In Brief
Snippets from the news
Posted at 5:23 PM on 04 Sep 2008
• BLM releases plan for opening public land to oil-shale development.
• What are the effects of public participation on environmental policymaking?
• Media ignores Energy Dept. data when reporting on drilling.
• Chile reforms salmon farms.
• U.S. now world leader in wind electricity generation.
• California prepares for water crisis.
• What are the effects of public participation on environmental policymaking?
• Media ignores Energy Dept. data when reporting on drilling.
• Chile reforms salmon farms.
• U.S. now world leader in wind electricity generation.
• California prepares for water crisis.
The Longest Yard
EPA requires emissions cuts by lawn mowers and speedboats
Posted at 4:11 PM on 04 Sep 2008
sources: Associated Press, EPA, Environmental Defense Fund
see also, in Grist: Umbra advises on lawn mowers
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Yes, They Can
Under pressure from Big Canned Tuna, FDA lax in mercury regulation
Posted at 12:59 PM on 04 Sep 2008
Under strong pressure from Big Canned Tuna, the Food and Drug Administration is crazily lax in regulating mercury in tuna. Among many examples: In 2000, a draft advisory to pregnant women listed canned tuna as a product highly contaminated with mercury; after FDA officials met with the three largest tuna companies, the final advisory left tuna off the list. When the FDA's fish mercury guidelines were revised in 2003, canned light tuna was put in the low-mercury group -- mainly, according to an FDA official, "in order to keep the market share at a reasonable level." The FDA doesn't require warnings in stores or on tuna cans, issuing advisories mainly through doctor's-office brochures. However, a recent appeals-court decision could open the door to allowing states to mandate warning labels on tuna -- a prospect opposed by both the tuna industry and, sadly, the agency tasked with regulating Americans' food and drugs.
source: Mother Jones
see also, in Grist: Study finds excessive mercury in 20 percent of women of childbearing age
source: Mother Jones
see also, in Grist: Study finds excessive mercury in 20 percent of women of childbearing age
Link and Discuss (1 Comment)
Insight Seen
Honda rolls out new cheap hybrid with familiar name
Posted at 11:01 AM on 04 Sep 2008
sources: CNNMoney.com, Jalopnik, Reuters, Consumer Reports, The Telegraph
see also, in Grist: Honda reports surprise first-quarter profit, Honda produces new fuel-cell car
Breaking and Exiting
Another large section of Canadian ice shelf breaks loose
Posted at 6:21 AM on 04 Sep 2008
In a predictable yet mildly troubling reminder of the Arctic's continued ice melt, researchers say yet another massive ice chunk has broken off from an ice shelf in Canada. The Serson Ice Shelf just saw its mass more than halved when two large sections broke off recently, leaving it about 47 square miles smaller. For those of you keeping track at home, this summer has seen 19 square miles of the Markham Ice Shelf break off and float into the sea, as well as an 8.5-mile section of the Ward Hunt shelf. "These changes are irreversible under the present climate and indicate that the environmental conditions that have kept these ice shelves in balance for 4,000 years are no longer present," said Trent University's Derek Mueller. Ice shelves are made of very old floating sea ice that's still attached to land; the surrounding sea ice usually acts to brace the shelves against wind and waves, but this year's and last year's were not much help. "We have now reached a threshold where [the environment] is too warm for these ice shelves to exist anymore," said Luke Copland of Ottawa University.
sources: Agence France-Presse, Associated Press, Telegraph
sources: Agence France-Presse, Associated Press, Telegraph
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In Brief
Snippets from the news
Posted at 5:07 PM on 03 Sep 2008
• Giant Arctic ice shelf breaks away.
• New eBay site is environment minded.
• Big Auto's sales continue to skid.
• Toddlers chock full o' flame retardants.
• Western forests face flammable future.
• New eBay site is environment minded.
• Big Auto's sales continue to skid.
• Toddlers chock full o' flame retardants.
• Western forests face flammable future.
