Urban Ecoist

Maybe all remember the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing (or maybe not, Michael Phelps…), and if you do remember than perhaps you also recall that the city of Beijing went to some lengths to curb its air pollution during the course of the Games.

Well, the data is being analyzed by some researchers that want to see what kind of tangible reductions in particulate pollution came with that olympic effort to cut back on industrial and automobile emissions.

Atmospheric scientist Jan Cermak of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich and a a mysteriously unnamed colleague looked at the aerosols in the atmosphere above the city of Beijing from the years 2002 through 2008. They used satellite data, which could measure the aerosol levels, but not the true location in terms of high-atmosphere or lower ground levels. Wind patterns, weather reports, rainfall, humidity — these factors were all taken into account to determine what the aerosol levels would have been during the Olympics and what they actually were from July to September 2008.

And guess what? It really didn’t matter what Beijing did. The city achieved some reductions in aerosol levels, but really nothing to get excited about. And why, you ask? Because so much air-bourne pollution came in to Beijing’s skies from other regional sources.

It turns out that the Chinese only achieved a modest reduction in aerosols. The researchers report in a paper in press in Geophysical Research Letters that pollution-control efforts reduced the overall amount of aerosols in the atmosphere by about 10% to 15%. That small change highlights the importance of factors such as wind direction in determining local pollution, says Cermak. In spite of the reduction in local emissions, winds from the south and southeast sullied Beijing’s air by bringing in pollution from distant industrial areas, he says. — Science Magazine News

You see, that’s the funny thing about air-bourne pollution. It doesn’t stay still like land-based pollution. Oh, wait, land-based pollution doesn’t stay put, either. It leaches into the water supply. Huh, maybe we should just try harder not to pollute in the first place.

Naw, that will never work.

Still, the numbers show that Beijing did achieve a 10 to 15 percent reduction in aerosols above the city. Am I the only one who thinks that is a good start? Too bad the Chinese only did it for three months. Who knows what reductions could be achieved with a long-term cut in emissions?

air pollution, Olympics, China, Beijing, emissions, aerosols, atmosphere

Ah, nuclear power. It could be the greatest thing ever, except for all that radioactivity.

March 28, 2009 is the thirtieth anniversary of the meltdown at the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station a bit south and downriver of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. It was a partial meltdown of the second reactor that released so many curies of radioactive materials. It’s how many curies that are still a point of contention. Officially, the numbers are low and no one was hurt; but one study has shown higher incidences of cancers in the area . The higher numbers could be unrelated, maybe even higher because newer tests find it earlier, so that’s inconclusive for many people. But would it be so hard to maybe do some more studies?

A New York Times article from 1981 reported that the State of Pennsylvania concluded that the accident had no effect on infant deaths around the time of the accident, despite admitting that numbers of deaths went up in the six months following the meltdown, jumping to 1.9% from a normal 1.3%. That may not seem like a big number, but that equates to six out of one thousand babies. Nobody likes dead babies, especially when it could have been prevented.

I am not saying that perhaps the scope of the danger involved was dismissed or covered up, but I’m also not saying it wasn’t. If you look up a chart on the rise of the nuclear power industry around the world, you see a definite plateau in the number of nuke plants starting just a few years after the accident at Three Mile Island, right around the time Chernobyl happened.

And as if the accidents were not bad enough, the idea of nuclear power as “clean” power is a bit of a myth, which undercuts the whole package of nuclear power generation. You see, nuclear power creates more than just water vapor (which is actually a “greenhouse gas”). It creates all kinds of long-lasting toxic waste that you don’t want in your backyard.

But it’s ok if it’s someone else’s yard…

I’m not trying to be coy. Just saying that nuclear fission-based power is not the answer we need to power the future responsibly.

nuclear power, Three Mile Island, TMI, nuclear plant, radioactivity, waste, Chernobyl, fission, accident, meltdown, reactor

You may not know about all the chemicals floating around in your house or even your office, and chances are you are not aware of how dangerous some of the Volatile Organic Compounds that are given off by synthethic materials that are found in your home. It’s a process called off-gassing. For example, particle board (that cheap stuff that all cheap furniture is made of) off-gasses formeldahyde. But here’s the deal. Even natural products off-gas, so it’s not like you can ever fully remove VOCs from your home. Anything plastic gives off VOCs, but then wood also gives off gases.

