mac Chapin showed the Map he recently did for Nat Geo, I assume
y'all have seen it. Quite interesting. A map of Mesoamerica showing
Ethnic/Lingusitic distributions on one side, and the state of the forest
on the other.
Mac said "the one over-riding trend we see across the isthmus is
FRAGMENTATION". And he was candid about that being very much the case
within the Indigenous lands being managed by local/native peoples. He
detailed the fragmentation ocurring in Mexican Lacandon. Wow. massive.
However, to really ride this train o' thought, y'all may want to check
out the recent article by Bill Weinberg in the May/June issue of NACLA,
Volume XXXVI, No. 6, entitled "Mexico: Lacandon Selva Conflict Grows".
Interestingly, it has the subtitle: "In Mexico's Lacandon jungle, poor
settlers claim environmentalists are aiding government counterinsugency
and development plans".
Hmmmm. Not us. But, w/ no rule of law not jack shit will ever be saved.
A dilemma to say the least. Now I wonder.....are they "settlers"....or
"invaders". Which is it. That word says it all, and if one supports the
notion of national land dedicated to conservation...well....it seems to
me it should be illegal to independently "settle" national land esp. if
there are no prior land claims or standing.
So....as pressure mounted throughout the fire season and the increasing
invasions of conservation lands, I screamed and screamed until finally I
travelled to Guatemala to present the case of the MBR to the Ambassador
of the UN (MINUGUA), Mr. Tom Koenigs. Very interesting discussion with
the head of a mission often accused of protecting Human (ie Invader's)
Rights over the need to uphold the rule of law (ie. According to the
law, invasions of national park land are illegal, and this land can not
be bought or sold for personal gain). Ironically, I had, at that time,
been marching with the Gua military and police looking for invaders, to
have a dialogue with them, and make it clear that they would not be
allowed to settle in these park areas, despite having cut and torched
the areas already. We were telling them they would go to jail if they
remain. After the dialogue with Mr. Koenigs, I felt satisfied that
indeed the UN supports the UNESCO-recognized Maya Biosphere
Reserve.....(a relief indeed)...as a site of world importance. And we
convinced him that the UN needed to update their land conflict
classification scheme to include a category which more accurately
reflects the current situation: ALL OUT ARMED INVASIONS.
Then, two weeks ago the US Ambassador came to visit. I guided an
overflight with the Gov of Peten, the Ambassador and all his staff,
Marie Claire, personnel of CONAP Peten, etc etc....we stuck all their
noses right in the worst of it all, open borders, the Usu river, the
Cenotes and the Macabilero area, all the invasions in Lacandon and
Laguna del Tigre, the huge illegal and untouchable (narco) cattle
ranches around Laguna Mendoza (SW Lacandon), the NEW narco landing strip
chopped right next to the Guayacan lagunas in NE Lacandon, and tons and
tons of burned forest, finally ending with a view of intact forest
around Tikal and Uaxactun.
A high impact flight. We discussed with him our concerns re the dam, re
the PPP road or Mundo Maya passing from Tikal to Uaxactun to Mexico. And
we suggested that if a big artery is needed to communicate the Peten to
Mexico, then it would make the most sense (environmentally) to place it
where the road is planned for El Naranjo/El Ceibo, at the corner between
Laguna del Tigre and Lacandon....that entire area is already trashed as
it is. Mitigation would be needed, but the risk of env. catastrophe
there would certainly be lower. Al fin, the Amb pledged support for our
efforts. It seemed sincere. FYI, this man is a career diplomat....he
obviously must toe the line on some things, such as the policies in
middle east and Iraq, but he is a life long birder, and lover of nature.
Was in Peru as US Amb during the fall of Fujimori....read into this that
he is a strong Ambassador, and has been sent to Gua to solve problems. I
wish him the best....he certainly has his work cut out for him. Now that
Nicaragua is being cleansed by the Saintly President Enrique
Bolanyos....with Aleman in jail (!!!!), Guatemala is clearly the biggest
bruise remaining on America's sexy thin wasteline.
