Jared Blumenfeld

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September 15, 2008

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Jared Blumenfeld

San Francisco is drawing attention to itself with a multitude of unusual ideas. And behind it all is Jared Blumenfeld, a 38-year-old lawyer from England and director of the Department of the Environment. One of Blumenfeld's ideas was to print blue and yellow banderoles with the words "Future Sea Level".

Jared Blumenfeld turns to publicity stunts to warn of environmental hazards.

Attached at head height to buildings throughout the city, they gave people an idea of what would happen if sea levels rose. Blumenfeld is convinced that you can only get people passionate about environmental protection if it is fun. "If you can't get environmentalism right in San Francisco," says Blumenfeld, "you're not going to do it in other parts of the world. We have everything going for us here: the citizens, politicians, businesses."

A banderole warns of rising ocean levels.

San Francisco has a good public transport system and a moderate climate, which means energy requirements are relatively low since not a lot is needed for heating or air conditioning. Blumenfeld adds: "At 70 per cent, we have the highest recycling rate of any city in the US. London is about 19 per cent and New York City about 29 per cent. Our recycling goal is to be at 75 per cent by 2010 and to have zero waste by 2020. Our public transit system not only has the largest fleet of buses running on biodiesel in the United States, it also has the largest fleet of electric vehicles. And 86 hybrid buses just entered the fleet."

Get the full story by Mark de la Viña in the San Francisco edition of MINIInternational