Puddle Jumping in DC

Gas in the water, toxins in the baby shampoo, coal ash in Lake Michigan!

Found myself writing about chemicals out of place. Recently on Care2:

My Water’s On Fire Tonight [Video]

Recent reports reveal that hydraulic fracturing, a form of natural gas drilling that involves injecting toxin-laden water deep underground, may have been responsible for earthquakes in England and Oklahoma and the Environmental Protection agency announced that it will investigate the drilling method’s impact on drinking water. . . Read more.

Toxic Chemicals in U.S. Baby Shampoo, Why?

It’s pretty clear that formaldehyde, used to embalm corpses, is not a health elixir. What’s less clear is why Johnson & Johnson thinks it’s a good idea to put this carcinogen in baby shampoo. . . Read more.

Powerplant Mudslide Dumps Coal Ash into Lake Michigan

Just weeks after the U.S. Senate voted to block the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to regulate the disposal of coal ash, what’s left after coal is burned in a power plant, a mudslide on the banks of Lake Michigan sends tons of the stuff into a drinking water source for 10 million people. . . Read more.

Catfish, Global Warming, and Barbie vs. the Rainforest - Recently on Care2

Virginia Anglers Catch 143-pound Monster Catfish

News outlets are calling the 143-pound blue catfish hooked by sport fishermen in Virginia a monster of our own making. The fish caught by Richard Nicholas “Nick” Anderson and his father and brother in John H. Kerr Reservoir, known locally as Buggs Island Lake, broke the state record just set in March by a 109 pound catfish, and may break the world record for largest fish caught. Biologists for the most part are not cheering the opportunity for more fisherman to catch a “big one” in Virginia waters. (more)

All Eyes to EPA on Global Warming

The U.S. Supreme Court reaffirmed the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to regulate carbon dioxide and other global warming pollutants under the Clean Air Act last month when it denied a petition by several states to force power plants to reduce pollution. (more)

Showdown in New Jersey Over Climate Pollution Pact

In response to New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s announcement that he would pull out of a multi-state agreement, known as the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, to reduce global warming pollution from power plants, the state legislature has passed three separate bills to prevent RGGI withdrawal. While no one expects Governor Christie to sign the bills that reach his desk, environmentalists such as Jeff Tittel, Director of New Jersey Sierra Club, say the votes indicate that the legislature would support legislation blocking the regulatory changes Christie will need to pull out of the agreement. (more)

U.S. Regulators Help Nuclear Power Plants Meet Safety Standards…

A very cozy relationship exists between the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and thenuclear power industry in the United States according to an Associated Press investigative report that found “proof that aging reactors have been allowed to run less safely to prolong operation.” ( more)

To Win Back Ken, Barbie Pledges to Stop Destroying Rainforests

After last week’s banner-dropping stunt at Mattel headquarters by Greenpeace, deforestation concerns began dominating the discussion over at Barbie’s Facebook page. It got so bad that Mattel temporarily shut down the page to comments. Greenpeace launched its social media campaign and PR stunt on Tuesday morning, calling on Mattel to stop purchasing paper pulp harvested from the last habitat of Indonesia’s orangutans and tigers; by late Wednesday, Mattel’s response was posted front and center on the company website. more

 

Tornados, Fish Farms, and Barbie vs Orangutans - Recently on Care2

Don't Make Connections Between Extreme Weather Events (VIDEO)

. . . because that might might lead you to conclude that global warming is already happening, warns Bill McKibben in a Washington Post oped.

In the wake of the devastating tornado's in Joplin, MO, and a record year for tornados, floods, and wildfires worldwide, author and environmentalist Bill McKibben makes the case that the extreme weather patterns predicted by climate science models look awfully like what we've been experiencing . . . (more)

June 12, 137 comments

NOAA OKs Factory Fish Farming for the Gulf of Mexico

That the U.S. government agency responsible for managing the nations fisheries falls within the agency responsible for international trade is painfully clear with Thursday's announcement that NOAA will finalize regulations for open ocean aquaculture in the Gulf of Mexico. The press material accompanying the announcement leads with the Commerce Department objective of closing the seafood trade gap, not with the importance of managing a stressed natural resource, fisheries, or ensuring the health of an ecological and biological wonder, the world's oceans . . . (more)

