Ahem, Cough, Gasp

(Cartoon by Lee Judge published 3/3/14 in the Kansas City Star and featured at McClatchy DC.  Click on image to enlarge and then drag yourself back here.)

Unfortunately, it's not just the conservatives burying their heads in the sand when it comes to climate change.  Most of the world is ignoring the consequences of using carbon based fuel.  Maybe the latest report from the World Health Organization will get some attention.  Maybe.

From the L.A. Times:

Air pollution kills about 7 million people a year and is linked to 1 in 8 deaths worldwide, according to a report released Tuesday by the World Health Organization.

 

The finding more than doubles previous estimates “and confirms that air pollution is now the world’s largest single environmental health risk,” the agency said.

 

An estimated 4.3 million people died in 2012 as a result of indoor air pollution, mostly from cooking inside with coal or wood stoves in developing countries, according to the report by the public health agency of the United Nations. An additional 3.7 million died from outdoor air pollution.

Many people are exposed to both indoor and outdoor air pollution, so deaths attributed to each cannot simply be added together, the agency noted. Because of the overlap, the combined estimate for 2012 is about 7 million deaths.

“The risks from air pollution are now far greater than previously thought or understood, particularly for heart disease and strokes,” said Maria Neira, the agency's public health and environment director.   ...

The greatest health risk is posed by fine particles -- also known as PM2.5 -- which include diesel soot, wood smoke and chemical-laden droplets. Experts say those combustion particles, less than 1/30th the width of a human hair, cause most of the fatalities because they penetrate deep into the lungs, inflame the airways and put strain on the heart and other organs.

”People don’t die of air pollution alone; they die of other things the pollution tends to exacerbate,” said Michael Kleinman, a professor of toxicology at UC Irvine, who was not involved with the report. “It's a contributor to many deaths, and the more we learn, the more effects can be attributed to air pollution."

Last year the WHO's cancer research arm declared air pollution a human carcinogen, saying it increases the risk of lung and bladder cancer.

Reducing pollution levels could save millions of lives, according to the agency.
 

“The evidence signals the need for concerted action to clean up the air we all breathe,” Neira said.  [Emphasis added]

The report attributes many of the deaths, especially in Asia and other lesser-developed nations to the use of coal and wood burned to cook meals.  That said, in the industrialized nations much of the air pollution is caused by the burning of carbon-based materials such as natural gas and oil as demands for energy increase, especially in areas hard hit by climate change.

Yes, reducing pollution levels would save millions of lives, and, yes, a concerted action to clean up the air (and the water and the ground) is necessary.  Now, all we need is the will to do so.

How long, O Lord, how long?

 

NOTE:  The W.H.O report is available here.

Ahem, Cough, Cough...

(Cartoon by Tom Toles, 11/25/12, and found here.   Click on image to enlarge and then please return.)

I've been a whiny-ass titty baby for the past week to ten days, primarily because I've been fighting off another infection, which increased my need for drugs which, in turn, required going off ice cream (my favorite food group) until the antibiotic regimen ended.  Then I fell into some financial difficulties which required me to haul out the begging bowl, always a blow to my ego.  And then ...

This news didn't exactly cheer me up:

In a Louisiana swamp several miles upriver from the Gulf of Mexico, about 3,000 construction workers are building a massive industrial facility to liquefy natural gas, preparing for a new era when the U.S. will begin exporting energy around the globe.

The $12-billion project is one of the largest single industrial investments in the nation, part of a massive transformation of the energy sector that has led to a boom in drilling, transportation and refining from coast to coast.

Five years ago, the idea of exporting U.S. gas and oil was not only unheard of, but, in the case of most U.S. crude oil, illegal. At that time, the United States was facing a future of dwindling domestic supplies and vulnerability to foreign producers. It was anxiously building facilities to import natural gas, worried about ever-higher prices and building much of its foreign policy on the need to secure energy supplies.

But U.S. energy production has boomed with the technological revolution of hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, and the ability to tap newly accessible massive reserves. The nation surpassed Russia in 2009 as the largest producer of natural gas and is expected to zip past Saudi Arabia next year to become the largest oil producer in the world.

Now, the U.S. energy industry is pushing for a new era of exports.   [Emphasis added]

What the frack??!!!??

I mean, really.

