Our World and Everything in It

I haven’t written any posts despite an earthquake in Indiana or Illinois, a House energy package that passed Michigan’s House of Representatives,  Earth Day tomorrow, and all the environmental events over the weekend because I didn’t have any dial tone.  I’m sooooo tired of my sloooooow dial up service for the internet I finally decided to get DSL.

DSL was only offered out here in Berlin Twp. a few months ago. But instead of getting faster service with DSL, I lost all of my phone service. The best part was fixing it. Imagine my surprise that a phone repair guy knocked at my door at 9:00 am Sunday morning.

There I stood in my beat up, but comfortable robe, hair all over the place, no makeup, and just as badly beaten slippers explaining what had transpired and why this was no ordinary repair call. I should have listened to that little qualm of mine that said someone was going to show up on Sunday. I thought that might happen after talking to yet another customer rep on Saturday, except this was a simple do it yourself hook-up for DSL. No repair or installation guy was necessary. I guess my phone lines simply were not ready yet, and neither was I on Sunday morning.

By the time I got back on line to look up everything I missed, like the earthquake, it was already this morning. It’s good I have my pc back, but I lost the acceleration program I used to have, so now I’m slower than ever. Hopefully, I’ll finally have DSL soon. (more…)

Today the U.S. House of Representatives held a hearing regarding the Clean Water Restoration Act. The Senate held a meeting about this earlier this week. HR 2421 helps clarify that federal safeguards against water pollution must protect all waters of the United States. It may seem funny to some that this is necessary because the general public is out of touch with what has been happening to many of our established environmental laws.

The Bush administration has systematically attacked many of our longstanding environmental laws including The Clean Water Act. Big corporations and developers who seek to pollute have gone to court over the Clean Water Act. It seems they have found a loophole in the act because in many places it describes the waters protected by this act as navigable for one thing, which means if you can’t place a boat on it, well it just might not be protected—by anyone. So we’ve ended up with ambiguous rulings by the Supreme Courts, and federal agencies have issued confusing guidelines on what is or is not protected by federal law.

This leaves ponds, streams, wetlands, drain areas, and many other seasonal wet spots open to damage and destruction from industrial pollution. I’ve read over HR 2421 and what used to be described as navigable waters is now simply called waters. I also read a review on the Big Bear blogsite that it’s doubtful this bill will pass. Hunters, ranchers, and farmers won’t like it. Well more than 175 House members are co-sponsoring it, and 21 Senators so far are co-sponsoring the companion legislation. I had to comment on that site that of course the huge farming and hunting lobby doesn’t want anyone messing with their new found freedom in states like Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana. They’ve pushed their weight around in those states to get the wolves, and bison killed, and wild horses rounded up. I believe it is to make way for more devastation of our national forests when Bush tries to weaken the Roadless Rule too. Because with these animals out of the way, no one has to protect their habitat, paving the way for more lumbering, mining, and drilling on or near our national forests.

Contact our legislators and let them know that every ounce of water is precious to us, especially with the drought that prevails in many places in our country. If anything as simple as a pond or a seasonal wetland is not covered by an individual state, as it stands right now, federal protection for that area may be challenged because the water in question is not navigable. It might not be navigable but pollute it with toxic material and it’s going to leach, or flow somewhere now isn’t it? That bad water just might end up in your well, backyard, creek, or pond. 

Read HR 2421 at: http://bulk.resource.org/gpo.gov/bills/110/h2421ih.txt.pdf

Conveniently contact your legislators with a petition at: http://action.earthjustice.org/campaign/cwara0408/w5eu6wbrlmetjdd

I ran across this article on the AP. It makes me think worse than I already thought about the EPA.  I sometimes get the feeling we are all guinea pigs to some extent. The subject is sludge, which as the article so succinctly states is “the leftover semisolid wastes filtered from water pollution at 16,500 treatment plants.” It goes on to say the federal policy for the past three decades has been that this sludge can be turned into something harmless, even if swallowed, (I may skip dinner tonight).

