Green Police Departments

It took all of Earth’s history to reach 1 Billion people by 1802. That number doubled in only 126 years. It is projected that by 2028, Earth will have 8 Billion residents. [14] Until recently, our oil-based infrastructure violently resisted attempts by others to introduce alternative energy ideas: The oil consortium claimed that the foreclosure of interdependent financial reserves would threaten national security and eliminate our economic leading edge abroad. [14] Oddly, the four economic pillars of our GNP do not include oil, and of those – only one remotely indentures sustainability.

The objective of this study is to address practical, energy efficient ideas that can be implemented at a local police department. These ideas can be implemented more efficiently at police departments because of reduced labor costs. When so many American industries have moved abroad to save 9,000% or more in labor costs, we can appreciate how probationers, prisoners, house arrestees and other incarcerated persons can be utilized to operate and maintain green facilities without receiving pay. These ideas can apply to any facility where free labor is provided, to include agricultural divisions at colleges and universities. [16]

Although nothing contained herein is intended to be antidotal, the similitude may be unavoidable at times. The chief benefit is that a green police department would place the department and the taxpayer in a ‘win-win’ situation.

Why is a green police department important?

When we look at a world energy graph, we can see that alternative energy is available in exponentially greater quantities than current oil reserves. Oil is limited. [3, 14, 19]

Mega = 1 Million Tera = 1 Billion Giga = 1 Trillion Pica = 1 Quadrillion

Every day, 89 PW of Solar energy reaches the Earth: If we could capture only 0.02% of that energy, it would meet the energy requirements of the entire planet.

Wind energy ranges between 300 TW and 370 TW constantly. If we captured only 5% of that energy, it would meet the energy requirements of the entire planet.

Coastal tides generate 3 TW of Tidal energy of which 1% is realistically exploitable. Geothermal energy within the Earth provides between 65 and 138 GW of usable energy. With a mare $1B investment, enough energy could be harnessed from the Earth to power the entire planet for several millennia. [19]

Why should anybody care about ‘green’ police departments?

When we recognize the huge concern surrounding depleting energy reserves and acknowledge that alternative energy has gone largely undeveloped, we feel a need to implement an energy efficient plan for exploratory purposes at a site where low cost labor is available. Police Departments are the only logical choice. [2, 10, 11]

Ideally, detention facilities would be grouped at a communal location where low flight-risk prisoners will live. This plan provides inmates with productive, purposeful work; makes the police department look resourceful to the media, and affords public satisfaction that their tax dollars are being maximized. [13] Once a successful model is demonstrated, other police departments may follow suit. This paper is intended to direct that endeavor.

What is sustainability anyway?

‘Sustainability’ was first coined by Ecologists to describe eco-systems that cycle perpetually: Animals, fauna and precipitation cycle through life and death so that the interdependency of different species in an environment maintain balance. The elimination of a key plant or animal species, for instance, could potentially disintegrate that environment’s sustainability. The lumber industry was the first industry to recognize the need for ecological sustainability by reseeding heavily deforested areas. The consequences for some actions, however, are irreversible. [17]

Why is sustainability important to police departments?

Sustainability shouldn’t be difficult but it is. The #1 adversary is apathy: If a problem can be ignored, then why recognize the problem? Unfortunately, our national ecological aptitude is extremely flawed. When the shift to alternative energy becomes imperative due to a finite quantity of oil, the transition will be greatly streamlined if the nation’s police departments have already converted. [18] Popular fears created by oil companies could be easily exploited by insurrectionist groups to instigate hysteria in paranoid sects that fear the apocalypse. Less excited citizens my simply need help. There could also be prohibitive costs involved i.e. Solar panels aren’t cheap.

So: How do we go green?

There are existing societies within the US that have used green technology all along. All of them are communal-theocratic societies that intermingle with the outside to varying degrees: The Eugenics-minded Hooterites in Montana have no aversion to modern technology and even solicit Germanic breeding stock in the local newspapers, where the Amish in Pennsylvania disdain telephones, cars and electricity altogether. [15] Police departments have a structured hierarchy that includes governing inmates who have lost their civil rights. Where participation in free communal societies is expected for hereditary reasons, police departments can conscript inmates to perform similar duties on the premises that inmates chose to have their rights suspended.