Regarding the Jaguar study, we are kicking it off this month. Joe is
headed to Peten today, and will start mapping the Macabilero area next
week I believe. I am trying to purchase and transport to Peten some
camera traps, and we expect to start trapping in mid August or Sept.
Some small delays, but still on track. We expect to execute 3 separate
2-month trapping sessions over the span of a year, say from Sept 2003 -
August 2004. Each 2 month trap session will provide us with a figure for
the number of distinct individual Jaguars detected in the area, this
based on their unique spot patterns. The sessions are limited to 2
months to avoid violating the important assumption that there is no
ex/in-migration from/into the areaduring the time of the study. The
three sessions will be averaged to provide one number which includes
changes in Jag density during different seasons, over time, etc. Some
data on the abundance of game species, deer, game birds, will also be
collected via line transects to allow us to compare the richness of the
Macabilero area with the good data set we already have from line
transects around La Quetzal (UMI), and Los Pozitos, just ENE of Bethel.
So, this is where the Jag study in Macabilero stands, now getting
underway. Will have a lot more information on this in about 4-5 weeks
after returning to Peten and talking to Joe.
Lastly, last week I received a map of the areas to be flooded by the
dams on the Usumacinta. This was a projection made by Joep Luitjen, of
NRDC, and Ari Hershowitz. It shows the impacts according to various dam
heights, per the dam locations selected....one clear thing is that the
Macabilero area where we plan to study Jags would be very very
threatened. I suggest y'all get in touch with Joep (really really great
guy), and ask him for a copy of this map, as well as the map of the
projected deforestation resulting from a highway from Tikal north to
Mexico.
In Counterpunch, a report on the U.S. government's 3 year old Plan Colombia, 1.3 billion dollars to fight the war on drugs.
(While we wait for the decision whether Rios Montt will be allowed to run for president of Guatemala.)
SOA Watch: Training Colombia's Killers in the US
From the report:
Many of the Colombian officers cited in the reports graduated from the School of the Americas (SOA) - a US military training institution for Latin American soldiers - and certainly the strategy of using paramilitary groups for the military's dirty work is nothing new for SOA students.
Roberto D'Aubuisson established the Death Squads that were responsible for much of the violence in El Salvador in the 1980's, and Benedicto Lucas Garcia masterminded the creation of the Civil Defense Patrols in Guatemala. Mexico's Jose Ruben Rivas Pena, who took the SOA's elite Command and Staff Course, called for the "training and support for self-defense forces or other paramilitary organizations in Chiapas."
Today is Bastille Day for the French. Something about their revolution (help me out here, they stormed the prison, right?).
It is also the day in 1958 of a coup against the British-backed monarchy in Iraq. It is celebrated as their National Day.
And today marks the one-year anniversary of this weblog. My thanks to everyone who has helped me, and to all who hiked with me on this trek through jungle and technology.
Busilha Falls - Usumacinta March 2003
Howard Dean will guest-blog on Larry Lessig's site while Larry's on vacation.
The Slashdot post about it got some interesting debate. Dean's campaign manager Joe Trippi responded:
Why? Why the Hell Not? (slashdot comment)
It's not like a nice bit of pottery or a carved piece of limestone. My life's work in TV is pretty much gone with the wind. Good that it's not clogging up the land fills. But what will remain of me?
Economist.com | Storing e-text for centuries
(by way of The Rogue Librarian -- Shooshin'and stampin')
Also:
Digital Archiving: The Impossible Dream?
And a bit more technical, with more links:
Digital Archiving in the New Millennium (PDF)
Someone recently told me XML was as big a cultural advance as the printing press. Hah! But maybe I'll get with it some day.
When I get old and geeky. Or next week at night hiding from the mosquitoes.
For Catherine, a program at Cornell that is refurbishing bikes and sending them to Chiapas.
