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“Green Drinks” Catching On

by Melinda Tuhus | Aug 21, 2008 8:52 am

(8) Comments | Commenting has been closed | E-mail the Author

Posted to: Arts, Environment

nate%20and%20julie.jpg Nate Bixby was on his way in to Wednesday night’s Green Drinks at Geronimo’s on Crown Street; Julie Newman was on her way out. These two environmental movers and shakers chatted for a few minutes before going their separate ways — and demonstrated why this year-old event is catching on.

Bixby is president of Havens for the Future (subtitled “restoring community health and wholeness in the greater New Haven bioregion”). Newman heads up Yale’s Office of Sustainability. They were just two of dozens of people who came out for the once-a-month gathering that brings environmentally concerned New Haveners together to network and to learn about local environmental campaigns.

justin%20and%20woman-1.jpg Green Drinks is unaffiliated with any environmental organization. It happens in Hartford, in Fairfield County, and other cities around the country and the world. New Haven’s co-organizer, Justin Elicker (pictured on the left with Diana Bercury, who installs solar panels with Milford-based Sunlight Solar Energy, the state’s largest such installer), said the first one he attended was organized by friends in Hong Kong. When he came to Yale to pursue a joint degree from the forestry school and the School of Management, he wanted to learn about the environmental scene and who was doing what, but had trouble finding one spot where people could interact and network.

emmett%20pepper.jpg Each month’s gathering also includes a speaker on a topic of local environmental interest. The speaker this month was Emmett Pepper, from Concerned Citizens for the Environment. The group claims 80,000 members in New York (where it began 20 years ago) and Connecticut (where it opened an office in New Haven last year). The group played a role in convincing New York Gov. David Paterson to nix the Broadwater liquid natural gas terminal in Long Island Sound right after he took office in the spring.

The group’s current campaign focuses on getting the Millstone nuclear power plant in Waterford to upgrade its cooling system to reduce the number of fish killed and the overall impact on the Sound.

“They’re using what’s called a once-through system, where it just takes the water from Long Island Sound, uses it to cool the plant, and spits it back out,” Pepper said.
“They should be recycling that water, which is what about 40 percent of the plants in the country are doing.”

bar%20scene.jpg The noise was deafening and the bodies were wall to wall on the open-air deck, but everybody (with the possible exception of this reporter) seemed to enjoy it that way. As he prepared to cross the street to Geronimo’s, Bixby said Green Drinks is certainly fulfilling its networking mission. “The first one I attended,” he said, “it took me a half hour to get through the door, and a whole hour before I had my first drink,” so busy was he meeting friends old and new.

Elicker emphasized that everyone is welcome, whether their drink of choice is alcoholic or not (or even if they drink nothing at all). And, he added, “The drinks aren’t really green.”

Comments

posted by: JP on August 21, 2008 3:24pm

Does Geronimo’s even serve beers from the New England Brewing Company?http://www.newenglandbrewing.com/ what’s the carbon footprint on bring all that Corona and Tequila in? What a bunch of frauds.

posted by: Emmett Pepper on August 22, 2008 10:54am

Great article and a fun time, indeed.

Correction: I work for Citizens Campaign for the Environment, not Concerned Citizens for the Environment.

Also, I do know that they were serving beer from Blue Point Brewery, from just across the Sound on Long Island, so there was a local option for the locavores among us.

posted by: dwightstreetrenter on August 22, 2008 11:39am

for the record, JP, Green Drinks New Haven patronizes any downtown spot that will welcome the group. This months’ happy hour location was Geronimo. If you want to see “sustainable” or “local” drinks at a particular establishment, talk with the manager/ordering person and get them to buy organic or local brews/mixes!

Don’t like your Coca-Cola coming from the south? Drink Foxon Park, made in East Haven. Want a local brew? BAR makes their own beer ON THE SPOT :)

But to say Geronimo is conducting fraudulent business for not being “green” is silly; they’re a themed bar, and carry drinks that reflect that theme.

Come out to a happy hour next month, JP, and you’ll see that the people who attend care more about each other and the issues presented, than the particular venue at which they meet.

An aside: no one is obligated to order drinks from any venue Green Drinks attends; tap water was the drink of choice for many. Without ice.

posted by: JP on August 22, 2008 11:51am

Dwightstreetrenter, I’m not saying Geronimo is conducting fraudulent business. I’m saying the people who run this thing are full of it. Geronimo’s is a great place with a great happy hour great bar tenders and great management. They have really added to they city by fixing up a dilapidated property. But for a group to run an event called “Green Drinks” and put no consideration in to what would actually make the event green is at absurd. I guess I’m saying talk is cheap and the proof is in how many miles away your beer comes from. Drink local baby!

posted by: JP on August 22, 2008 6:37pm

Well i guess 120 miles to Blue Point Brewery is better then going all then way to mexico but its no where near as green as the 3.9 miles to NEB.

posted by: LastStraw on August 23, 2008 9:23am

JP, it’s a good thing they weren’t there in the winter—when Geronimo’s outside heaters burn all that fuel to heat the outdoors.

posted by: Bruce on August 25, 2008 10:48am

JP, You are absolutely correct that buying local foods and products certainly plays a part in reducing emissions, but you have to be realistic about things like this. These people aren’t “frauds” because they drink a couple bottles of beer. Not everyone is willing to live in a hut out in the woods and not everyone needs to in order to work towards a more sustainable culture. I ride a bicycle a lot of the time but when it rains, I drive. Am I a fraud?

posted by: carolyn humphreys on August 29, 2008 5:17pm

I imagine each of us could come up with a less than “green” aspect of any gathering (I also imagine that we could spend a great deal of time competing for who is greener than whom). But I am so impressed by how many of you show up to talk about solutions without being mired in negativity. Bravo for the restraint shown by those of you who responded to what I initially thought was a joke about the beer! It makes me want to work harder to join our adorable Diana.

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