Methodology

a. The Key Objective:

The principal goal of a green police department is to generate surplus production using available low/no cost labor to maintain a self sustaining compound adjacent to a police department. The local PD would become the first government agency to model energy saving possibilities to a community that would, in turn, spread those ideas around.

b. How it compares to non-green PD’s:

There is the longstanding view by police and citizens alike that incarcerated persons soak up taxes for little or nothing in return. Where traditional alternatives are not meant to effect meaningful change, the ‘green PD’ model gives prisoners something constructive to do that economically benefits the PD and the public alike. The city may be able to afford sustainable commodities that are beyond the reach of moderate-income citizens. [2, 10]

The Purpose of a Green Environment

Prisoners are up at the indecent hour of 3:30 a.m. to prep cows for milking. Other prisoners have to cut firewood to provide heat for a steam driven sawmill. Wood would serve as the main energy source for hot water in any case. The horses have to be fed and harnessed for a days field work. The ploughs may need to be edged.

Although the department roof is covered with solar panels, modern alternative energy is used to run the department’s computers and office machines at night. Solar panels on the roof keep the building cooler in the summer. Water is drawn from a common well or piped in if necessary. There is nothing accessible to inmates that was invented after the year 1889, and not without guard supervision. [15]

Prisoners learn to live without modern amenities to segregate them from law abiding citizens. Criminals do not have the capacity to invent modern conveniences and therefore have no access to them. Role model prisoners might be given luxuries such as coal to run the steam engine or maybe a lantern to read by at night. Beyond that, all prisoners are ‘off-the-grid.’ If you don’t work – you don’t eat. If you don’t eat – nobody cares. Modern medical treatment is provided for unpremeditated accidents, however, ‘failure to eat’ is not considered accidental. Everything described would have been normal operating procedure 100 years ago. [15, 20]

What we improved:

Part I – An Agrarian Production Base allows for the cultivation of x number of State owned acreage to produce crops that can be realistically cultivated there. Such an environment permits the implementation of experimental cultivation technology provided that modern machinery is not used. [13] Since the State is picking up the tab whether the crop grows or not, hybrid and genetically altered seeds can be tested at green facilities. The facility would have one or two seasoned farmers to teach select inmates how to cultivate. Guards are posted on inaccessible elevated walkways so that inmates never forget where they are.

Successful crops can be consumed by the compound with the excess released to charitable organizations for distribution among the locals. The police department is given full credit for operating the facility at maximum efficiency by using non-P.O.S.T. certified officers for guard duty.

Once the exploratory model is sufficiently developed so that manning requirements are known, juvenile delinquents could be annexed to work during the day and quartered separately at night. The manning possibilities are limited only by the warden, whose imagination can produce additional bodies as he locates sources. As rough as this concept sounds – it was routine farming procedure 100 years ago.

Part II – Aspects of Ranch Operations are required to maintain the animals necessary for farming. Uncultivated pasture is needed to provide grazing ground for farm animals whether intended for slaughter or work; approximately 2 acres per animal depending upon available moisture. In a self sustaining environment, all feed for the animals must be grown and harvested on-site, so the concept of buying feed defeats the purpose. Inmates who possess any type of farming or ranching skill would be assigned to serve in that capacity. After demonstrating a degree of proficiency, he could teach other inmates. The State would hire a professional ranch hand to supervise operations. Unmotivated inmates would be relocated to a less accommodating facility.

Animal Husbandry is a valuable trade that could be learned in this kind of environment. Role Model inmates could be taught Ferrier skills. Prisoners who demonstrate exemplary aptitude and become quite accomplished, upon release, could teach new inmates ‘the ropes’ as a means for earning money for transitioning back into society. The surplus production from a sustainable facility could be distributed to the public as evidence of taxpayer relief since the goal of sustainability is to alleviate the need for full tax subsidies. Ideally – to not need any subsidy at all.