Briefly in Tompkins - ithacajournal.com
From an ex-scriptygoddess, PHP tutorials.
php woe(); - Fumbling through PHP one script at a time
Apple won't bring it out for its Airport products until the end of the year (with the new Panther OS) but this may shut up the doomsayers about Wi-Fi security holes (as in today's NY Times magazine).
Tom's Hardware Guide Networking: Need-To-Know: Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) - Introduction
UPDATE: More on wireless security from Daily Wireless, including quotes from the Times Magazine article.
Complete text of 610,000 weblogs, regularly updated. Just in case.
(via Boing Boing)
Music has always been wireless. At least in the last inch. Someday I'll revamp my home MIDI system and make a little music again. Now Wi-Fi meets MIDI in more capable control systems than the 20-year-old MIDI spec ever envisioned.
So I wrote a rant that I was ready to send in to the Hack4Dean email list. I urged them to abandon the consensus-based style that ruled their development process and let a leader emerge to make this the Manhattan Project it should be, to beat the Republicans to it. Then I thought better, and decided to sleep on it.
But before I slept, I looked again at what they were actually doing on their development websites, and I was amazed again at the intelligence and dignity of these "hackers". One example, from Aldon Hynes' Movable Type weblog, one of several he set up as tests, towards the Americans for Dean nodes:
Daily Wireless has a compendium of information about picturephones and the various plans the cellular companies are offering. Still too expensive in my opinion, and though nifty, it is a trend I can resist a little longer.
DailyWireless - Picturephone Update
The team of Susana Hayward and Janet Schwartz have another story on Knight-Ridder online, about the popular Mexico City mayor (his father is from Palenque) who may have a shot at the Mexican presidency.
This kit allows the Airport Extreme Base Station to be powered through the ethernet cable, for remote or outdoor installations. The same company has a kit for the original base station. The extreme kit is $90, the other $30. Why?
Best summary of RFID - tiny chips that will be imbedded in every product. Turns out I'm already driving around with one, in the EZpass that lets you drive through toll booths and get billed wirelessly.
The Register - RFID Chips Are Here
From my Dad's alma mater.
Lab Cultures Used to Create a Robotic 'Semi-Living Artist'
A picture-drawing robot in Perth, Australia whose movements are controlled by the brain signals of cultured rat cells in Atlanta.
Joel Skidmore, at Mesoweb, has a new link to the Peabody Museum website, which has a page on the San Bartolo murals in Guatemala. Bill Saturno discovered them in March, 2001, and Heather Hurst did the drawings that June. You can find Heather's work on the San Bartolo site.
Early Maya Murals at San Bartolo, Guatemala
San Bartolo - Research
(Run your mouse over the far left "trowel" icon to see one of Heather's drawings)
Charles Golden has recently returned after his first season doing a survey of Maya sites between Yaxchilan and Piedras Negras, on the Guatemalan side of the Usumacinta River.
Charles will be completing a report on the survey sometime this summer.
Time to post again this link to the Homepage of the Sierra del Lacandon Regional Archaeology Project.
The map above (click for a larger image) should help orient folks who are new to this weblog and to the campaign to prevent the construction of dams on the river.
ScienceDaily News Release: New Catalyst Paves Way For Cheap, Renewable Hydrogen
Thanks to Analia Gonzalez for sending me this letter from the InterAmerican Development Bank, dated March 19, stating that they are not providing funds for the Boca del Cerro dam, nor have they received such a request. They are funding power transmission and rural electrification projects only, they say, not power generation.
However the $240 million that the IDB agreed in 2001 to loan to the System of Electrical Interconnection for the Countries of Central America (SIEPAC) does make building the dam, and selling the electricity, more attractive.
This is for my older son, Mick, who's leaving for grad school at Stanford this fall.
NWC | Centerfold | Security | Authentication Gets Into Stanford | | June 26, 2003
Good collection of info and links on several ways to create a weblog, including Movable Type, Blogger, etc., and on MT plug-ins and templates. Josh and Zack ought to make an Americans for Dean plug-in.