Here in California we're in the fourth year of a drought because the jet stream has been pushed northward, sending our badly needed precipitation eastward.  Folks in the eastern half of the country have had a brutal winter, with snow and ice storms as far south as Atlanta, and that weather is freaking continuing even as I pound on my poor laptop's keys.

The UK and parts of Europe have been hit with similar disastrous weather and Beijing China has had several bouts of smog radiating out for over 400 miles which amounted to at least ten times the particulate level marking extremely unhealthful air.

The whole world and all of the living things in it are suffering because we continue to use carbon-based fuels for energy.  And now we've found a new way, a dangerous way, to pump even the most difficult-to-reach pockets of oil and natural gas, so that our water supplies are even more directly affected.

For what?

So that a few rich titans, like the Koch Brothers, can get richer and richer as the rest of us die off.  And our government is going to help them do it.

Lord have mercy
Christ have mercy
Lord have mercy

I have none to spare.

 

And Yet Again ...

(Cartoon by Ted Rall and swiped from his blog, which you all should visit anyway.  Click on image to enlarge.)

For the second time this year, Duke Energy has hit the news with another nasty bit of dumping. 

From the Los Angeles Times:

While poring over regulatory documents for Duke Energy coal ash ponds, environmentalists at the Waterkeeper Alliance grew suspicious of the way the giant utility was handling the toxic ash waste left over from burning coal.

They decided to send up a team in an aircraft to photograph Duke's shuttered Cape Fear coal-burning power plant and ash ponds, tucked into piney woods in this tiny community in central North Carolina.

The photos revealed what the Waterkeeper Alliance says is evidence that Duke, the nation's largest electric utility, is deliberately pumping toxic coal ash wastewater from the containment ponds into a canal that eventually feeds into the Cape Fear River, a source of drinking water for downstream cities.

In the photos, two portable pumps and hoses can be seen drawing water from a coal ash pond and dumping into the canal and into nearby woods. According to the environmental group, that is a criminal violation of the Clean Water Act and state laws.  ...

State regulators said the pumping could be illegal, and added that they were investigating the incident.

The allegations came as Duke and state regulators are under intense public and political pressure following the massive Feb. 2 Duke Energy coal ash spill that coated the Dan River with toxic coal ash sludge for at least 70 miles in North Carolina and Virginia. Hazardous heavy metals such as arsenic and lead were dumped into the river.   [Emphasis added]

What is so maddening about this news is that it took a citizen's group, Waterkeeper Alliance, to uncover this latest dump.  The state agency was fully aware of the prior problems, yet it appears it simply closed the books after the February 2 spill, not checking out the other sites within the state. 

What is up with that?

That's what the feds wants to know:

Federal prosecutors have announced a criminal investigation into the relationship between the state agency and Duke Energy. They have said they are seeking evidence of any money or gifts exchanging hands.

Kudos to Waterkeeper Alliance for doing another fine job.  I suggest you click on the link to their official site, nose around a bit, and check to see if they have a local unit you could support in some fashion.

Rain, Rain, Come Our Way

(Cartoon by Ted Rall and found here.  Click on image to enlarge.)

Yes, California is in the midst of a three-year drought, and, unless we have a March Miracle, we will start rolling into a fourth year. Governor Brown's declaration, even if a little late in the game, has at least raised the consciousness of residents of the state, especially in the southern half, that we will be facing both water shortages and water use restrictions.  The griping has already begun as talks of fines for poorly adjusted sprinkler systems which water sidewalks rather than lawns have been mentioned in city councils.  Central Valley farmers (especially the agri-corps) have announced that there will be layoffs because there won't be enough water for many of the crops which are shipped all over the country and to other nations.  Food prices as well as water bills will rise for all of us.

OK, Californians have a history of wasting water.  We raise cotton and rice and other water-intensive crops.  We have beautiful green lawns in the middle of what is essentially a desert.  We have swimming pools in back yards.  We have a burgeoning population which just can't be supported by our geology.  Newspapers all over the country have been filled with articles on all of this, but few, if any, have said much about the story behind the drought:  climate change.

What amazes me is that world scientists (the rational ones, at least) know the primary cause of climate change -- the reliance on carbon-based energy generation -- and yet world leaders (especially those in the U.S.) have done nothing to dramatically curb the use of oil, coal, natural gas to generate power.  It's not as if there aren't existing alternatives and the technology for developing even more effective, non-lethal sources.

What there isn't, however, is the will and therefor the funding for such alternatives.