Part III – A Return for Taxpayer Investment makes dollars and sense. Imagine a police department with a prison population converted into a communal model to provide for and support an energy efficient police department. Such a model does not currently exist in the US. There are boys camps set up to help emotionally handicapped adolescents, and a few ‘mom-and-pop’ facilities that make unruly kids work for their meals, but nothing for manageable adult prisoners.

Since all prisoners are not alike, it would make sense that like-prisoners be housed with other like-prisoners so that Jeffrey Dahmer profiles are not housed with Martha Stewart profiles. Not every prisoner will want to work in a communal society like the one proposed, then again, there are many who would prefer constructive movement than to rot forever in a cell. This concept is not pleasurable, but it doesn’t reintroduce the ball-and-chain either.

Anything that shows the voting public that their money is being wisely spent is a step in the right direction. Who wouldn’t support an energy efficient police department? Imagine how an entire community can benefit when city planners can redirect taxes toward neglected and under funded projects, like replacing the long absent manhole cover next to the front-end alignment shop?

Part IV – Setting an Example for the World to follow requires a special kind of leadership expected from police departments. Although the commercial connotations are evident, the police are expected to endorse the morality of a product rather than pitch an abrasive hard sell for profit. This makes the transition from commercial to moral, more palatable to the public. For the logical minded: The police endorse energy conservation because it makes sense; because oil supplies are limited; because it sanctions and encourages the private sector to follow suit.

DISCUSSION

The alienation effect: Reporters are always looking for an angle to sell a better story, and a green PD concept ‘could’ be negatively portrayed as a foreboding sign of things to come. Citizens who are not inclined to think through a particular issue become vulnerable to clerical attacks by an ill-humored media. It would behoove the PD to designate an inside PR person to write press releases and invite public participation. Such actions prevent the possibility of an outside source leading public opinion the wrong way. Generally speaking, the novelty of ‘going green’ has a positive appeal to most media sources that tend to take a proactive approach to the subject. There is, however, always one reporter who seeks 15 minutes of infamy. Just make sure that nobody can find the body, and have a grain of salt handy.

“The most intriguing quality about this whole experiment is that opponents, antagonists, ACLU and conspiracy theorists alike can be adversely interned at such facilities to witness their greatest fears coming true. After 6-months detainment for questioning, they would be qualified to speak from personal experience,” said one advocate of the plan.

Biodegradable means Energy

There is a chicken farmer in Argentina who has so many chickens on his bus that he can power his bus using the methane produced by chicken poop. He has his energy supply already on board. Composts that accumulate vegetable and animal waste also produce the same type of methane that powers gas stoves, ovens and the farmer’s bus. It is primarily because people have a bourgeois aversion to the sanitation industry that virtually nothing has been done to harness the abundance of unnaturally produced methane. The very notion of harnessing flatulence in order to power a city bus, however unpalatable, is possible. [4, 7] Unless flatulence becomes a desperate last effort to procure energy, it is unlikely that methane will ever be exploited to its maximum potential. Natural methane is created by trapped pockets of biomass; virtually no difference in effect. There is speculation that enough methane exists on Capitol Hill to power the Solar System, but findings are inconclusive for inclusion here. This would explain the existence of solar energy if proven true.

What are some of the technical ideas?

There is insufficient space to list every innovation when new ideas are presented every day. The most conspicuous ideas include: Composting toilets, biodegradable plastics made from plants; using rainwater for toilets. [1, 2] Bio-diesel has outperformed petroleum-based diesel with greater power for less volume and fewer emissions. [1] Organic cleaning supplies, reusable paper products, biodegradable plastic bottles with tree seeds already inside. [5, 6, 8] Converting steel shipping containers into buildings; building an on-site wastewater treatment system ad infinitum. [9]

Any innovation that that encourages sustainability should be taken under advisement by city planners. Once any idea is proven viable, it makes sense that others will follow. [12] Most treasurers will agree that agencies do not have money to throw around now days.

Perhaps the greatest crime is the failure to act when the luxury of action is replaced by a mandate to survive. Even today, there are naysayer’s and skeptics who accuse sustainability advocates of dramatizing a non-existent concern. Those skeptics made ‘planned obsolesce’ an industrial norm, so that industries could profit perpetually to fix built-in flaws; those skeptics are the ones who say that smoking is good for you. To them, sustainability is an enemy to be squelched and oil is good to the last drop.

