Environment
Experience shows that history, like nature, does not move in a linear way, in a straight line. It is characterized by long periods of time when, on the surface, little seems to be changing. Then, all of a sudden, big changes can happen, much more quickly than anyone thought possible.
We are facing this reality in a negative sense with the transcendent issue of climate change. The hard truth of the matter is that we are in great danger of experiencing soon, within years, not decades, a “climate snap,” a shift from the general climate reality the world has been experiencing for the past 10,000 years, to one characterized by freakish, violent and persistent major storms, spreading drought and wildfires, extensive plant and animal species extinction, water scarcity and crop failures on a massive scale, and accelerated sea level rise.
This is what the world scientific community is telling us. The rapid heating up of our atmosphere, caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels, is the evidence which leaves no room for doubt.
We are facing this reality in a negative sense with the transcendent issue of climate change. The hard truth of the matter is that we are in great danger of experiencing soon, within years, not decades, a “climate snap,” a shift from the general climate reality the world has been experiencing for the past 10,000 years, to one characterized by freakish, violent and persistent major storms, spreading drought and wildfires, extensive plant and animal species extinction, water scarcity and crop failures on a massive scale, and accelerated sea level rise.
This is what the world scientific community is telling us. The rapid heating up of our atmosphere, caused primarily by the burning of fossil fuels, is the evidence which leaves no room for doubt.
Patrick Moore has called me a "jerk." He may not be Queen Elizabeth, but it feels like being made Knight of the Realm.
Moore is a supporter of nuclear power. He is also an advocate for clear-cutting forests, genetically modified foods and a wide range of other corporate eco-assaults. The companies behind them fund Moore's "consulting" agency, which appears to specialize in greenwashing.
Moore's mission also seems to include tagging the Greenpeace name onto things Greenpeace opposes. As a voting member of Greenpeace USA, my e-mail box is often filled with contemptuous messages about Moore's latest outrage, and anger about his claim to be a Greenpeace founder. Many advocate ignoring him.
I'm not of that faith. Based on his appearances, too many people ask me why Greenpeace now "supports nuclear power." It doesn't. Its opposition to atomic reactors is as strong and clear as it was when Moore made his brief appearance on the organization's staff list, decades ago.
Moore is a supporter of nuclear power. He is also an advocate for clear-cutting forests, genetically modified foods and a wide range of other corporate eco-assaults. The companies behind them fund Moore's "consulting" agency, which appears to specialize in greenwashing.
Moore's mission also seems to include tagging the Greenpeace name onto things Greenpeace opposes. As a voting member of Greenpeace USA, my e-mail box is often filled with contemptuous messages about Moore's latest outrage, and anger about his claim to be a Greenpeace founder. Many advocate ignoring him.
I'm not of that faith. Based on his appearances, too many people ask me why Greenpeace now "supports nuclear power." It doesn't. Its opposition to atomic reactors is as strong and clear as it was when Moore made his brief appearance on the organization's staff list, decades ago.
In the global campaign to save the Earth, a shared vision is vital.
"Solartopia" foresees a democratic, green-powered 21st Century civilization. Our economic and ecological survival depend on it.
Technologically, the vision rests on four simple pillars:
1. Total renunciation of all fossil and nuclear fuels. In a sustainable, survivable future, they are a 20th Century pox, neither green nor clean.
2. All-out conversion to renewable energy, led by the "Solartopian Trinity" of wind, solar and bio-fuels. Mother Earth gives us the natural power we need.
3. Complete commitment to maximum efficiency, including revived and solarized mass transit and passenger rail systems. Our automotive "love affair" is a hoax.
4. Zero tolerance for production of anything that cannot be re-used or recycled, including chemical-based food. Solartopia is an organic, post-pollution world.
Along with wind, solar and bio-fuels, Solartopian energy comes from the waves, currents, rivers and tides; from the geothermal heat beneath the earth's crust; from the interplay of solar-heated water at the oceans' surface and the frigid deep.
"Solartopia" foresees a democratic, green-powered 21st Century civilization. Our economic and ecological survival depend on it.
Technologically, the vision rests on four simple pillars:
1. Total renunciation of all fossil and nuclear fuels. In a sustainable, survivable future, they are a 20th Century pox, neither green nor clean.
2. All-out conversion to renewable energy, led by the "Solartopian Trinity" of wind, solar and bio-fuels. Mother Earth gives us the natural power we need.
3. Complete commitment to maximum efficiency, including revived and solarized mass transit and passenger rail systems. Our automotive "love affair" is a hoax.
4. Zero tolerance for production of anything that cannot be re-used or recycled, including chemical-based food. Solartopia is an organic, post-pollution world.
Along with wind, solar and bio-fuels, Solartopian energy comes from the waves, currents, rivers and tides; from the geothermal heat beneath the earth's crust; from the interplay of solar-heated water at the oceans' surface and the frigid deep.