"Some" of All Fears
National Toxicology Program still concerned about BPA
Posted at 4:58 PM on 03 Sep 2008
The National Toxicology Program begs to differ with the Food and Drug Administration's recent conclusion that common chemical bisphenol A is safe at currently regulated levels. In a report released Wednesday, the NTP notes "some concern" that BPA can affect children's brains and reproductive systems. The agency made the same conclusion in a draft report in April, which caused enough outcry to make companies including Nalgene and Wal-Mart back away from BPA. The NTP's final report says further study is needed and suggests that concerned parents consider limiting their family's exposure to BPA, but does not recommend altering U.S. safety standards at this point. "There remains considerable uncertainty whether the changes seen in the animal studies are directly applicable to humans, and whether they would result in clear adverse health effects," says NTP's John Bucher. "But we have concluded that the possibility that BPA may affect human development cannot be dismissed."
sources: Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, ScienceDaily
straight to the report: The Potential Human Reproductive and Developmental Effects of Bisphenol A [PDF]
sources: Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, ScienceDaily
straight to the report: The Potential Human Reproductive and Developmental Effects of Bisphenol A [PDF]
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I'll Huff and I'll Puff ...
Warming seas make strong storms stronger, says new study
Posted at 1:39 PM on 03 Sep 2008
sources: Reuters, Agence France-Presse, The New York Times, LiveScience, The Destin Log
Link and Discuss (4 Comments)
Don't Shoot the Messenger
New HP laptop packaged in messenger bag instead of box
Posted at 12:03 PM on 03 Sep 2008
Don't take Grandma to Wal-Mart: the big-box store's new Hewlett-Packard laptop "will be displayed on shelves wearing only the HP Protect Messenger Bag." Scandalous! But actually, there's no need to avert your eyes: the HP Pavilion dv6929 is served up in a recycled, reusable messenger bag instead of a box, cutting cardboard and plastic packaging by 97 percent. Thinking outside the box helped HP win Wal-Mart's Home Entertainment Design Challenge, which judged suppliers' products on attractive design, environmental innovation, and less-wasteful, less-toxic packaging. Wal-Mart says 25 percent less truck space is now needed to schlep the computer to stores, cutting transportation costs by 31 percent. In addition, purchasers of the $798 laptop, which is available only at Wal-Mart and Sam's Club, can recycle an old PC for free.
sources: Reuters, Wal-Mart, HP, Environmental Leader
see also, in Grist: Tech companies go for the green
sources: Reuters, Wal-Mart, HP, Environmental Leader
see also, in Grist: Tech companies go for the green
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Good-Natured
New Ecuador constitution would give nature inalienable rights
Posted at 10:20 AM on 03 Sep 2008
Ecuador's environment will be given inalienable rights if residents of that country vote yes Sept. 28 on a referendum to overhaul the constitution. One of the draft document's 444 articles gives nature the right to "exist, persist, maintain, and regenerate its vital cycles, structure, functions, and its processes in evolution." The controversial constitution, which would greatly extend the power of leftist President Rafael Correa, would also give the state more control over Ecuador's mining and oil industries.
sources: Los Angeles Times, Reuters, Prensa Latina, Xinhua
sources: Los Angeles Times, Reuters, Prensa Latina, Xinhua
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Taking a Standard
U.S. EPA criticizes DOT over fuel-economy standards
Posted at 7:20 AM on 03 Sep 2008
Officials at the U.S. EPA have criticized their counterparts at the U.S. Transportation Department lately over the DOT's proposed fuel-economy standards for vehicles of 31.6 miles per gallon by 2015. The EPA has said the DOT used an unreasonably low figure for future gasoline prices -- $2.42 a gallon in 2016 and a high of $3.37 a gallon -- which skewed the final cost-benefit figures in favor of lower fuel-economy standards; the 2007 energy bill mandates that automakers meet a standard of 35 miles per gallon by 2020, but the legislation allows the DOT to set the interim standards. "EPA has several concerns with the methodology used to determine the relative benefits and costs of the alternatives analyzed," said EPA's Susan Bromm in flawless bureaucratese (the shared language of all U.S. federal agencies). The EPA also criticized the DOT for putting what it said was too low a value on the societal benefits of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions, saying that the DOT calculated only the costs to the U.S. and not to other nations of the world that are also impacted by climate change.
source: Associated Press
source: Associated Press
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How Can You Be So 'Shore'?