Those with the foresight to courageously leap into the sustainable frontier need not leap empty handed – this paper exists to guide you.

CONCLUSION

Since there remains to be seen a real live model in operation, it is the intention of this paper to elicit analytical feedback on the processes involved. A need for sustainability and a logical method of introduction has been presented. A rural police department that manages its own prisoners in an area with adequate acreage for cultivation would be an ideal location to assemble the minimum components and pilot this program. It would be inadvisable to sink millions of dollars into a comprehensive master plan until all of the separate elements can be successfully tested and assessed for feasible integration. This is a first step.

<>Since not every department is ideally situated and not every prisoner is ideally suited for the proposed environment, it may take the combined thrust of several communities to effect this kind of a plan. Those who venture today will become tomorrow’s authorities and technical experts.
<>

<>It is a field that will come.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Biodegradable plastic and plastic from plants: Retrieved April 15, 2007

From http://www.biotaspringwater.com/

2. A sustainable nightclub that uses rainwater for toilets: Retrieved April 15, 2007

From http://www.enviu.org/

3. Biodiesel: Retrieved April 17, 2007

from http://www.biodiesel.org/buyingbiodiesel/retailfuelingsites

4. Composting Toilets: Retrieved April 06, 2007

From http://www.envirolet.com/ , http://www.biolet.com/ , http://www.sun-mar.com/ and http://www.compostingtoilet.com/

5. Organic Cleaning Supplies: Retrieved April 09, 2007

From http://www.littlegreendifferent.com/

6. Reusable Paper: Retrieved on April 10, 2007

From www.recycle.net/Paper/used/index.html

7. Feces Into Methane (at a Rwandan prison) Retrieved on April 11, 2007
From http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/news/2005/07/68127

8. Biodegradable plastic bottles with tree seeds inside: Retrieved on April 18, 2007 From http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/03/AR2006080301454_pf.html

9. Steel Shipping Containers Converted Into Buildings: Retrieved on April 17, 2007 From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shipping_container_architecture

10. Creative Construction Concepts: Retrieved on April 18, 2007

From http://www.architectureandhygiene.com/

11. An Alternative to Cement Shoes: Retrieved on April 13, 2007

From http://www.eternalreefs.com/

12. Ten Best Examples of Green Buildings in 1999 Retrieved on April 14, 2007

From www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek06/0421/0421cote.cfm

Those best examples are: 1. CCI Center in Pittsburg, PA. 2. Denver Dry Building in Denver, CO. 3. Duracell’s HQ in Bethel, CT. 4. Georgia Tech Aquatic Center (Olympic Natatorium) in Atlanta, GA. 5. Kansas City Zoo Deramus Education Pavilion in Kansas City, MO. 6 . McKinney ISD Sustainable Elementary School in McKinney, TX. 7. Missouri Historical Society Museum at St. Louis, MO. 8. New York Life Building in Kansas City, MO. 9. Real Goods Solar Living Center in Hopland, CA. 10. REI Seattle Flagship Store at Seattle, WA.

13. Bleeding Edge Technology:

14. World Energy Resources and Consumption: Retrieved on April 14, 2007

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_resources_and_consumption

15. The Riddle of Amish Culture Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 28, No. 3 (Sep., 1989), pp. 379-380
From http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0021-8294(198909)28%3A3%3C379%3ATROAC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-Q

16. The Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education Retrieved on April 19, 2007

From www.emeraldinsight.com/1467-6370.htm

17. ASHARE Engineering for Sustainability Retrieved on April 18, 2007

From http://www.engineeringforsustainability.org/

18. Sustainability International Retrieved on April 16, 2007

From http://www.sustainabilityintl.org/

19. The Sustainability Institute Retrieved on April 15, 2007

From http://www.sustainabilityinstitute.org/

20. Audubon International Principles of Sustainable Resource Management

From http://www.auduboninternational.org/resources/principles.htm