There is a 1978 memo where the EPA makes the argument that the sludge contains nutrients and organic matter ‘which have considerable benefit for land and crops.’ Does this not sound like the spreading of so-called nutrients from CAFO lagoons onto farm land irregardless of all the bacteria and low levels of toxic substances?

The particular sludge in the article wasn’t sprayed on farmland however. “Nine low-income families in Baltimore row houses agreed to let researchers till the sewage sludge into their yards and plant new grass. In exchange, they were given food coupons as well as the free lawns as part of a study published in 2005 and funded by the Housing and Urban Development Department. Nice, real nice.

Researchers believe that the sludge contains phosphate and iron that binds to lead and other hazardous metals in the soil so that it would pass right through a child if they ate any of it. This little experiment was done elsewhere also in a poor neighborhood, and without much fanfare. The problem is there has been no medical follow up. Isn’t that curious?

It looks like the EPA is looking to utilize semisolid waste in unlikely places. If the EPA was truly in earnest using this waste to protect the health and safety of children against lead, wouldn’t there, shouldn’t there be medical tests over a period of time afterward to see if it worked? The only way I can see that there are no follow up records of this experiment is that it’s not 100% but only a theory and the poor neighborhoods chosen were guinea pigs.

The frightening part is that this idea about sludge/pollution being a nutrient still reigns. So where else has sludge been spread or dumped masquerading as a nutrient? We better not have any more tainted vegetables turn up this year.

http://enews.earthlink.net/article/hea?guid=20080414/4802d6c0_3ca6_15526200804141768367295

Ah, how soon we forget. Just a little over a year ago the United States Supreme Court ruled that the EPA could not bypass its authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from vehicles. That ruling caused a rush to court on behalf of other industry polluters, i.e., coal burning facilities. But luck ran out for the coal industry when the of U.S. Court of Appeal’s basically threw the EPA’s cap and trade program out, and told the EPA that they were wrong by taking power plants off the list of hazardous pollution sources with its “Clean Air Mercury Rule.” Now the EPA has two years to develop mercury emissions standards for existing power plants. http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=232

So it seems a little redundant for citizens to have to sign a petition to send a message to our state congress to get Michigan moving. This particular petition calls for Governor Granholm to issue an executive order to immediately direct Michigan’s DEQ (Dept. of Environmental Quality) to regulate CO2 emissions from coal and other power facilities.

The real goal here is to show our state government we are indeed watching what does or does not happen in Michigan as far as legislation to move forward to bring new jobs to boost the economy, while continuing to curb pollution in Michigan. Our two houses and the governor continue to come to a stalemate regarding jobs, the environment, pollution, and our economy. We wouldn’t be as afraid to loose jobs in polluting industries like construction of coalburners, refineries, and even nuke plants, if we had a decent RPS (Renewable Portfolio Standard) and Energy Efficiency program to entice more green industry into our state, which seems to go hand in hand with the technical industries also.

Job growth in a new sector certainly takes the sting out of job loss and poor working conditions in waning manufacturing sectors. So get on with it Michigan! We’re missing a golden opportunity to transform ourselves quickly from old manufacturing status quo to something new completely that’s being afforded by green industry.

Perhaps signing a petition to nudge our politicians forward is a very good idea to show we want the green—both industry and paycheck green.

Take the time to sign at:   http://progressmichigan.org/page/s/globalwarming.
 

Good news and just in time I think. The Great Lakes Compact looks to be signed off by the last, (Wisconsin), of 8 states that are involved in the agreement to keep Great Lakes water from being diverted elsewhere. The deadline for Wisconsin coming on board is April 17th.  Wisconsin was holding out for changes to the compact that many claim would unravel the whole thing. So either Wisconsin conceded or something changed.