Jun 10, 62 comments

Ken Dumps Barbie to Save the Rainforest, Protect Orangutans and Tigers

Would you ditch your girlfriend of 50 years if you discovered she was complicit in the deaths of endangered orangutans and tigers? That's the call Ken made when he discovered the boxes in which Barbie dolls are packaged contain mixed tropical hardwood from Indonesia's rainforests. At least that's back story to a campaign stunt by Greenpeace on Tuesday calling on Mattel to set corporate policy eliminating rainforest sourcing of paper for packaging . . . (more)

Jun 7, 70 comments

 

 

Water water everywhere . . . on Blog Action Day

More the 5000 bloggers are writing about water today for Blog Action Day.   Why? Because unsafe water and lack of basic sanitation cause 80 percent of diseases and kill more people every year than all forms of violence, including war.

A colleague recently pointed me to this stunning graphic about how war over water could kill even more people in the future.  Check it out and then sign the petition.

Waste not, want not: conserving resources across time in time to save the planet

"Wow, and I thought my life was complicated," lamented Mac as we followed Maya off to see the rabbit hutches at Quiet Valley Living Historical Farm one afternoon this past August. We had just sat through a little presentation by one of the farm staff on conserving resources in a late colonial kitchen. While the word recycle was not part of the lexicon, the colonial era farmer put today's environmentalist to shame; nothing was wasted. Whether making cutlery out of a ram's horn, a footstool from deer antlers, or kitchen lamps from the boiled down fat of a possum or other farm pest, the colonial farmer maximized every last bit of resources at her disposal.

SUV love - a symbol of our
ease and waste? by Studiojmm.

Comparatively, we live a life of ease and convenience. We also create a great deal more waste.

This month's Green Moms Carnival on conserving resources will be full of great ideas for reducing our waste stream and its drain on our pocketbooks. Hopefully, we'll also raise some questions and inspire some activism on systemic ways to reduce waste. We certainly could be wasting a lot less energy.

One of our biggest sources of pollution is energy. The New York Times this week covered the water polluting implications of our energy use — pollution from coal mines and coal plants threatens drinking water in hundreds of Appalachian towns. According to the U.S. Energy Information Agency, coal is responsible for nearly half of electricity generation in the United States. Because electricity demand is expected to grow, even if more renewable energy comes online in the next few years, so will more coal.

News Round-up for 2009-05-19 aka Things Keeping Me Too Busy to Blog

• House Committee Begins Debate on Historic Energy Bill
  “Now is the time for bold and meaningful action on clean energy and global warming. We look forward to working with Congress to strengthen and pass the American Clean Energy and Security Act," says Federal Global Warming Program Director Emily Figdor.
  (tags: green news energy globalwarming pollution congress environment)
  
• GOP looks to expand renewables mix, stress economy during climate bill fight
  In case you are wondering, "expand renewables mix" means coal and nuclear. "'Bring a sleeping bag,' [Representative] Barton [R-TX] said yesterday after a relatively brief, three-hour session for opening statements."
  (tags: green politics globalwarming congress environment pollution)
• Cleaner Cars to Hit the Fast Lane, Obama and States Lead
  "President Obama is proving himself behind the wheel in the race to a clean energy economy. This historic action will reduce our nation’s dependence on oil, save consumers money at the pump, and cut global warming pollution. This is what leadership looks like,” said Environment America Federal Global Warming Program Director Emily Figdor.
  (tags: environment green cars global warming)
• Obama regulates tailpipe greenhouse gas | MNN - Mother Nature Network
  The Obama Administration announced May 19 tough new standards for carmakers to meet by 2016: 30 mpg for trucks and 39 mpg for cars. Why go after fuel economy when the target is climate emissions? There is virtually no other way to reduce tailpipe greenhouse gas.
  (tags: environment cars globalwarming)

"What? You took me seriously?"

"One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally." - Knight Ridder Newspapers

"Senior administration officials acknowledged Wednesday that even if the president's push for substitutes for gasoline and diesel were successful, the reliance on Persian Gulf oil by world markets - including the U.S. market - is unlikely to change.

