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The Fight for Clean Air

• A major victory for the Clean Air Act! The Supreme Court REJECTED all industry-led challenges and UPHELD the way the U.S. EPA sets clean air standards by affirming that air quality requirements should be based on public health. As part of updating the Clean Air Act to reflect current scientific knowledge, President Clinton in 1997 announced new health-based air standards for soot and smog. Soon after the new health-based air quality standards were finalized in 1997, industry, led by the American Trucking Association, filed a lawsuit to halt these efforts to clean the air. On May 14, 1999, the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled against the EPA, leaving the fate of the new standards in limbo.
• Clinton Diesel Rules Stand! The Bush administration has graciously let stand regulations imposed by President Bill Clinton that are intended to reduce substantially the pollution caused by diesel fuel and engines. The rules were drafted by Clinton officials in a last-minute flurry of new rules and then put on hold when President Bush took office. The new standards would eventually cut pollution from heavy-duty trucks and buses by 95 percent and reduce the sulfur content of highway diesel fuel by 97 percent. It is reported that the rules would prevent an estimated 8,300 premature deaths and tens of thousands of cases of bronchitis each year. Under the new regulations, diesel producers will be required to virtually eliminate sulfur from the fuel. Sulfur produces soot and clogs up a vehicle's catalytic converter, the device that removes other pollutants. With the removal of sulfur, manufacturers of diesel engines will be required to incorporate the sophisticated pollution-control devices that are standard equipment in cars.

Protect our Water

• Smithfield Foods, the world's largest pork producer and processor of "gross contamination" of rivers and tributaries in Eastern North Carolina, was hit last week with a wide-ranging environmental lawsuit brought by The Water Keeper Alliance and the Sierra Club. The suit alleges that the Smithfield, Va.-based company as well as its North Carolina subsidiaries allowed feces and urine from its thousands of hogs to seep through the ground, eventually ending up in the river system. Smithfield Foods raised 12 million of its own hogs in 2000 and, together with purchases from other sources, slaughtered 19 million hogs. It sells fresh and processed pork including bacon, sausage, ham, hot dogs, and pork and loin parts to retailers, restaurants and directly to customers under its own brands. It did $5.2 billion in sales in fiscal 2000. Although there are rules stipulating that lagoons in this case pits containing the fecal waste must be lined, many of Smithfield's lagoons have been grandfathered under old laws, the lawsuit says, allowing Smithfield's hogs to create massive pollution, the suit says.
• Thirty years after the passage of the Clean Water Act, ocean pollution from cars, fertilizers and septic tanks has gone largely unabated, a recent study by the Pew Oceans Commission notes. Entitled "Marine Pollution in the United States: Significant Accomplishments, Future Challenges," the report is the first of many interim papers on various issues affecting the U.S. marine environment that PEW plans to publish. There have been significant gains in reducing pollution from conventional point sources, but non-point source pollution is a major problem. Due to the increased use of chemical fertilizer, domesticated animals and fossil fuels, more non-point source pollution is leaking into oceans, the report notes. Since pollution is far more difficult to control once it reaches the ocean, conservationists argue that it must be stopped at the source.
• More global warming trends? . . . .Lake Chad, once the fourth-largest body of water in Africa, has shrunk by almost 95 per cent over the past 38 years, according to research sponsored by the US space agency Nasa. Worse, climate change and increasing demands for water have drained the lake to such an extent that it will shortly be nothing more than a “puddle”. The lake produces water for more than 20 million people in up to six countries, covers a surface area of 520 square miles — little more than a twentieth of its size in 1963, when it covered 9,650 square miles. The Lake Chad basin is a closed water system that depends on monsoon rains to replenish the water that drains from the lake. The lake is also shallow, meaning that its level responds rapidly to changes in rainfall and run-off. Since the early 1960s, the region has experienced a significant decline in rainfall, while the amount of water diverted to irrigate surrounding fields has risen steeply.
• Rising nitrate levels -- most likely from farms and homes in the region -- along North Florida's famous Suwannee River are prompting concerns about the nutrient's effect on the environment and public health. "The federal safety standard for nitrate-nitrogen in drinking water is 10 parts per million, but in some areas we're finding levels in the 20 to 30 ppm range," said David Hornsby, water quality analyst with the Suwannee River Water Management District in Live Oak. In addition to making drinking water unsafe, high nitrate concentrations can lower water quality in rivers and springs, causing algae blooms that consume oxygen needed by fish and other aquatic animals. A three-year $1.4 million grant from the state environmental protection agency and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is supporting University of Florida work to monitor groundwater quality and evaluate the effectiveness of best management practices, or BMPs -- solutions designed to be fair and workable for everyone involved.