I say this happened just in time because the March 31st issue of Time magazine featured an article on Lake Mead drying up. It looked like the photographs of Lake Chad in Niger Africa that I blogged about in 2006.  Lake Chad was once 10,000 sq mi but is now a mere 500 sq mi., probably less now in 2008. Lake Chad is comparable to some of our Great Lakes. It’s drying up, as is Lake Mead. The Time article said the marks on the surrounding rock show past water levels of Lake Mead that were100 ft. higher.

After that article, I picked up my latest Reader’s Digest May 2008 issue and the special report was titled as a question: “Are we running out of water?” That article highlighted Atlanta’s latest drought, as well as Lake Mead. The whole time I’m thinking about Wisconsin holding out on signing the compact because they are worried about communities outside of the basin getting water from the Great Lakes.  The wells that one of the communities used to rely on are full of radium, so they need lake water more than ever.

But without the compact and as the law reads now for this Wisconsin out-of-basin community, the governors of the Great Lakes basin states can say no to a diversion from the Great Lakes for no reason at all. At least the new rules in the compact set up standards a community must meet to get the water, and as long as the treated wastewater is returned, that community wouldn’t be denied access.  Did Wisconsin ever stop to think that they shouldn’t tick off the other governors by holding up this valuable compact, that those governors could veto the water to this out-of-basin community in the future? It’s doubtful that would happen, considering the moral and ethical implications, but Geez.

I think that we’re all a little spoiled. That Wisconsin community was used to just getting the water without a big hassle before. All they have to do is comply with standards outlined by the new compact, which they probably have been doing all along. So do the paperwork involved for the compliance and get your water already!

And the rest of us in the Great Lakes area are spoiled as well. I live right on the water. It is higher this year than all but one of the past 20 years I’ve lived here. Yet I read about fellow Americans suffering drought and fires elsewhere in the country. The dumb thing is that if climate gets so bad that drought forces millions of Americans out of their homes and migrating back toward the Great Lakes basin to settle, we will be using the water up anyway now won’t we? Instead of pumping it to them, they come here for it. What’s the difference? We’re simply delaying the process with this compact because if the scenario for water scarcity gets worse, we’ll be packed in like sardines around here, and just counting the days to our demise anyway.

We shouldn’t be fooling around about conservation in this country any longer.  We’re seeing some pretty drastic changes in a very short period of time, a lot shorter than ”oh we-don’t-have-to-worry about global warming for ten years!” Right. 

Read about the Great Lakes Compact: http://www.glc.org/about/glbc.html

About finalizing the compact: http://www.onewisconsinnow.org/page/community/post/coryliebmann/C27D

About the holdup in Wisconsin: http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=718988
 

It’s one thing to read a really interesting article about capturing energy in the smallest possible ways that leads to quite a large impact worldwide, but sometimes a reader’s comments about the article are even more intriguing.

The article I refer to was in the March 6th edition of Time Magazine called “Finding Energy All Around Us.” It’s about using vibration converted to energy. Vibration is unused energy and it’s everywhere. We vibrate when we walk. Scientists can transform that “micromotion” into electricity, albeit, small wattage but in times like these ever little bit helps. An engineer at the University of Southampton in Britain has even created a vibration harvester.

The article stated, “The shaking of a bridge could power tiny sensors to monitor the structure’s physical integrity.” Before the Minnesota bridge collapse, we would have considered this a minor achievement, but in light of that disaster, what a good idea. Ditto for using the steady rhythmic vibrations of the human heart to run a pacemaker so that cardiac patients won’t have to be cut open to replace batteries. Does this not sound like a racket—cutting people open periodically, at what insurance costs, just to replace batteries in a pacemaker?

Besides harnessing the energy from vibrations, a company called Thermo Life produces devices that can harness thermoelectric energy. The heat from the temperature difference between the opposite ends of a circuit can be converted for additional voltage but in the past has been too expensive. Thermo Life produces energy from some pretty small temperature fluctuations and uses it to power rechargeable batteries right now. But with more innovation, if we can ever get away from the stranglehold of big oil, Thermo Life believes it will be able to “harness the energy lost as heat in the fossil fuel plants” providing our electricity. How much heat is lost from the production of the world’s energy?—60 percent! Now that is a waste.

