[Mb-civic] Better to be informed than to be in denial...

[ean at sbcglobal.net]

Important environmental news briefs.  Better to be informed than to be in denial...

Environmental news from GRIST MAGAZINE
<http://grist.org>

.
YOU SAY TOMATO, I SAY HIDDEN COSTS OF TRANSPORT
Locally grown food greener than organic, British study says

Though organic farming is relatively easy on the environment, buying
locally grown food, even the pesticide-sprayed variety, is usually more
earth-friendly than buying organic, a new study contends. Published in the
journal Food Policy, the study found that the transportation of food over
long distances -- anywhere outside a 12-mile radius -- can cause more harm
than the growing of food with non-organic methods.  Researchers calculated
the hidden costs of farming and food transport and found that the U.K.
would save some $4 billion a year in environmental and traffic costs if
all food consumed was locally grown, and an additional $2.1 billion a year
if all food were grown organically.  The study authors called on
supermarkets to label items with the number of "food miles" they travel to
get to the store.  "The most political act we do on a daily basis is to
eat, as our actions affect farms, landscapes, and food businesses," said
study coauthor Jules Pretty of the University of Essex.

straight to the source:  BBC News, 02 March 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4459>

straight to the source:  The Independent, Steve Connor, 03 March 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4460>


AAA FOR EFFORT
Legislation would force EPA to get realistic about fuel-efficiency stats

A bill debuting in Congress today would require the U.S. EPA to 
revamp its gas-mileage tests to more accurately reflect real-world 
driving conditions.  Currently the EPA determines mileage ratings for
vehicles by using 30-year-old tests that allow vehicle engines to get
warm, never push the speed above 60 mph, never run the air conditioning,
and never accelerate quickly.  Enviro groups have long argued for reform
of the tests, but now the bill has garnered the support of behemoth auto
club AAA, which has conducted its own tests and found that the EPA is
overestimating average gas mileage for several vehicle models, sometimes
by almost 10 miles per gallon.  The AAA's test, though not scientific,
involves drivers around the country "getting groceries, getting stuck in
traffic jams, driving the same way you would," says AAA spokesdude Mantill
Williams.  Now if only AAA would stop lobbying for more highways and fewer
emissions standards ...

straight to the source:  USA Today, James R. Healey, 02 Mar 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4462>

see also, in Grist:  Sticker Shocking -- The EPA has been 
misoverestimating the fuel economy of cars sold in the U.S., says 
enviro group -- in Muckraker
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4463>

see also, in Grist:  Road Warriors -- A travel club provides a 
greener alternative to AAA -- by Michelle Nijhuis
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=3604>


BRAZILNESS AS USUAL
Amazon forests not doing well

If Amazonian rainforests are, as the old saying goes, the lungs of 
the world, then our respiratory outlook is not good.  The forests 
face a trio of threats.  There are fire and logging, as poor farmers,
cattle ranchers, and agribusinesses clear land for crops or cattle. Then
there's "dieback," whereby the forest vegetation dies from lack of water,
which is driven by drought, which is driven by climate change, which is
driven by excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which is exacerbated by
fire, logging, and dieback in the Amazonian rainforest.  Ah, such tangled
webs we weave.  Attempts to break the cycle have been inauspicious.  Last
year, Brazil's Workers' Party, led by President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva,
suspended logging licenses in an attempt to slow deforestation of the
Amazon.  In response, loggers and their allies rioted, blockaded a major
highway, burned buses, threatened to seize an airport and dump poisonous
chemicals in rivers, and promised that "blood will flow."  The government
vowed not to "cave into blackmail," and then, uh, caved into blackmail,
restoring the licenses last week.  And so the world's lung cancer
progresses, untreated.

straight to the source:  The Boston Globe, Associated Press, Charles J.
Hanley, 12 Feb 2005 <http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4310>

straight to the source:  The New York Times, Larry Rohter, 13 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4311>


EXHAUSTED
Old diesel engines kill more than 20,000 Americans a year

Particulate pollution generated by old diesel engines is killing more
people per year than drunk driving, said a report released yesterday.
Using data and methodologies from the U.S. EPA, the Clean Air Task Force
and a coalition of public health groups found that more than 20,000
Americans -- particularly those in urban areas near bus stops, highways,
truck stops, or construction sites -- die, and more than 400,000 visit the
emergency room, each year after breathing in tiny particles of diesel
exhaust.  While the EPA has mandated the phase-in of cleaner diesel
engines for highway vehicles and heavy equipment starting in 2007, it has
not addressed the 13 million such engines already in use, which have a
lifespan of some 30 years.  The groups behind the report recommended
requiring the upgrading of current engines and the use of cleaner-burning
fuel.  "We do not need to wait," wrote Howard Frumkin of Emory University
in the report's foreword.  "Technology is available today that can reduce
particulate matter emissions 90 percent."  Industry groups, you'll be
shocked to hear, decried the study.

straight to the source:  Scripps Howard, Joan Lowy, 22 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4394>

straight to the source:  The Washington Post, Shankar Vedantam, 23 Feb
2005 <http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4395>

straight to the source:  San Francisco Chronicle, Associated Press, 
Devlin Barrett, 23 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4396>


GLOBAL WARMING -- IT'S INFECTIOUS
Environmental change linked to spread of infectious diseases