Brainstorms and Raves - BUILD ONE
From Electrolite
“The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.”
(James Madison)
“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
(Benjamin Franklin)
“Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.”
(William Pitt)
One part of me is singing:
...and the packets' red glare, wi-fi bursting on air...
and another parts screams out the Who:
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss...
So I get down on my knees and pray we don't get fooled again!
The Who sang that before Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush I, Clinton, and Bush II.
Next?
A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to be present at the birth of a new approach to electronic democracy. The hack4Dean crew is a group of young programmers and activists who are developing a node-based, viral tool for political organizing. So far I've only met Josh Koenig in person, but fellow founding father Zack Rosen gave an interview to Wired News this week that explains what they are up to.
Wired News: Netizens Rally for Dean Team
For my small contribution to the effort, I get the eastvillage.fordean.net node. And first spot in the database. And a seat on the sidelines to toss in suggestions. Oh beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of online participatory democracy!
This report, THE BARRIERS TO BOCA DEL CERRO, confirms that not only is the Bocal del Cerro dam still underway, but 4 other "small" dams are still being studied.
This is a summary of opposition to the Boca del Cerro dam. It appeared in a publication called "Water Power and Dam Construction" on March 31, 2003, three days after the governor of Tabasco said there would be no dams. He had CFE's word on it.
From the article:
"CFE, however, remains poker-faced about its plans. The closest it has come to an explanation is a news statement that: 'No project exists to build a high dam curtain on the Usumacinta River. Many years ago the CFE cancelled a project with those characteristics.'
But an internal CFE report obtained by the author suggests the electricity commission may have found sites for the 'five little dams' agreed last summer. According to a reliable source, this internal report appeared in late October and is the CFE's latest plan for the Usumacinta river."
"...The report does not indicate Boca del Cerro has been cancelled. It appears on the project map alongside the four new dams, although it is not mentioned in the report.
CFE spokesman Ignacio Cabrera confirmed that feasibility studies were being carried out with regard to the four dams. These studies, according to the report, must be done in Guatemala as well as Mexico."
Here's the link, to a site of Plan Puebla Panama information that printed it in its entirety. I am going to do the same. You'll find it below.
INFORMACION PPP 2003 - THE BARRIERS TO BOCA DEL CERRO
INSIGHT MEXICO; THE BARRIERS TO BOCA DEL CERRO
Mexico's plans to tap the energy of the Usumacinta are highly controversial, as Jason McGahan explains
It has been at least 30 years since engineers from Mexico's Federal Commission of Electricity (CFE) first surveyed southeastern Mexico and learned just how much electricity can be generated at Boca del Cerro.
The site lies at the point where the most torrential river in Mesoamerica, the Usumacinta, rushes at its greatest velocity out of the rugged Chiapan Highlands into a narrow canyon before being released onto the broad plains of Tabasco. A dam at this spot could potentially generate 4200MW.
The locals call it Boca del Cerro, or mouth of the hill. But for the engineers at CFE, it is the punishment of Tantalus. Twice already they have announced plans for the dam that have not been realised. The third attempt is currently under intense scrutiny.
The previous attempts to realise the potential of the site were during the administrations of Miguel de la Madrid in 1988 and Carlos Salinas in 1992. But they failed because although the site's potential is unmatched in Mexico, a dam at Boca del Cerro would flood a large expanse of jungle known as the Lacandon that is famed for its biological diversity, archeological ruins and insurgent indigenous population.
The question of who would finance the project is also unanswered. Mexico's constitution explicitly forbids foreign investment in its energy sector.
President Vicente Fox can circumvent this protectionist measure through the CFE's 'external producer programme', in which foreign investors must sell nearly all the electricity they produce back to the CFE. But the more lucrative independent producer programmes have been stalled since a Supreme Court ruling last spring found them unconstitutional. Fox's subsequent attempt at a constitutional amendment has been met with bitter opposition. Electricity reform in Mexico has no timetable.