After reading this article I was still amazed by the notion of energy scavenging, and the amount of energy wasted in the form of heat, until I read what another reader had to say about it in the March 31st, 2008 edition of Time. He suggested that we should harvest the energy from the ocean’s tides too. Robert F. Bourque said that off the coast of New England the tides rise and fall 8 to 12 ft. twice a day. He thinks that we could generate electricity from floating pistons in the ocean. His idea is also environmentally friendly compared to the use of dams. The floating pistons wouldn’t silt up bays and would be less expensive than dam construction. He said that north of Maine, in the Bay of Fundy, a moon tide can be 50 ft? Who knew, and are floating pistons possible? A 50 ft. rise and drop in that volume of water would no longer be considered micromotion, that’s for sure.

Finding out that even the smallest movements can produce energy, and that such an enormous amount of heat is being wasted by the generation of electricity world wide, we have to wonder why the rush to drill in pristine parts of the world for more oil. We haven’t begun to conserve or recycle our waste, and now we know there is more waste out there than we thought. With more and more people weighing in like Robert, who knows what we can come up in the very near future? 

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1720111,00.html

Hopefully, everyone in Michigan realizes by now that we are not simply in an economic downturn. We are going through a transformational change away from a predominantly manufacturing state toward more economic diversity. We should have done this long ago. Michigan has suffered horrible ups and downs in the economy from relying too heavily on the auto industry. If we can just hang tight and move to change wisely, things will get increasingly better for Michigan. Dr. Charles Ballard, an economist, writes about transformational change in his book “Michigan’s Economic Future.”
http://www.absolutemichigan.com/dig/michigan/michigan-books-michigans-economic-future/

We don’t need anyone to tell us we’re going through something much different than regular economic cycles. We know we’re trying to expand our markets, many of which will be green markets.  Back in 2006, Governor Granholm issued an Executive Directive for the development of a comprehensive plan for meeting the state’s electric power needs that would include alternative sources and a timetable. As a result the MPSC, Michigan Public Service Commission, developed the 21CEP or 21st Century Energy Plan. That plan calculated what would happen if Michigan’s economy went through a tranformational change for the worse, which is evident as loss of manufacturing capacity and jobs continues: http://www.emaee.org/articles.php?id=42 and http://www.cis.state.mi.us/mpsc/electric/capacity/energyplan/newenergy_oct11_2006rev.pdf

The MPSC calls transformational change for the worse “low load growth sensitivity” and the results of this low demand for electricity is found on page 67 of the above pdf from the MPSC. The table there shows no new coal plants are needed until 2021. This is big difference from DTE’s rate filing before the MPSC that shows no growth demand until 2012, a nine year difference. But it shows that even DTE doesn’t expect any increase in electricity demand for years. Pages 73-75 of http://efile.mpsc.cis.state.mi.us/efile/docs/15417/0001.pdf

There should be a moratorium on any new permits for coalburners then. The rush to get scrubbers on Michigan’s coalburners satisfies Michigan’s lax CO2 laws that state if a number of emissions are eliminated, then the owner of the coalburning facility can apply for a permit to expand that facility and not have to capture or control the remaining emissions. Unfortunately sulfur dioxide (SO2), and nitrogen oxide (NOx), mercury, and CO2 are all lumped together. The scrubbers will eliminate the sulfur and nitrogen, but the mercury and more CO2 are good to go. Why the rush to put scrubbers on coal plants now if not to apply for permits, and before the rules change? Any new permits for expansion or new construction of coalburning facilities should be denied because by DTE’s own admission, the increase in demand for electricity in Michigan is simply not there, at least for awhile. 

