Tuesday, 25 Apr 2006

Last night, six activists from around the world were awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize for their work. These aren't "I remembered to separate my paper and plastic recycling" activists -- more like "I risked death to expose my corrupt government's transgressions" activists. Read Michelle Nijhuis's interviews with the winners -- three now and the rest over the course of the week -- and you'll find yourself not only humbled, but inspired.

You Got Reserved!

Bush presents plan for combating high oil prices, halts reserve deposits

In September 2000, then-candidate George W. Bush said that the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve "should not be used as an attempt to drive down oil prices right before an election. It should not be used for short-term political gain at the cost of long-term national security." Guess that was some of the "pre-9/11 thinking" we hear so much about. In a speech this morning, President Bush announced that he will order a temporary halt to deposits to the reserve. "Every little bit helps [Republican congressional candidates in 2006]," he said, only without that part in brackets. He also offered other oil-price-lowering gambits like boosting ethanol production, speeding up refinery approval, relaxing domestic drilling limitations, easing environmental regulations on clean-burning gasoline, promoting conservation (yes, really!), increasing hybrid tax credits, investigating possible price gouging, taking back some of the tax incentives offered to big energy companies, and ... something about the kitchen sink. All these strategeries would, he said, help the U.S. "get off its dependency of oil." You know what he means.


The Gangi Brothers Packing Co., a tomato processing plant in California, cut its water use by more than 60 percent and found that the move saved it $130,000 a year. Green-biz guru Joel Makower heard a flood of such stories about water conservation; others came from a winery, a hotel chain, and a chocolatier. In his latest column, Makower tells you how your own workplace can soak up benefits from saving H2O.

Cruel Hand Nuke

Controversy still rages on 20th anniversary of Chernobyl

Tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of the nuclear power-plant accident in Chernobyl, Ukraine, that spewed radioactive fallout across Europe. Estimates of the total number of deaths that will result range from around 9,000 (a U.N. report released last year) to 93,000 (a new Greenpeace report). The controversy stems from uncertainty about the health effects of small doses of radiation. Thyroid cancer and other thyroid abnormalities are health problems that most scientists agree are directly linked to Chernobyl, but the Greenpeace report also blames fallout for "damaging immune and endocrine systems, leading to accelerated aging, cardiovascular and blood illnesses, psychological illnesses, chromosome aberrations, and an increase of deformities in fetuses and children." The last of Chernobyl's four reactors was taken out of commission in 2000; now, the site sits quietly amidst a wide "dead zone" that has, ironically, become a kind of wildlife refuge. It almost makes it all ... wait, no it doesn't.

Think of It as Saran Wrap, to Keep the Ocean Fresh

An enormous patch of plastic trash swirls in the Pacific Ocean

When it was a kid, the Pacific Ocean always wanted a Garbage Patch of its very own. Now it's got one: a patch of trash, at least twice the size of Texas (!), floating midway between Hawaii and San Francisco. Held together by swirling ocean currents, the refuse clump used to be mostly driftwood and random ocean stuff. But no longer. In 2003, researcher Charles Moore sailed through the area and wrote, "I was confronted, as far as the eye could see, with the sight of plastic." Scientists are now starting to see the effects of widespread plastic pollution on marine ecosystems. Seabirds like northern fulmars, which graze the waves for food far out in the ocean, are washing ashore with bellies full of plastic. Even plastic that is ground into dust is ingested by clams and other filter feeders. "[T]he actual ability to wipe out the entire vertebrate kingdom in the ocean is with the plastic particles," says Moore. Sorry about that, entire vertebrate kingdom of the ocean!