An additional complication is the site's location near Mexico's border with Guatemala and the near-certainty that floodwaters would inundate part of the Peten jungle in northwestern Guatemala. The political problem of the effect on Guatemala are more difficult to solve, as opposition in that country has proven itself uninterested in the electricity it would receive from the project.
Binational progress
Despite the barriers, a binational dam agreement has been announced between Mexico and Guatemala, following a 28 June summit meeting of Central American leaders in Merida, Yucatan. Fox and Guatemalan president Alfonso Portillo announced they would co-operate on 'five small dams' along the Usumacinta where it constitutes the Mexican-Guatemalan border.
The agreement also marked Mexico's late entrance into an project already begun between the governments of Central America to create a regional power grid connecting six other countries: Guatemala, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica and Panama. Granted a US$240M loan by the Inter-American Development Bank in December 2001, the System of Electrical Interconnection for the Countries of Central America (SIEPAC) is moving forward with a price tag of US$320M.
Working within the framework already formed by SIEPAC in Central America, Fox agreed to share with Guatemala the hydroelectricity to be generated by the dams in southern Mexico. For his part, Portillo must prepare northwestern Guatermala to accept part of the inundation.
For Fox, the dam construction and interconnected energy grids are key steps in his regional development plan, the Plan Puebla Panama. Once these developments are in place, Fox wants to see inland ports, irrigation projects, hotels and foreign-owned factories in Mexico's tropical southeast. He also foresees Mexico taking part in plans to industrialise the length of the Central American isthmus from Guatemala to Panama.
However, the Boca del Cerro project, considered by many to potentially be the most productive in the region, has been beset by bad publicity since it was announced.
An article in the New York Times on 12 October 2002 warned that the ruins of two ancient Mayan civilisations would be inundated by a dam at Boca del Cerro. CFE moved quickly to announce it had scaled back the size of the dam from 130m to 25m, and that the fears of the archeologists were unfounded. But complaints from archeologists continued. In November, a set of well-preserved Mayan cave paintings was discovered just a few kilometers from the dam site.
Archeologists from Mexico's National Institute of Archaeology and History (INAH) who were performing feasibility studies for the CFE estimated that as many as 220 Mayan sites would be flooded. The INH also claimed it was alienated by a lack of information from CFE, eventually publishing an open letter in the daily newspaper Reforma on 22 December, saying that its archeologists had not received any definitive technical plans from the CFE regarding Boca del Cerro.
Environmentalists have begun to publish their opinions in the Mexico City dailies and the project remains in the spotlight. CFE, however, remains poker-faced about its plans. The closest it has come to an explanation is a news statement that: 'No project exists to build a high dam curtain on the Usumacinta River. Many years ago the CFE cancelled a project with those characteristics.'
But an internal CFE report obtained by the author suggests the electricity commission may have found sites for the 'five little dams' agreed last summer. According to a reliable source, this internal report appeared in late October and is the CFE's latest plan for the Usumacinta river.
New dams
Four new dams are being considered to the south of Boca del Cerro along an 89km stretch of the Usumacinta where it forms Mexico's border with Guatemala. None of the four dams is to exceed 19m in height, and each would take advantage of the Usumacinta's northward descent through the Chiapas highlands. The four dams, as they appear on the project map from north to south are: La Linea, 13m; El Provenir, 17m; Isla el Cayo, 17m; and Yaxchilan, 19m. Since the river flows from south to north, all four dams would precede Boca del Cerro, and thus reduce its potential generating capacity. CFE calculates the four dams would have a total installed potential of 2100MW.
The report does not indicate Boca del Cerro has been cancelled. It appears on the project map alongside the four new dams, although it is not mentioned in the report.
CFE spokesman Ignacio Cabrera confirmed that feasibility studies were being carried out with regard to the four dams. These studies, according to the report, must be done in Guatemala as well as Mexico.
