Tuesday, 16 Jul 2002

Sound Science

In a triumph of the military over the environment, the U.S. Navy yesterday won approval to deploy two ships that use low-frequency sonar to detect distant submarines, despite ongoing fears that the system could injure whales and other marine mammals. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration granted the Navy an exemption from federal rules protecting marine mammals, saying the likely effects of the sonar would be "negligible" as long as protective measures were followed. The new sonar system creates a noise similar to a Boeing 747 at takeoff, a sound everyone agrees would injure nearby marine mammals. The NOAA ruling, however, requires the Navy to use visual sighting and passive sonar to make sure that no mammals are within 1.1 nautical miles when the sonar is used. But environmentalists question whether that will sufficiently protect whales, dolphins, and other sea creatures; the Natural Resources Defense Council said it might sue to overturn the ruling.

The Kingsolver and I

Thanks to a string of wildly successful novels and a stint on Oprah's Book Club, Barbara Kingsolver can count on attracting a lot of readers to just about anything she writes. That's good news for environmentalists, according to reviewer Jonna Higgins-Freese, because Kingsolver's new essay collection, Small Wonder, makes the case for living lightly on the land. From thoughts about how the United States' profligate use of natural resources contributed to the events of Sept. 11 to reflections on her daughter's relationship with a rooster, Kingsolver engages with the world as it is and as it should be -- while offering thoughts on how to get from here to there. If there is something environmentalists can learn from this book, writes Higgins-Freese, it is how to do a better job communicating the importance of the work they do. Read the complete review, only on the Grist Magazine website.

What About Tupperware?

Now that the U.S. Senate has given the go-ahead to store the nation's most highly radioactive nuclear waste at Nevada's Yucca Mountain, new questions loom: What kind of containers can protect the waste for 10,000 years, and who will provide them? Those are high-stakes issues, given that the Department of Energy plans to buy about 10,000 storage containers at roughly $500,000 a pop. So far, the DOE is looking at conventional containers made of steel alloyed with chrome, molybdenum, and nickel, and covered by a titanium tent. But some scientists question whether anything made of metal can withstand long-term storage without rusting -- especially since water percolates through the rocks under Yucca Mountain. Ceramics and polymers have been proposed as alternative materials, but experts say the DOE is likely to opt for familiar materials over experimental ones.

Cod Is Dead

In a development that scientists have predicted for years, cod have virtually vanished from the North Sea due to overfishing, according to a report by the U.K.-based Wildlife Trusts. The species is now commercially extinct, meaning it no longer makes economic sense to try to catch it. The report also chronicles the decline of other species, ranging from the horse mussel to the sunset coral. Especially at risk is the bottle-nosed dolphin, which could become extinct in British waters within a decade. The dolphin population has already declined precipitously -- in some areas, by as much as two-thirds -- with many dolphins falling victim to fishing nets. Wildlife Trusts is calling for stricter fishing laws to protect the bottle-nosed dolphin and other species.

Alcoa Can Wait

And now, some news from a place you seldom hear about: Iceland, which is forming the backdrop for the latest skirmish in the battle between conservationists and power companies. The country's Vatnajokull Glacier is Europe's second-largest wilderness, and is graced with mountains, lakes, canyons, rivers, and abundant wildlife. Iceland's national power company wants to harness the billions of gallons of glacial melt off Vatnajokull by building a $3 billion hydropower plant. (That's about a third of the country's gross domestic product, by the way.) The plant will have precisely one customer: a smelter owned by Alcoa, the world's largest aluminum company. Alcoa defends its entry into the Icelandic power market, saying hydropower is at least cleaner than coal. But, noting that the plan would entail damming two of the area's three virgin rivers, environmentalists say the cost to the pristine region is not worth the handful of jobs the plant and smelter would provide.