Rescue our Animals

• Orangutans barely hanging on in the wild. Unless logging and poaching are greatly curbed, the largest natural population of orangutans may vanish from the planet over the next decade, a recent study funded by the Wildlife Conservation Society notes. Found throughout southeastern Asia, orangutans have seen their habitat shrink 80 percent in the past 50 years. Today they are restricted to the shrinking forests of Sumatra and Borneo in Indonesia. Despite the area's protected status, rampant logging is backed by the Indonesian military and police. The rampant illegal logging that often follows selective cutting in Leuser and other areas has caused densities to drop as much as 90 percent. Because orangutans play an important part in a forest's regeneration through the fruits and seeds they eat, they are considered to be a "keystone" species. Their disappearance could mean the loss of hundreds of species of plants, animals and insects within the forest ecosystem.
• Need another reason to not eat Great Lakes Salmon? High levels of a common flame retardant found in plastics, foams and textiles has been detected in Lake Michigan salmon. All 21 salmon examined in a recent University of Wisconsin study contained chemical compounds called polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs, which are widely used for fire safety in computers, television sets, upholstery and cars. The average level of PBDE contamination in the salmon was 80 parts per billion — about six times higher than levels found in a 1999 salmon study in the Baltic Sea, where the most intensive research has been conducted for PBDEs. The concentrations are reported to be the highest in the world for salmon in open waters. The EPA ranks PCBs among the most toxic 10 percent of chemicals for human exposure - they do not biodegrade in the envoronment. While PCB production has been banned, PBDE output has been steady. Studies indicate that, if ingested, PBDEs may increase the risk of cancer, liver damage and immune system dysfunction. Recent research on young mice showed that the chemical could create an adverse affect on neurodevelopment, learning, memory and reproduction. Although restrictions exist in Europe, there are no proposals to limit PBDE use in the United States or Canada.
• Sea Census! An ambitious billion-dollar plan to count the creatures that live in the world's oceans is taking shape at a meeting in Hobart, Australia. Scientists there are taking part in the 10-year-long International Census of Marine Life, which aims to fill in the gaps in our knowledge of what lies beneath the waves. Our motive is discovery," says Jesse Ausubel of the US-based Alfred P Sloan Foundation, which is helping to finance the project. "Very large areas of the oceans are unexplored." The census will use acoustic and optical techniques to carry out its headcount, but it will not employ the other techniques which would be needed to count microbiological lifeforms, he added. The worldwide census will not only provide valuable information for conservationists, it will also help provide maps of unknown regions of the oceans
• Foot and mouth disease. Does it kill? No, but we do. Read Foot and Mouth disease facts and information from the UK's Guardian. A medieval method says the UK's The Sunday Times. Their editorial states that scientists say they could produce better vaccines if they had the funding. Several European rugby matches, outdoor events, footpaths, hiking trails, zoos, national and local parks, and festivals have been canceled or closed to prevent the spread of the disease. UK news is full of reports that this is overeaction and a scam.

  Save our Land

• Alaska's Sen. Frank Murkowski, chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, has presented a bill that would allow oil drilling in the Alaskan refuge. Central to the energy bill is a provision to permit oil drilling inside the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, one of America's last wild places. Sen. Murkowski and other drilling proponents claim that the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) concluded that the Arctic Refuge contains as much as 16 billion barrels of oil. In fact, the USGS predicted there is only a 5 percent chance there is that much recoverable oil, and that it is more likely the area holds only about 3.2 billion barrels of economically recoverable oil -- less than what the nation uses in six months. Moreover, according to Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), production of the 3.2 billion barrels would be spread out over the 50 years of the field’s lifetime and would likely peak at 150 million barrels per year in 2027 -- amounting to only 1.5 percent of projected U.S. consumption that year. Given that current U.S. demand for oil, which is more than 7.1 billion barrels per year, is increasing about 2 percent annually, the coastal plain would contribute less than 1 percent of the oil we are projected to consume over the next 50 years. Little known, the bill also rolls back the Clean Air Act for certain power plants and gives a host of new subsidies to the oil, coal and nuclear industries. "It directly contravenes what presidents have maintained as a position since Dwight Eisenhower," former President Carter said. "What we can do is dampen U.S. consumption, which amounts to about 25 percent of world petroleum demand," Dr. Lashof continued. For example, increasing average fuel efficiency for new cars, SUVs and light trucks to 39 miles per gallon over the next decade would save 51 billion barrels of oil over the next 50 years -- more than 15 times the likely yield from the Arctic Refuge.
• Chilean forest rescued from logging! U.S.-based Boise Cascade Corporation revealed last month that the company will cancel a project to build a wood-chip processing plant near Puerto Montt. The company cited “unfavorable supply/demand outlook” for the construction lumber that it would produce at the mill. The $160 million project, hatched in 1997 between Boise Cascade and Maderas Condor, a Chilean company, faced stiff opposition from a coalition of environmental groups, tourism promoters and salmon farmers. Environmentalists argued that the project would increase logging of the region’s native forests by 27 percent. Salmon farmers said pollution from the project would devastate their business. Tourism officials said that the region’s natural beauty supplied many more jobs than the 200 that the mill would generate.
• Clinton's Monument Designations Stay! The Whitehouse will not fight his proposals. Interior Secretary Gail Norton signaled that while there is nothing the Bush administration can do to reverse Clinton's actions, the Interior Department and Congress could work with local officials, property owners and business executives to address their concerns -- such as by allowing existing mining operations to continue. Clinton established 19 national monuments covering more than 5 million acres and expanded three others. Except for the 1.7 million-acre Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, which Clinton created in southern Utah in 1996, all the monuments were designated within the final year of Clinton's presidency.

Green Scissors 2003 exposes $$58 Billion In Wasteful, Environmentally Harmful Programs!

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