'A great limiting factor is to make good use of the river without altering its course,' said Cabrera. 'Dams that alter the course of the river must not be built. We want to avoid inundations.' To this end, the CFE would build these dams so they would be barely visible above the surface of the river.
Generating capacity
One critic of the plan says it would reduce generating capacity and thus rob Mexico of a powerful energy resource. Manuel Frias Alcaraz is an ex-CFE engineer and he said: 'Boca del Cerro is Mexico's most important project, and it's most productive. The Usumacinta is a virgin river. It is the axis of all the other rivers in the region.'
Frias said 25m is too short for a dam on the Usumacinta. He said erosion will clog the dam with mud and offer a smaller return on investment.
He is perhaps the most vocal supporter of the original 130m dam. 'We have to make use of our natural resources,' he said, adding that a dam of this size would accelerate a number of other plans for the region.
For example, it could provide water for the irrigation projects being planned for the Yucatan Peninsula and energy for the inland port being planned for Villahermosa, Tabasco.
'The government says this project would generate a lot of social conflict,' said Frias. 'On the contrary, it will resolve problems of social character through the creation of jobs. It will make social spending unnecessary.'
The Mexican government is taking a more cautious approach with regard to the people of Chiapas, as shown by the frequent references to 'political viability' in the CFE report.
This is not surprising. In addition to outraged environmentalists and archeologists in the region, the insurgent Zapatista Army of National Liberation remains an important factor.
Although voluntarily disarmed for several years, the Zapatistas made front-page news for their New Year's Eve descent into the tourist-heavy city of San Cristobal de Las Casas. Twenty-five thousand indigenous from the region marched into the central plaza wearing ski masks and brandishing machetes and torches. After a series of fiery speeches from the principal command, the rank and file fanned out into the plaza, breaking windows and lighting a bonfire in the central plaza. The stretch of river reserved for the four dams plus Boca del Cerro is known to be inhabited by Zapatista rebels.
'The reality is that the project must be socially viable,' said CFE director of project investments Eugenio Laris Alanis. '(It must be) as socially viable for the investors as it is for the people.
'As of now, we have no investors, because we have no project. We are only doing site studies.' And he pointed out that 'These are projects that, when their moment comes, must pass through the Guatemalan government'.
Dam studies
Studies have been completed for dozens of dams in southeastern Mexico, particularly in the tropical state of Chiapas. And binational dam sites are not restricted to the Usumacinta river. The rivers that form the Usumacinta watershed have been studied by CFE. Two dams known as Huixtan I and Huixtan II along the Santo Domingo river, an important tributary to the Usumacinta, are under consideration. Three other dam sites have also been studied for the same watershed, on the rivers Jatate, Tzaconeja, and Lacantun.
'The directors of the CFE tell me there are many groups on the Guatemalan side that don't want this project because it will destroy their land,' said Frias Alcaraz. 'But the Guatemalan government wants the project because the country lacks electricity.'
He adds 'It has reached a level of international politics where everyone asks himself, 'which is the most palatable scenario?'
Copyright 2003 Wilmington Publishing Limited , Water Power & Dam Construction, March 31, 2003
Here's a recent report, in Spanish, from Guatemalans who took a trip in June from Bethel to Boca del Cerro and saw signs that the dam construction is moving ahead.
In a section of background information, it mentions our letter to Mexican president Vicente Fox.
Noticias - Sigue temor en Petén
I haven't switched to Safari as my browser, still using Mozilla. One thing I did notice when I tried Safari was that the bookmarklet that I used to post to Movable Type didn't work.
Now Dori of Backup Brain has posted 2 versions of bookmarklets for those with a similar problem.
UPDATE: Finally did it. Here's how - drag the link from Backup Brain to your bookmarks bar. It won't work yet. As Dori says, you have to edit the javascript to point to your mt installation. How the heck do you do that? I'm no programmer. Click More to see the whole process.