On 9/11/2001, George W. Bush, Rudy Giuliani and Christine Todd Whitman sent a message to New York: Drop Dead.
The fallout now taints us all.
After the terror attacks, Bush and Giuliani saddled up their bullhorns and raced down to the smoldering World Trade Center to shout out a single "patriotic" demand: re-open the stock market!
And to hell with the health of the good citizens doing the clean-up. Ditto the rest of us downwind.
The public health outcome has now become visible: those brave and caring people who marched onto the site to do what needed to be done are starting to die in droves.
The New York Times says less than a third of them were wearing respirators. Giuliani is getting a long overdue bashing for letting this happen. With all his swagger, Rudy imposed a single demand above all: the financial district must re-open. That people would die doing it was known but never mentioned. Giuliani had his priorities.
Bush's Environmental Protection Agency knew full well that the airborne fallout from the smoldering the World Trade Center was absolutely lethal.
The fallout now taints us all.
After the terror attacks, Bush and Giuliani saddled up their bullhorns and raced down to the smoldering World Trade Center to shout out a single "patriotic" demand: re-open the stock market!
And to hell with the health of the good citizens doing the clean-up. Ditto the rest of us downwind.
The public health outcome has now become visible: those brave and caring people who marched onto the site to do what needed to be done are starting to die in droves.
The New York Times says less than a third of them were wearing respirators. Giuliani is getting a long overdue bashing for letting this happen. With all his swagger, Rudy imposed a single demand above all: the financial district must re-open. That people would die doing it was known but never mentioned. Giuliani had his priorities.
Bush's Environmental Protection Agency knew full well that the airborne fallout from the smoldering the World Trade Center was absolutely lethal.
No response is more predictable than the reflexive squawk of the greenhouse fearmongers that anyone questioning their claims is in the pay of the energy companies. A second, equally predictable retort contrasts the ever-diminishing number of agnostics to the legions of scientists now born again to the "truth" that anthropogenic CO2 is responsible for the earth's warming trend.
Actually, the energy companies have long since adapted to prevailing fantasies, dutifully reciting the whole catechism about carbon-neutrality, sniggering jovially over Tom Friedman's rapturous endorsement of "clean coal," repositioning themselves as eager pioneers in the search for virtuous alternative fuels, settling comfortably into new homes, such as British Petroleum's "Energy Biosciences Institute" on the UC Berkeley campus.
Actually, the energy companies have long since adapted to prevailing fantasies, dutifully reciting the whole catechism about carbon-neutrality, sniggering jovially over Tom Friedman's rapturous endorsement of "clean coal," repositioning themselves as eager pioneers in the search for virtuous alternative fuels, settling comfortably into new homes, such as British Petroleum's "Energy Biosciences Institute" on the UC Berkeley campus.
By now many farmers producing organic milk or meat from ruminants have seen the news about the federal court ruling that the USDA violated the law by failing to conduct a full Environmental Impact Study before approving Monsanto’s genetically engineered alfalfa trademarked Roundup Ready®. The judge’s latest ruling in the case bans any further planting of the GE seed until the USDA conducts a complete Environmental Impact Statement on the GE crop.
Genetically modified alfalfa presents significantly different challenges than any other previous GE crop introduction. These differences mean the introduction of GE alfalfa could have significant economic impact on producers of organic forage and animal products. The differences directly relate to the biological differences between alfalfa and the grain crops and the way seed is produced.
Genetically modified alfalfa presents significantly different challenges than any other previous GE crop introduction. These differences mean the introduction of GE alfalfa could have significant economic impact on producers of organic forage and animal products. The differences directly relate to the biological differences between alfalfa and the grain crops and the way seed is produced.
Thirty years ago this month, in the small seacoast town of Seabrook, New Hampshire, a force of mass non-violent green advocacy collided with the nuke establishment.
A definitive victory over corporate power was won. And the global grassroots "No Nukes" movement emerged as one of the most important and effective in human history.
It still writes the bottom line on atomic energy and global warming. All today's green energy battles can be dated to May, 13, 1977, when 550 Clamshell Alliance protestors walked victoriously free after thirteen days of media-saturated imprisonment. Not a single US reactor ordered since that day has been completed.
In the classic tradition of New England democracy, it all started when the tiny town of Seabrook voted four times against the construction of a mammoth twin reactor complex aimed at the salt marshes along its seashore. The site is at the very southeast corner of New Hampshire, where the Granite State meets Massachusetts and the Atlantic. All other towns within a ten-mile radius of the proposed plant joined the opposition, including those in Massachusetts.
A definitive victory over corporate power was won. And the global grassroots "No Nukes" movement emerged as one of the most important and effective in human history.