On March 5, 2008 I got an email from Earthjustice that buffalo are being threatened in a particular area outside of Yellowstone in Montana called Horse Butte peninsula. Supposedly the buffalo carry a virus that threatens cattle, although no cattle have ever died from it, and there are no cattle grazing nearby. As a matter of fact, Earthjustice said that “in 2002 cattle grazing on public lands was stopped by a court order and the remaining private land in the area ha[d] been purchased by new owners who ha[d] declared the property open to bison.” The best part is the government is using hundreds of thousands of dollars of our money for this slaughter. Earthjustice, the Buffalo Field Campaign, and local landowners want the slaughter stopped and a new environmental impact study initiated that takes into account the above ruling and therefore the justification for this slaughter. What a tail chase with our money.

As of April 3 Defenders of Wildlife reports that 3,000 bison have been killed in the past 15 years. If you’re like me you’re thinking that’s not many. I ate buffalo last summer for the first time because I don’t eat pork or beef, and I know it’s free range. But then I read that already this year alone 1100 bison have been slaughtered, a quarter of their wild population. Now we’re getting into mindless, and needless slaughter. This hasn’t happened since the 1800’s.

Earthjustice, the Buffalo Field Campaign, and local landowners are calling for a halt to the buffalo slaughter and the initiation of a new environmental impact study that takes into account the current circumstances in the area and removes the justification for the killings.

Because I’m always looking at and receiving information on environmental things, I’m a little alarmed at the widespread slaughter of wildlife across our most forested states and can’t help thinking these animals are being forfeited for the mining, oil, and lumber industries. Because none of the excuses for the execution that’s taking place are true. And parts of our national parks have been up for auction in the past few years. It’s as if everything is being cleared away from the perimeter of those parks, perhaps for more slant oil drilling?

Anyway, since I enjoyed the buffalo I ate last summer the first thing I though was who gets all the meat? I found that much of it is given to Native Americans on reservations, and food banks. The Native American handout is such an irony isn’t it? Early Native Americans believed in taking only what was needed from the earth. This is a big slaughter for nothing. They are being urged to not accept the buffalo meat at the reservations by the Buffalo Field Campaign.

Another irony. We have wolves being slaughtered because they supposedly threaten to eat cattle, yet the deer and elk populations are up in Idaho and Wyoming where wolves are threatened. So evidently the wolves aren’t all that bloodthirsty. And even if they are, can’t we see our way to a different compromise. We’re killing buffalo in another state over nothing and looking to hand it out. Why not let buffalo graze in wolf territory and let nature balance things out? We seem to constantly spend money to introduce wildlife, get it to flourish, then spend more money to slaughter it all.

In the balance of all these Nero like mood swings of government is our wildlife, and all of its habitat. It’s outrageous to kill off a species of animal in such a short period of time and despite a public outcry against it. After all it’s our money, it’s our wildlife, and it’s our world.
http://action.earthjustice.org/campaign/bison_0308/w5eu6wb9qmtdwie?

http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org/media/press0304/news0304/030204.html

In 24 hrs over 30,000 logged on to protest here at Defenders of Wildlife: https://secure.defenders.org/site/Advocacy?pagename=homepage&page=UserAction&id=1059&autologin=true&s_einterest=C3C4&s_Affiliate=act_&JServSessionIdr005=0iwmuej2l2.app26a

It was such a beeaauuuutiful day today that many people got the bug to be outside. This is just a reminder of a really fun and buggy you’re looking to do something different outside and/or you have kids that are right around the bug age and would love it. You know, the age when the fascination for bugs-as-pets occurs. My interest was fuzzy caterpillars. I would ride them around on the back of my tricycle. I collected jars of them. Oh, and fire flies, or lightening bugs depending where you’re from. That was always fun.

Before I get lost here, this event SEARCH FOR BUGS is sponsored by the River Raisin Watershed Council’s Spring Adopt-A-Stream search for bugs that will help them monitor the health of our River Raisin.

It’s a learning experience that teaches young and old the importance of insects as indicators of the health and quality of the water. The Watershed Council makes good used of the data collected year after year where they can get a clear picture of trends in the river’s overall health. The weather looks to cooperate for a perfect day. This is good family time outside and with purpose!