Just go to the Bookmarks menu for Safari, choose "Show all bookmarks" and when you see the list for the bookmarks bar, the bookmarklet will have a line of code instead of a URL. Click in it and use the arrow keys to get to the point where you see http:// then replace everything after that up to the /mt.cgi with your URL for your installation. Here's what it looked like for me:
BEFORE:
javascript:t=window.getSelection();void(window.open('http://path%20to%20your%20MT%20installation%20here/mt.cgi?is_bm=1&bm_show=trackback,category&__mode=view&_type=entry&link_title='+escape(document.title)+'&link_href='+escape(window.location.href)+'&text='+escape(t),'_blank','scrollbars=no,width=410,height=550,status=yes,resizable=yes,scrollbars=yes'))
AFTER:
javascript:t=window.getSelection();void(window.open('http://gomaya.com/mt/mt.cgi?is_bm=1&bm_show=trackback,category&__mode=view&_type=entry&link_title='+escape(document.title)+'&link_href='+escape(window.location.href)+'&text='+escape(t),'_blank','scrollbars=no,width=410,height=550,status=yes,resizable=yes,scrollbars=yes'))
And then you have your mt bookmarklet again, in Safari, to post web pages. You may never have to learn html.
Joel Skidmore at Mesoweb has created a new feature, beautifully designed: a series of informal articles by David Stuart, Peabody Museum, Harvard University.
Whenever Doc Searls posts a link to my weblog I feel like I have to clean up the place, greet new visitors.
Here's the story - besides working on projects in the Maya region, primarily in Chiapas, Mexico, I'm looking for bandwidth for a community wireless network in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. With me so far?
First step in the Wi-Fi plan is building a comunity center to house the The Lower Eastside Girls Club and other groups. We have site control of a city-owned lot, where we "broke ground" this summer for a farmers market every weekend. When the building is completed, it will have a green roof, with antennas giving away free broadband to the housing projects and surrounding neighborhood.
Check the archives in the right column for more of these and other stories. Go ahead, poke around!
Modern cultural icons as pre-columbian sculptures.
(via Boing Boing)
An update on the crisis in Guatemala. This story focuses on the Laguna del Tigre reserve, which I visited last year. It is one of the last refuges of the scarlet macaw.
Latinamerica Press: Mayan Biosphere under siege
From the report:
Carlos Albacete, director of the environmentalist non-governmental Tropico Verde, noted another observation: "Curiously, if you overlay satellite photos of the heat foci on the map of oil concessions, it turns out that there is a concentration of these red points over the [oil] leasing areas." If these protected lands were already destroyed by fire, oil explorers would have an easier time of it in an anticipated land-use struggle with the environmentalists.
I also received today a shorthand report from Roan McNab, who works in the region with Wildlife Conservation Society. He recently did a flyover with the American Ambassador, other officials, and press. He is quoted in this story from Reuters:
Reuters AlertNet - FEATURE-Rare macaws in peril as Guatemala jungle shrinks
When I saw him in April he was tired and depressed. This message shows him still tired but a bit more optimistic, at least about officials understanding the problems. His note can be found below.
...so fried I can't spell bizzzzy. Amb Hamilton just left, 2 day visit. Flew over MBR [Maya Biosphere Reserve] with emb staff, MCP [Marie-Claire Paiz, director of the Sierra Lacandon National Park] and I detailed the threats to the future of the greatest reserve in Meso region as the Cessna Caravan glided over the burned and unburned zones, Usu river, cenotes, LdT and Macaw habitat, Uaxactun, Tikal. Impact high. Gov of Peten on board, CONAP, Press, all heard MCP's concerns re represa [dam], the impt of the area, jag [jaguar] study, invasions, landing strips. Their own eyes saw. Later Amb made public recog of env leaders, thanked Peten conap for well done job, and lauded the impt of la lucha. Guided birds in Tikal in am, the man loves birds. Good Amb. I have hope for the future. Jag study starts next month with mapping of trails, [camera] trap sites...
RBM