From McClatchy DC:

Investment in clean energy is faltering at the same time the United Nations and others say it needs to quadruple to avoid the catastrophic impacts of climate change.

New figures released at the U.N. on Wednesday show that global clean-energy investment dropped by 12 percent in 2013, the second straight year it declined. The Bloomberg New Energy Finance numbers show $254 billion in investment last year, far below the $1 trillion a year average that the International Energy Agency estimates is needed to avoid a climate crisis. ...

“This is incredibly important. The time is now,” said Lisa Carnoy, the head of global capital markets for Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Carnoy was among some 550 financial executives who attended an investor summit on climate risk Wednesday at the U.N., organized with the investor and environmental coalition Ceres.
The overriding message was a call for more green investment. ...

He said America’s glut of cheap natural gas from fracking had made it more difficult to attract investment and that the news media had focused far more on clean technology failures than on successes, which helped drive policies in Congress.  [Emphasis added.]

Ironically (and sadly), it reminds me of that old motor oil commercial:  "You can pay me now, or you can pay me later."

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/01/15/214636/un-investment-in-green-energy.html#storylink=cpy

More Like This, Please

Over the weekend, I came across this article and found myself smiling.  Not too much has made me smile so far this year, so I thought I'd share it with you.

Decades ago, the Colorado River was dammed in an attempt to control the flooding along its banks.  The damming was successful, but it had some unintended consequences.  Lake Havasu, which long had been the recipient of tree limbs and brush as a result of the flooding was now crystal clear.  Now that might not sound like a bad thing, but it was:  the fish in the lake nearly all died out because there wasn't a ready source of food (the decaying vegetation) nor a sanctuary for young fish to hide from predator larger fish.

Then, 1992, a plan was implemented to try to resolve the problem.  That plan involves Christmas trees.

Structures were formed by sinking PVC pipe, concrete sewer pipe and cinder blocks in 42 coves. Then, discarded Christmas trees were lashed together, weighted down and dumped around the structures. Piles of brush were added.

As the trees and brush decomposed, the pipe and concrete structure grew a biological skin of mosses and algae that was then colonized by insects. In addition to providing shelter, the Christmas tree structures also became a source of fish food. ...

It takes a Christmas tree five to six years to decompose under water. So each year, volunteers toss in as many as 500 additional trees and a thousand brush piles to replenish the reefs.

Part of the benefit of creating habitat with Christmas trees is that it's cheap — trash haulers are happy to unload onto others what they pick up at the curb.

The result is that the fish are back and the lake is healthy and diverse.  Fewer Christmas trees are going to landfillls, which is an added bonus.  The project has been sufficiently successful that other jurisdictions (including Riverside County in California) are planning similar ones.

I think that is pretty cool.  And, like I said, it made me smile.

In The Long Term

I've come to the conclusion that industrial polluters get off lightly, no matter how big the fine nor how high the cost of the mandated clean-up. Their pollution inevitably has long term consequences, even if those consequences aren't readily identifiable for years. This article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune is a clear example of what I mean.

Toxic compounds have lingered and accumulated in the blood of east-metro residents who drank water tainted with 3M chemicals, a new state study shows.

State health officials said it's unclear what the long-term health effects of those substances might be because studies have been limited and difficult to interpret.

But the analysis of blood samples from 196 adults in Lake Elmo, Cottage Grove and Oakdale found that levels of three toxic compounds were above the national average -- twice the average for one chemical and four times for another. ...

The compounds, known as perfluorochemicals, were manufactured by 3M in its Cottage Grove plant for more than 50 years until 2002. They were used in Scotchgard, Teflon, firefighting foam and hundreds of other products. The company disposed of wastes in area dumps until the mid-1970s.

3M agreed in 2007 to clean up the chemicals in three locations that it owns, and to help pay for removing wastes from the former Washington County landfill in Lake Elmo. The company has also financed hookups with city water for more than 200 households with private wells in Lake Elmo. [Emphasis added]

Yes, 3M did finally agree to clean up the mess it made, but 30 years later. During those 30 years, the chemicals leached from the landfills into the water table and into the private wells of the area. Residents of the area drank the water all that time, not knowing about the bonus chemical additive.

As the article makes clear, health officials don't know whether the chemical levels in residents' blood portend an increased likelihood for disease, but the fact that those chemicals are in the bloodstreams at two to four times the rates of unexposed citizens is troubling, to say the least.