Offshore wind power in U.S. poised to take off
Posted at 6:07 AM on 03 Sep 2008
There are no offshore wind turbines generating electricity in U.S. waters yet, but that's expected to change soon if wind-power advocates and wind developers have their way. The first U.S. offshore wind turbines could be spinning in as little as three to five years if all goes well. The U.S. Interior Department is already conducting environmental impact studies for offshore wind farms at 10 sites in federal waters off the U.S. East Coast, and the agency is expected to finalize its rules for offshore alternative-energy production by the end of the year. For their part, wind-energy companies are especially excited about the offshore potential of the East Coast due to its high electricity prices, high winds, proximity to plenty of energy-hungry population centers, and relatively shallow offshore waters. Yet, despite the momentum and the offshore industry's promise, the forecast offshore wind-power boom could potentially slow to a crawl if the current federal tax breaks for wind-power projects aren't renewed before they expire at the end of the year.
source: The Wall Street Journal
source: The Wall Street Journal
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In Brief
Snippets from the news
Posted at 4:50 PM on 02 Sep 2008
• Efforts to clean up Naples trash blocked by the mob.
• Amazon deforestation jumped 69 percent in last year.
• Melting of Greenland ice sheet could lead to accelerated sea-level rise.
• Are fireflies endangered?
• Climate change could mean less plague.
• Rajendra Pachauri reelected as head of IPCC.
• Amazon deforestation jumped 69 percent in last year.
• Melting of Greenland ice sheet could lead to accelerated sea-level rise.
• Are fireflies endangered?
• Climate change could mean less plague.
• Rajendra Pachauri reelected as head of IPCC.
Stick It to 'Em
Conclusions of 'hockey stick' graph stand up to further scrutiny
Posted at 3:42 PM on 02 Sep 2008
The infamous "hockey stick" graph, which shows the northern hemisphere beginning to rapidly warm around the industrial age, has been backed up by new research. Michael Mann, who helped develop the 1998 graph that climate skeptics love to hate, is the lead author of the new study to be published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "Ten years ago the estimates for earlier centuries were really primarily reliant on just one sort of information: tree ring measurements," he says. For the new study, researchers perused coral reef skeletons, glaciers, ice sheets, sea-floor sediment, stalagmites, and stalactites. Thus, says Mann, "we now have enough other sources that we can achieve meaningful reconstructions back a thousand years without tree ring data, and we get more or less the same answer" -- that is, that "the current warmth is anomalous."
sources: National Geographic News, Arizona Daily Star, Canwest News Service, BBC News, Christian Science Monitor, Mongabay
see also, in Grist: "Hockey stick" climate study largely holds up to collegial scrutiny -- way back in 2005
sources: National Geographic News, Arizona Daily Star, Canwest News Service, BBC News, Christian Science Monitor, Mongabay
see also, in Grist: "Hockey stick" climate study largely holds up to collegial scrutiny -- way back in 2005
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Yazoo Keeper
EPA puts kibosh on wetland-destructive Army Corps project
Posted at 1:14 PM on 02 Sep 2008
The U.S. EPA has vetoed a giant, expensive plan to build the world's largest water pump in the Mississippi River delta. The so-called Yazoo Pump flood-control project would have sucked 6 million gallons of water a minute from 67,000 acres of wetlands along the Yazoo River. The scheme, proposed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and first authorized by Congress in 1941, would have cost $220 million. The EPA concluded that maybe, just maybe, sucking all that wet out of the wetlands would have been damaging to fish, wildlife, and migratory birds. "The EPA truly deserves our thanks for killing this unnecessary and economically wasteful Corps of Engineers project," says the Sierra Club's Ed Hopkins. "The natural, and free, flood protections offered by these wetlands are far more effective than an expensive pumping project." Today's veto was only the 12th time since 1972 that the EPA has put the kibosh on a Corps project; the last was in 1990.