Captain and Collector training is this coming Saturday, April 12th, 9:00 am, at Adrian College. Next Saturday, April 19th training will be in Dundee (location TBA). Call (517)
265-5599 or email jennifer.janssen@comcast.net for more info and to participate.

The actual Stream Search day is Saturday, April 26th from 9:00 am – wpm with 3 locations:

· Adrian College
· Mill Pond Park in Saline
· Monroe Drain Commission (tentative)

You will need to call or email about the Monroe event. You get to see the results of your search on BUG ID DAY Saturday, May 10th, 9:00 am –1:00 pm, Adrian College. This sounds like a very nice memory to make with your kids.

I’d like to know what those bugs say about the River wouldn’t you?

I’ve complained about an unscrupulous EPA before, showing that some of its exiting hierarchy was tied to the oil industry. I’ve also tried to get the point across that the Bush administration has dismantled the federal government in small increments handing out contracts to for-profit corporations to do the work our agencies used to do, while cutting the budget drastically in many departments across the board. Sound alright? A lot of people think so—less spending. But do we know who is doing the work instead, how the contract was awarded, who is responsible if something goes wrong, or how much the contractor was actually paid for the job?

Cuts are going to happen. We must pay for the war.  But we just don’t know all the things that have been cut, until it’s too late that is. Just last year around this time, the Bush administration planned to cut some $500 million from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s budget and was met with fierce opposition in congress. The complaint was that it would shortchange vital environmental programs and was unacceptable. Do ya think?

Now it’s the FDA. The cover of the April 2008 Reader’s Digest asks “Can We Trust the FDA?—Must Read Special Report,” and reveals the Food and Drug Administration is in crisis. Most of the article is about the drugs we take, but the department is responsible for regulating $1.5 trillion in food, as well as, animal feeds and drugs. The article stated that insiders say, “it’s [FDA] woefully underfunded, dangerously understaffed and fractured by bitter internal tensions.” I immediately suspected feuding within the department exists because some people have ethics. In 2004, the FDA came under fire for silencing a staff scientist about antidepressants causing suicidal tendencies in teens. Ditto for the EPA, when scientists testified before congress last year that they were tired of being suppressed, and their findings/reports compromised.

The FDA receives only $2 billion in funding, which sounds like a lot but as the article says “is about what Fairfax County, Virginia, pays for its public schools.” It’s really frightening to read words like “chilling new report” in reference to the department in charge of our food and medicine. Worse yet the “chilling” report was commissioned by the FDA’s own advisory Science Board that also describes it as “nearly out of control.”

Congress has just begun to help shore up the FDA, increasing their funding by $145 million, but hey compared to billions, that’s a drop in the bucket. Of course about a quarter of that went to the drug review branch, another reason to read this story to see how much conflict of interest there is within the FDA relative to the drug industry. But special interests and conflict of interest on the food side of this equation cause an equal amount of damage. We start seeing problems like tainted food, beef, and chicken recalls, lax inspection of CAFO’s and runoff from them that may make its way into our tributaries, and of course really lax inspection of imported food. I watched a program where farm raised shrimp in an Asian country were swimming in polluted water with feces from farm animals. I check what I buy now. I steer clear of imports. I know the FDA isn’t checking.

The article said the public needs to weigh in. Weigh in? Scream for Pete’s sake. This is our bread, this is our health and it’s being handled shabbily. This type of decision-making and ethics is repetitive in the EPA, and more than likely throughout our federal agencies at this point. As I read the five key problems in this industry, they were similar to the EPA’s problems:

· The FDA suffers pressure from industry to speed decisions, and soft-pedal problems.
· Safety of New Drugs. Safety decisions are many times based on inefficient industry studies.
· Sloppy Record Keeping
· Conflicts of Interest
· Muzzled Experts

This list just about says it all doesn’t it? From the looks of things, we’re on our own.

Read the article: http://www.rd.com/national-interest/special-reports-and-surveys/problems-in-the-fda/article55513.html