Friday, 04 Aug 2006

Will Evolution Be Next?

Heat waves linked to climate change; even Pat Robertson is convinced

Experts agree: damn, it's hot! And you might as well get used to it. At the rate global temperatures are rising, blistering heat waves like the ones that have recently baked parts of the U.S. and Europe will become more frequent and severe, according to climate researchers. Of course, no individual weather event can definitively be traced to global warming; global warming simply loads the dice in favor of extremes. Nonetheless, the scorching heat has led to an unusually vigorous and open discussion of climate change. Hell, even evangelical huckster Pat Robertson, who's spent much of his career lambasting godless enviros, is a convert: the heat is "the most convincing evidence I've seen on global warming in a long time," said Robertson on his 700 Club. (Guess he didn't like all those charts and graphs we kept trying to show him.) Said NASA atmospheric physicist Drew Shindell, "This is not like 'Centuries from now the ice sheets will melt.' This is, 'In a few decades it will be dramatically different.' To me, that's alarming." Such a worrywart!

Friedman At Last, Friedman At Last

Federal judge whacks EPA for foot-dragging on toxic air pollution

This week, a federal judge administered a well-placed kick to the rear end of the U.S. EPA, blasting the agency for being "grossly delinquent" in regulating air pollutants as required by the 1990 Clean Air Act amendments. While EPA has developed emissions regulations for only 15 of the 70 industries covered under the act, it has devoted considerable time to making discretionary rules, "many of which make existing regulations more congenial to industry, and several which since have been found unlawful,'' wrote U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman. The ruling comes a week after a report from the Government Accountability Office finding the same basic negligence. Since the EPA apparently obeys its statutory obligations "only when forced by litigation to do so,'' wrote Friedman (who is this dude?), he is forcing it: this spring he gave the agency until 2009 to make the regulations required by law, rejecting its request for a 2012 deadline. Ah ... we love the smell of moral clarity in the morning.


Last month, Surfrider Foundation president (and this week's InterActivist) Jim Moriarty found himself surfing off the coast of El Salvador in water polluted with "a sickening amount" of trash and human waste -- and not surprisingly, he's felt ill since. But the fact that coastlines everywhere are threatened by these and other problems makes him even sicker. In answering reader questions, Moriarty argues that regular folks can make a real difference in keeping beaches clean, praises surf-stuff manufacturers that are moving in the right direction, and reveals the secret behind his group's clever ads.

Break on Through to the Other 'Cide

EPA proposes ban on two toxic pesticides, limits on use of many others

As part of a congressionally mandated 10-year review, the U.S. EPA this week recommended banning two particularly toxic pesticides and putting thousands of restrictions on the use of others. Out of 231 "active ingredients" reviewed by the agency, the two singled out for bans are lindane, which is used primarily on grain seeds and which persists in the environment and has been called by EPA "quite toxic to humans," and carbofuran, which is used on a range of crops and has been especially lethal to birds. The chemical review employed new safety guidelines on the risks posed to kids, and also examined the effects of cumulative exposure. Enviros applauded the decisions on lindane and carbofuran, but some said the agency hadn't gone far enough in limiting other pesticides. Also, some scientists at EPA and other federal agencies have criticized the way the review was conducted, saying the EPA gave in to pressure from pesticide manufacturers and rushed safety reviews.

But 82 Percent Would Still Grab a Brewski With Him

Poll finds growing disenchantment with Bush environmental policy

A new poll finds a rise in the number of people who think President Bush is not doing enough to protect the environment -- 56 percent, according to a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg survey, up from 41 percent in 2001. Most want more action on environmental problems, and by a more than two-to-one margin, they think Democrats in Congress are more likely to give it to them. The number who think global warming is a serious problem rose to over 70 percent, and 58 percent think Bush isn't doing enough about it. Unsurprisingly, Bush's support on environmental policy is sharply higher among Republicans, and higher in the South than in the East and West. Support for mandatory government regulations is low -- under 10 percent support raising vehicle fuel-efficiency standards, and just 11 percent support carbon-emissions caps -- but Americans are gung-ho about research into and subsidies for new technologies, including wind and solar. So Americans think global warming's a problem, but don't want to do anything about it but funnel pork to industry, and yet they disapprove of Bush's policy. Why?