Bush's main message, however, was about priming the budgets of federal laboratories and agencies to foster basic science research and strengthening math and science education." - Associated Press

Oh. Unfortunately, the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere very seriously have increased by at least 30%, methane has doubled, and nitrous oxides have increaased by 15-20% in the last two centuries and we are seriously expecting an increase in global surface temperatures by 2 to 10 degrees by the end of this next century. (Rabe again)

Energy Policy

The president spoke last night and Mac, Tom and I hid in the basement. Ok, that's more dramatic than it sounds. We were installing moulding and trying to get the kitchen drain hooked up (still need one more part).

From the recap news stories, I've found out that George W. proposed the U.S. reduce it's dependence on foreign oil by 75% by 2025. Now, the U.S. consumes about 20 million barrels of oil per day and about 12.3 million of that is imported (1). If those numbers stayed the same (which they won't), to reduce our oil imports by 75%, we need to conserve or find domestic sources for 9.2 million barrels per day or 3.4 billion barrels per year (the Arctic Refuge is estimated to contain a total of somewhere between 9 and 16 billion barrels but only ~3 billion that would be profitable to pump out, by the way (2))

Since the president doesn't seem to want to increase auto fuel efficiency (cars being our #1 use of oil by far; about 2/3 of everything we use (3)), that's a pretty tall order. Ya see, U.S. oil production peaked in 1970 and we have approximately 22 billion barrels of proven reserves to tap into (4). The only way to reduce the amount of foreign oil that we use is to reduce the total amount of oil that we use.

Exxon Mobil, which made a record breaking $25 billion in profits last year, isn't going to like that very much. To put that in perspective, let's compare ExxonMobil's profits to the gross domestic products (GDP, the sum of all the goods and services sold) of a few countries:

Cote d'Ivoire $ 24.8 billion in 2005, making it the 106th largest country by GDP
Zimbabwe $ 24.0 b.
Bolivia $ 23.6 b.
Qatar $ 22.5 b.
Panama $ 22.2 b.
Estonia $ 21.8 b. . . . and that's just profits. (5)

Should we talk about sales volume? Exxon moved $263.99 billion in product last year. (6) That's more than

Switzerland $ 262.1 billion, making it the 37th largest country by GDP,
Hong Kong $ 254.2 b. (yes, world financial markets calculate this separately from China),
Vietnam $ 251.8 b.,
Malaysia $ 248.0 b., and
Greece $ 242.8 b.. (5)

What's amazing is that, somehow, ExxonMobil can't find the money to just pay the $3 billion in punitive damages they were supposed to from the ExxonValdez oil spill 16 years ago (7). Perhaps the Exxon CEO should hear how you think he should cough it up and clean up his act.

Don't want to watch think about the math? Watch the flash file then:

(1) Independent Petroleum Association of New Mexico
(2) SavetheArctic.com
(3) & (4) U.S. Department of Energy: Demand, Reserves
(5) CIA World Factbook
(6) Forbes Magazine
(7) Houston Chronicle

Editors note: This evening, someone informed me that the president was only talking about oil imports from the middle east or, maybe, unstable nations. That would give him some more leway. Apparently this many-million-barrel nuance was lost on the news outlets I examined today.

Shocking Figures

Did you know that at 1,526.1 metric tons of carbon equivalent, the U.S. emitted nearly twice what the second largest emitter of green house gasses did in 1999?

Additionally, only 6 countries emitted more than the state of Texas! In fact, if you compare emissions from the 50 states to world countries, 17 of them rank in the top 50 global emitters!

I'm reading Statehouse and Greenhouse by Barry Rabe, whom I considered studying under at the University of Michigan. I'm on page 5.

Too Funny

Climate Mash Flash Movie ed note: no longer in original location but preserved on YouTube instead!

Not Funny Google News search on Global Warming provides more sobering reasons to take action now. Global Warming a Major Threat in Africa - Associated Press Global Warming Makes Oregon's Wine Hot as Pinot Purists Fret - Bloomberg News Glacier Melting Speeding Up - Oregon State University Worst Amazon Drought in 40 Years Linked to Global Warming - E Magazine