Following a full day of surgery—Earth Day, natch—a couple of D.C. cosmetic surgeons started crunching the numbers. Just how much carbon is used in the disposal of sucked-out fat?

Considering that an average of 7 pounds of fat is sucked out per surgery and that national surveys estimate Americans undergo 450,000 liposuctions and tummy tucks annually, that’s about 3 million pounds of yellow, goopy fat to get rid of. Each pound of fat is about 78 percent carbon, but because no one has yet figured out how to make biodiesel out of it in a way that people will, uh, stomach, the fat gets incinerated, pushing about 1,000 tons of carbon into the atmosphere every year. Drs. Navin Singh and Marwan Khalifeh, senior partners at Ivy Plastic Surgery Associates in Chevy Chase, D.C., figured out that creates the pollution equivalent of driving 2 million miles.

So they’re trying to do something about it. Their office is paperless; they’re energy conscious and all of that. But there’s only so much they can do with fat, so to offset handing about 160 pounds of fat per month over to a medical waste disposal service, Singh and Khalifeh are purchasing carbon credits.

Singh calls it a “baby step” for his industry. “The first incentive is to conserve, reuse, recycle. We do as many of those things as possible, but when we can’t, you have to go for a lazier way and purchase credits.”

The surgeons got online at carbonfund.org and signed up to spend about $100 to $200 a month on carbon credits, which will (they hope) go to companies and nonprofits involved in pollution reduction, protecting existing forests, planting trees, etc. “You do wonder if this is legitimate or if someone is taking our money and not doing anything, so we spread it around with different companies while we figure this out,” says Singh.

Something else they figured out: If people actually jogged off the weight, that would be cheaper and better for their health, but not actually better for the environment. “They would just liberate that carbon into the air by burning it off,” says Singh.

(photo by keizie)

Washington Gas is making bad service into a form of art. Since November, they’ve sent me two bills every month–one for me, and one with my name on it for the nice lady who lives in the apartment upstairs. She and I verified that it’s her gas bill by checking the meter numbers on the two bills and comparing them to the numbers on our meters. Right after I moved in, she says, Washington Gas sent her a refund check and discontinued her direct payment program. She was baffled.

I’ve explained the problem to Washington Gas call-takers five times. On Mar. 12, after several calls from me, my upstairs neighbor, and even the management company, Washington Gas sent a guy to check the meter numbers. He confirmed the mix-up. I figured that had to be the end of it, but yesterday, I received my neighbor’s bill once again. Like the last two, it says DISCONTINUANCE NOTICE on it. It’s for over $1,000 and there’s no way for her to pay it.

Washington Gas is just hell bent on sending me my poor neighbor’s bill. It’s Theatre of the Absurd over here. It’s like something from a play by Samuel Becket or Harold Pinter. It’s crazy! I explained the problem to a Washington Gas call-taker again yesterday–now I’m escalating the situation with public whining.

I beseech you, teeming millions of City Desk readers, for suggestions on how to solve this problem.

UPDATE 4/9/08: An alert reader forwards me a Mar. 16 Baltimore Sun story on similarly-bad service a Prince George’s County deli owner received from Washington Gas this year.

UPDATE 4/10/08: A woman from corporate communications at Washington Gas called my neighbor and me last night to apologize and say the problem would be fixed. We’ll see…

On Jan. 17, ABC 7 News ran a brief story about harassment based on race and sexual orientation at a firehouse in Northeast. The piece described a couple incidents, including one situation in which firefighters hung a mounted deer head with chains and a marijuana blunt in its mouth. Apparently, below the deer head, there was a sign that used the derogatory word “Buck,” saying “The Buck Stops Here, Da Heights Zoo.” (Punctuation added.)

According to the ABC story, Fire Chief Dennis Rubin “issued a statement saying he takes the allegations very seriously and intends to learn all the facts of what occurred.”

Well, clearly Rubin’s response was inadequate to some. A group called E.R.A.S.E. (End Racism And Stop Exploitation), based in Ward 7, is distributing a flier excoriating the department’s handling of the buck incident and the racist culture at the firehouse. Among other allegations, the flier says that “the deer head was bolted to the wall and decorated as part of a pattern of intimidation and exploitation that has included: sex scandals; black firefighters being attacked, hit by plates thrown at their heads by officers, with injuries serious enough to send them to the hospital.”

The flier also blames firehouse leaders and Mayor Adrian Fenty, as well as past mayors, for allowing a racism to “foment” unchecked. E.R.A.S.E., which has roughly 20 members, came together after local firefighters spoke at a ANC 7D meeting, said group commissioner Rick Tingling-Clemmons.

“We wanted to draw attention,” he said about circulating the flier. “We want people who are responsible to act. If I was fire chief, I would immediately have an investigation, and there would be action. I think it’s really bad for men to go into battle like that, with fire–and work in that kind of atmosphere. I would be really afraid myself personally.”

Tingling-Clemmons says the flier is being distributed at various locations in the neighborhood and via e-mail. Read it yourself here. There’s even a picture of the decorated deer.

Washington Gas has a message to customers on its website:

To our customers:
We apologize for any inconvenience you have had in reaching a customer service representative when calling Washington Gas.

Typical wait time: 15 minutes.

If you’re looking to free up a few parking spaces to do some construction work, getting official “Emergency No Parking” signs is no big deal. You head on down to the District Department of Transportation (DDOT) headquarters at the Reeves Center a few days beforehand, fill out a few forms, and walk out with your placards.

Apparently, that’s still too much hassle for somebody in Foggy Bottom.

Temporary no-parking signs on the 1100 block of 24th Street NW have been changed by construction crews, says Michael Malloy, editor of a neighborhood newsletter. “They’ve been doing it for a while,” he says, “but now it’s just getting out of control.” Malloy says the signs are put up on short notice—less than the required 72 hours—and altered whenever construction crews deem it necessary. “It’s probably just a construction crew saying, ‘No one will complain,’” Malloy says, discussing a sign that was originally marked to expire June 25 and has been changed to June 30.

Just exactly who’s doing the creative editing, though, remains unclear. An employee of Bovis Lend Lease who operates a construction site on the block, says his crew isn’t the problem. He blames the city, the Department of Public Works (DPW) in particular, for the altered signs—and a big hassle. Though Bovis workers can’t park vehicles on the east side of the street, no maintenance is currently being done. “The signs have been up for three days and no trucks have been there,” he says.

“I haven’t heard anything about the issue,” says DPW spokesperson Mary Myers. She points out that her agency does not handle any sidewalks or street maintenance and referred questions about the signs to DDOT, which could not respond to an inquiry by press time*. “DPW does not issue any signs, ‘No Parking’ or otherwise.…[People] say DPW, but they mean DDOT.”

Malloy isn’t buying the excuses, either. “I’m 90 percent sure it’s not a city crew,” he says.

ADDENDUM, 6/29, 1:05 P.M.: Late yesterday, DDOT spokesperson Erik Linden said that his agency had not placed the signs. Linden said that Washington Gas was working in the area and might be the culprit. However, a Washington Gas spokesperson, Janet Davis, also denied responsibility. “As far as I know, we have no scheduled work in that area,” she said.