If the catastrophic flooding, drought, and weather-related calamities
associated with global warming don't kill you, exotic infectious diseases
might step up to do the job, a new report released by the U.N. suggests. 
It found that changes to the environment -- such as deforestation, urban
growth, mining, and pollution of coastal waters -- may be aiding the
spread of infectious diseases, including ailments never before seen in
humans.  The report also suggests that global warming could be a major
aggravating factor because rising temperatures and altered habitats could
allow more diseases and their carriers to flourish.  Climate change may
also increase the number of environmental refugees moving to new areas and
taking germs with them.  The researchers noted a rise in the occurrence of
dengue fever, found in only nine countries in the 1970s, but now present
in more than 100.  Other ailments scientists have linked to the
environment include tuberculosis, bubonic plague, and cholera.

straight to the source:  The Independent, Michael McCarthy, 22 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4391>

straight to the source:  VOA News, Cathy Majtenyi, 21 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4392>

straight to the source:  Planet Ark, Reuters, C. Bryson Hull, 22 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4393>


MARSHING OUR MELLOW
Legendary Iraqi marshes slowly on the mend

Despite certain, er, unfortunate events elsewhere in the country, one part
of Iraq, subject to some of deposed dictator Saddam Hussein's worst
crimes, is experiencing a glimmer of hope.  For years after the 1991 Gulf
War, much of Hussein's industrial machinery was turned toward a massive
dam-building project that drained some 90 percent of the southern wetlands
where Marsh Arabs had lived for more than 5,000 years.  Aside from the
human toll -- hundreds of thousands of marshland inhabitants were
displaced -- it was an ecological catastrophe, destroying an area many
call the cradle of Western civilization, periodically flooded by the
Tigris and Euphrates rivers and home to hundreds of fish and bird species.
 After Hussein was booted, residents tore down the dams and water began
flooding back in -- water a group of researchers now says is much cleaner
than they expected.  The researchers report in the latest issue of Science
that the marshes are surprisingly resilient and that while full
restoration is impossible, signs are positive that with enough water, much
of their former glory could return.

straight to the source:  MSNBC.com, Associated Press, 19 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4397>

straight to the source:  Planet Ark, Reuters, Maggie Fox, 21 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4398>

PEOPLE, PEOPLE WHO BREED PEOPLE
Better make room -- world population to hit 9.1 billion by 2050

There will be 9.1 billion people on this li'l planet of ours by 2050,
according to revised U.N. population figures released yesterday. That's a
40 percent increase from today's mere (!) 6.5 billion. While population in
developed countries is expected to remain largely stable at 1.2 billion --
mainly due to immigration, as their native birth rates are declining --
the world's 50 poorest countries will see their numbers more than double. 
At the same time, life expectancy in southern Africa has declined from 62
years in 1995 to 48 years in 2000-2005, and is projected to hit a low of
43 before a slow recovery.  That means Africans are being born and lost to
AIDS at a rate almost incomprehensible to comfortable Westerners. Speaking
of which, U.S. population is set to rise from 298 million in 2005 to 394
million in 2050, with immigration the main driver of growth.  Meanwhile,
India will probably surpass China as the world's most populous nation in
coming decades, due to higher birth rates. "It is going to be a strain on
the world," said Hania Zlotnik, U.N. Population Division director and
master of understatement.

straight to the source:  The Globe and Mail, Associated Press, 25 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4416>

straight to the source:  BBC News, 25 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4417>

DAM
Hydropower a major greenhouse-gas producer, researchers say

Although hydroelectric power is often heralded as a green alternative to
fossil fuels like coal, scientists now say that in terms of greenhouse-gas
production, hydro projects may be just as damning. Ahem.  New research
reveals that the initial flooding involved in creating hydroelectric dams
releases large amounts of carbon from plants that are killed in the
process.  Then, leftover plant matter and other plants killed when water
levels rise decompose and release methane into the atmosphere.  These
greenhouse-gas emissions add up -- in the case of one Brazilian dam
project studied, emissions released over a year were more than triple what
would have been produced by burning oil.  The Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change is considering counting some hydro-related emissions toward
countries' allotments, but its proposed new guidelines would not count
methane in this group, so some scientists say the proposals don't go far
enough.

straight to the source:  New Scientist, Duncan Graham-Rowe, 26 Feb 2005
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4412>

THE CRADLE-TO-CRADLE WILL ROCK
Smart, eco-friendly design making inroads in the business community

The seminal 2002 book "Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make 
Things," by architect William McDonough and chemist Michael 
Braungart, inspired a slogan for 21st century designers:  "Pollution is a
symbol of design failure."  They proposed that every material used in
manufacturing should be capable of either biodegrading harmlessly into the
soil or returning with no loss of quality into the manufacturing process. 
More and more businesses are embracing the C2C concept, for economic as
well as environmental reasons. Office design company Herman Miller Inc.
hopes to have 50 percent of its products meet C2C specs by 2010.  Carpet
maker Shaw Industries now offers to pick up and recycle all of its carpet
tiles, reducing both waste and money spent on new materials.  Office
furniture company Steelcase has released "Think," a 99 percent recyclable
office chair.  Going C2C is getting easier, too, as industry introduces
new eco-friendly materials and economies of scale push the prices down. 
As that happens, more companies, says Shaw's Steven Bradfield, "will
quietly adopt this as a basic business practice."

straight to the source:  The Wall Street Journal, Rebecca Smith, 03 
Mar 2005 (access ain't free)
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4458>

see also, in Grist:  Better, By Design -- A review of Cradle to 
Cradle -- by Hal Clifford
<http://grist.org/cgi-bin/forward.pl?forward_id=4466>


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