sources: Associated Press, National Audubon Society, U.S. EPA, Sierra Club
get the backstory, in Grist: EPA set to kibosh Mississippi Delta boondoggle
see also, in Grist: A special series on the Army Corps and the Mississippi River
sources: Associated Press, National Audubon Society, U.S. EPA, Sierra Club
get the backstory, in Grist: EPA set to kibosh Mississippi Delta boondoggle
see also, in Grist: A special series on the Army Corps and the Mississippi River
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We Must Decrease Our Gustav
Oil platforms off La. fare OK under hurricane; wetlands, not so much
Posted at 10:39 AM on 02 Sep 2008
sources: USA Today, The Washington Post, Bloomberg, The Hill
see also, in Grist: Coverage of the Gustav-addled Republican National Convention
Link and Discuss (3 Comments)
The Electric Cool-Aid Acid Test
Aid agencies offer carbon offsets aimed at helping poor adapt to climate change
Posted at 7:39 AM on 02 Sep 2008
Aid agencies and environmental groups, including UNICEF, Greenpeace, CARE International, and others, partnered up recently to introduce new carbon offsets aimed at reducing carbon emissions while also helping the poor adapt to climate change. The voluntary carbon-offset market is worth some $330 million and is likely to grow even more as consumers in rich countries become increasingly aware of their contribution to climate change. Many voluntary offset programs now focus almost exclusively on ensuring that large renewable-energy projects get built, thereby essentially offsetting the carbon emissions of guilty consumers who contributed cash for the project's construction. But the group of aid agencies and eco-groups has its eye on entirely different projects in underdeveloped nations that would benefit the poor and help them adapt to climate changes already taking place. Projects they're considering include planting drought-resistant cashew trees in India from which locals can harvest fruit, giving fuel-efficient stoves to displaced families in the Congo, setting up solar-powered lighting in Mauritania aimed at helping girls do their homework, and teaching kids in India how to swim so they can survive floods.
source: Reuters
source: Reuters
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Between a Bush and a Workplace
Bush admin proposes rule that could delay workplace toxics standards
Posted at 6:20 AM on 02 Sep 2008
Last week, the Bush administration published a proposed rule that would add an extra step to the process of creating federal standards for toxics and other hazardous substances in the workplace. The rule, which was reportedly rushed so it could take effect before President Bush leaves office, has been widely criticized by unions and other worker advocates as an unnecessary delay that ultimately won't help workers. "It's a terrible idea," said workplace safety professor David Michaels. "It will lead to more delays in setting new standards, and it gives parties that oppose new regulations an opportunity to confuse the regulatory process." The regulatory process is already incredibly lengthy for setting new federal workplace safety standards, and at least in some cases, the additional proposed step could tack on a few more years. "Now, to put out a rule for a complex hazard takes a good eight years. Without question, this will add another year or two," said Peg Seminario of the AFL-CIO.
sources: The Washington Post, The New York Times, Associated Press
sources: The Washington Post, The New York Times, Associated Press
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Two Roads Diverged in a Wood, and I ... I Couldn't Believe I Was in a Roadless Area
Deal to shrink roadless areas in Idaho approved by Bush admin
Posted at 4:53 AM on 02 Sep 2008
An Idaho-specific plan meant to replace President Clinton's national roadless rule in the state was agreed to Friday by the Bush administration, timber interests, and a few environmental groups. If approved by the Secretary of Agriculture after a public-comment period, the revised rule would protect just 3.3 million acres of forestlands in the state, down from 9.3 million in Clinton's original roadless rule. Over 400,000 acres of current roadless areas in the state would be open to development with no restrictions, worrying environmental groups who are opposed to the plan that those areas could be mined and subjected to other destructive practices that were restricted under the original rule. Another 5.6 million acres of "roadless" forestlands could be subject to logging (and its attendant roads) if it's determined that logging could reduce fire risk to communities. Environmental groups Trout Unlimited and the Idaho Conservation League have backed the plan while the Wilderness Society and others have criticized the compromise, arguing that national forest lands protected by the original roadless rule "should be left roadless and undeveloped."
sources: The New York Times, Idaho Statesman
sources: The New York Times, Idaho Statesman
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In Brief
Snippets from the news
Posted at 2:02 PM on 29 Aug 2008
• Alaskans choose mining over fish.
• California moves forward with anti-sprawl bill.
• Ozone hole expected to be normal this year.
• U.N. climate talks still running into roadblocks.
• Walruses still in trouble.
• California moves forward with anti-sprawl bill.
• Ozone hole expected to be normal this year.
• U.N. climate talks still running into roadblocks.
• Walruses still in trouble.
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