It still writes the bottom line on atomic energy and global warming. All today's green energy battles can be dated to May, 13, 1977, when 550 Clamshell Alliance protestors walked victoriously free after thirteen days of media-saturated imprisonment. Not a single US reactor ordered since that day has been completed.
In the classic tradition of New England democracy, it all started when the tiny town of Seabrook voted four times against the construction of a mammoth twin reactor complex aimed at the salt marshes along its seashore. The site is at the very southeast corner of New Hampshire, where the Granite State meets Massachusetts and the Atlantic. All other towns within a ten-mile radius of the proposed plant joined the opposition, including those in Massachusetts.
CORNUCOPIA, WI: Consumer fraud investigators in the state of Wisconsin released their findings this week after a three-month long investigation into allegations that Wal-Mart stores throughout the state of Wisconsin had misled consumers by misidentifying conventional food items as organic.
In a letter to Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., based in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection stated they'd found numerous instances of conventional food products improperly labeled as organic by the retail chain. Specifically, Wisconsin authorities told Wal-Mart’s legal counsel that “use of the term ‘Wal- Mart Organics’ in combination with reference to a specific non-organic product may be considered to be a misrepresentation and therefore a violation” of Wisconsin state statutes.
The Cornucopia Institute, a governmental and corporate organic industry watchdog, had filed complaints with Wisconsin regulators and the USDA after finding numerous incidents of fraudulent organic labeling in Wal-Mart stores in five states from Texas to Minnesota.
In a letter to Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., based in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection stated they'd found numerous instances of conventional food products improperly labeled as organic by the retail chain. Specifically, Wisconsin authorities told Wal-Mart’s legal counsel that “use of the term ‘Wal- Mart Organics’ in combination with reference to a specific non-organic product may be considered to be a misrepresentation and therefore a violation” of Wisconsin state statutes.
The Cornucopia Institute, a governmental and corporate organic industry watchdog, had filed complaints with Wisconsin regulators and the USDA after finding numerous incidents of fraudulent organic labeling in Wal-Mart stores in five states from Texas to Minnesota.
Judge Orders Complete Environmental Review of Monsanto's Gene-Altered Alfalfa
San Francisco, CA - A Federal judge today made a final ruling that the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) 2005 approval of Monsanto's genetically engineered (GE) "Roundup Ready" alfalfa was illegal. The Judge called on USDA to ban any further planting of the GE seed until it conducts a complete Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the GE crop.
In the decision, Judge Charles Breyer in the Federal Northern District of California affirmed his preliminary ruling, which echoed the Center for Food Safety's arguments in their lawsuit against USDA, that the crop could harm the environment and contaminate natural alfalfa. Today's ruling also requires Forage Genetics to provide the locations of all existing Roundup Ready alfalfa plots to USDA within 30 days. The Judge ordered USDA to make the location of these plots "publicly available as soon as practicable" so that growers of organic and conventional alfalfa "can test their own crops to determine if there has been contamination."
San Francisco, CA - A Federal judge today made a final ruling that the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) 2005 approval of Monsanto's genetically engineered (GE) "Roundup Ready" alfalfa was illegal. The Judge called on USDA to ban any further planting of the GE seed until it conducts a complete Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the GE crop.
In the decision, Judge Charles Breyer in the Federal Northern District of California affirmed his preliminary ruling, which echoed the Center for Food Safety's arguments in their lawsuit against USDA, that the crop could harm the environment and contaminate natural alfalfa. Today's ruling also requires Forage Genetics to provide the locations of all existing Roundup Ready alfalfa plots to USDA within 30 days. The Judge ordered USDA to make the location of these plots "publicly available as soon as practicable" so that growers of organic and conventional alfalfa "can test their own crops to determine if there has been contamination."
Twenty-one years ago this week, lethal radiation poured into the breezes over Europe and into the jet stream above, carrying death and disease around the planet.
It could be happening again as you read this: either by error, as at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, or by terror, as could have happened on September 11, 2001.
Those who now advocate a "rebirth" of this failed technology forget what happened during these "impossible" catastrophes, or refuse to face their apocalyptic reality, both ecological and financial.
Radiation monitors in Sweden, hundreds of miles away, first detected the fallout from the blast at Chernobyl Unit 4. The reactor complex had just been extolled in the Soviet press as the ultimate triumph of a "new generation" in atomic technology.
It could be happening again as you read this: either by error, as at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, or by terror, as could have happened on September 11, 2001.
Those who now advocate a "rebirth" of this failed technology forget what happened during these "impossible" catastrophes, or refuse to face their apocalyptic reality, both ecological and financial.
Radiation monitors in Sweden, hundreds of miles away, first detected the fallout from the blast at Chernobyl Unit 4. The reactor complex had just been extolled in the Soviet press as the ultimate triumph of a "new generation" in atomic technology.