Monday, 13 Jan 2003

Home Is Where the Environmental Devastation Is

Divorce has been blamed for everything from falling academic grades to rising crime rates -- and now a new report says broken homes are partly to blame for environmental devastation. According to a study appearing in the journal Nature, social trends such as living alone, having fewer children, divorcing more often, and remaining single longer have led to an increase in the number of smaller households. That, in turn, has taken a heavy toll on the world's natural resources, because home construction leads to increased demand for building materials, appliances, and energy, as well as increased waste production. Although many environmentalists worry about population growth, the study says a more accurate indicator of environmental harm is the growth in number of housing units. It found that, in countries where the environment is especially imperiled by human activities, population grew by 1.8 percent per year, while housing units grew by 3.1 percent per year. In countries where human activity is not having as great an effect, both population and household growth were about 1.7 percent. In the U.S., one-quarter of all homes are inhabited by just one person.

Less Than Zero

Under California's zero-emissions vehicle (ZEV) regulation, 2003 was supposed to be the year that thousands of nonpolluting cars hit the road -- but on Friday, the state's air quality officials proposed amending the regulation to postpone the deadline by a decade. The proposal seemed to be an acknowledgement by the California Air Resources Board that the technology does not yet exist to make the cars attractive and affordable. Although cars are getting cleaner, especially in California, there are still no competitively priced, emissions-free models on the market. The proposed changes would allow automakers to put off ZEV requirements until 2012, but require them to produce more hybrids and super-clean gas-powered vehicles between 2005 and 2011. Both environmentalists and car manufacturers have expressed dissatisfaction with the board's suggestions; the former want the original ZEV requirements and deadlines maintained, and the latter want them scrapped altogether.

The Gas They Pass

In other news from the Golden State, California's two Democratic senators, Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer, have introduced legislation that would prevent energy companies in Mexico from using Californian natural gas in their plants near the California-Mexico border unless those plants complied with the state's strict air-quality standards. The legislation would apply to natural-gas-powered generators that produce more than 50 megawatts of electricity and are located within 50 miles of the border. Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) has introduced a similar bill in the House. The legislation would have its most immediate effect on two new plants planned for Mexicali, Mexico, just across from Imperial Valley, Calif., which suffers from some of the worst air pollution in the state. Both of the proposed new plants are owned by U.S. companies.

Wet 'n' Not-so-wild

New guidelines unveiled by the Bush administration on Friday could spell trouble for 20 million acres of wetlands across the United States. The guidelines were prompted by a 2001 Supreme Court decision that found that isolated, non-navigable ponds and wetlands in Illinois did not merit protection under the Clean Water Act. Environmentalists say that narrow ruling should not be applied to the entire nation, but the U.S. EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have ordered their regional offices to withhold protections from similar water bodies and seek federal advice prior to protecting other small, intrastate waterways. As a result, responsibility for protecting as much as 20 percent of the 100 million acres of wetlands in the continental U.S. could be devolved from the federal government to the states. Environmentalists fear that could lead to widespread development of wetlands and mark the beginning of a wholesale weakening of water protections.

Thank God

Environmentalism is getting a big boost from religious communities that increasingly see protecting the Earth as central to their theology, according to the Worldwatch Institute. In its annual "State of the World" report released late last week, Worldwatch found that religious organizations from all corners of the globe are urging their congregations to save wildlife preserves, protect rainforests, and oppose overuse of natural resources, among other environmental tenets. In Pakistan, the government has sought the advice of Muslim clergy in designing an environmental awareness program based on the teachings of the Koran. In Thailand, Buddhist monks are helping lead the campaign against their country's deforestation. In the U.S., the Sierra Club and the National Council of Churches teamed up to make a television ad using a Jewish prayer to urge protection of Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. "The quickening of religious interest in environmental issues suggests that a powerful new political alignment may be emerging that could greatly strengthen the effort to build a sustainable world," said Worldwatch's Gary Gardner.