Much like a garden can be a “sink” and a “scrubber” for water and pollutants, your indoor houseplants can help you remove volatile organic compounds (loosely defined by the Environmental Protection Agency as any compound that photoreacts or easily vaporizes and enters the atmosphere. The problem with VOCs in your house is that because you keep your house closed up (especially in colder weather) those VOCs can reach some pretty high levels, even 5 times more than if you were outside.

And your houseplants are effective at removing VOCs from your house. Of course, some plants are better than others. Here’s a top 15 to get you started.

1. Philodendron scandens `oxycardium’, heartleaf philodendron
2. Philodendron domesticum, elephant ear philodendron
3. Dracaena fragrans `Massangeana’, cornstalk dracaena
4. Hedera helix, English ivy
5. Chlorophytum comosum, spider plant
6. Dracaena deremensis `Janet Craig’, Janet Craig dracaena
7. Dracaena deremensis `Warneckii’, Warneck dracaena
8. Ficus benjamina, weeping fig
9. Epipiremnum aureum, golden pothos
10. Spathiphyllum `Mauna Loa’, peace lily
11. Philodendron selloum, selloum philodendron
12. Aglaonema modestum, Chinese evergreen
13. Chamaedorea sefritzii, bamboo or reed palm
14. Sansevieria trifasciata, snake plant
15. Dracaena marginata , red-edged dracaena

That list comes from Clean Air Gardening.

And get this…the study of using plants to clean the air all started with NASA in the 1960’s. The materials used in the enclosed environments in space are synthetic and the VOCs off-gassed were making people sick. An environmental scientist named Wolverton started studying how plants could clean up toxic waste, and he found that simple houseplants can be really effective little cleaners of indoor air pollution. Today, Wolverton’s company is working on using natural materials derived from plants as filters for enclosed environments.

plants, indoor air quality, indoor air pollution, VOC, volatile organic compounds, plastics, synthetic materials, indoor environment, health

This week is National Poison Prevention Week, as if you didn’t know. But you may not know that this is the 48th of such weeks, and National Poison Prevention Week is one of the longest running public health campaigns.

In fact, did you know that 30 children a year die in the United States from accidental poisoning? Thanks to the National Poison Prevention Week, that number is down from a high of 216 in 1972. What I think is even more impressive is that the numbers of accidental poisonings are down despite the increase in household poisons we keep around our typical American homes. Good work, NPPW!

And it’s not just cleaning products or drain openers that are poisoning our kids. Half of all accidental poisoning in very young children involve prescription drugs and dietary supplements.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission offers tips on preventing accidental household poisonings, including not referring to your medicine as candy in front of kids. No kidding. Also, keep an eye on your kids when any hazardous material is present. Keep everything dangerous out of reach or better yet, locked up. Also, and I thought this is a good one, do not have colorful lamps and candles that have lamp oil in them. The stuff may look like Kool-Aid to kids, but even more deadly.

I’m going to go you one better and suggest that instead of keeping lots of chemically-delicious household cleaners around the house, explore other ways to clean your house with natural ingredients. Not that a tummy full of borax would be good for your child upon ingestion (it really wouldn’t), but it cannot be as bad as some of the stuff that may be under your sink.

poison, poisoning, National Poisoning Prevention Week, Consumer Product Safety Commission, children, health, death, chemicals, household cleaners, prescription drugs, medicine, dietary supplements, natural, borax

Within days of getting my email from the Great Sunflower Project asking me to confirm my mailing address for my free sunflower seeds, I also get news that the Natural Resources Defense Council is campaigning to get the EPA to suspend use of and review its approval of the pesticide imidacloprid, a “moderately” toxic pesticide that works on the neurotransmitters in insects.

If you are a regular reader, you know that I often lambaste the EPA for its shortsightedness when it comes to approving chemicals for use in industry and agriculture (and pharmaceuticals and consumer use) without any true long-term testing. And in the case of imidacloprid, the NRDC is asking that something as simple as multi-generational studies on how this pesticide affects honey bees.

Imidacloprid was first patented and put into use in the late 1980’s. The pesticide is a neonicotinoid, which is based on the chemical makeup of nicotine. Imidacloprid works on a an insect’s nervous system, after the insect ingests the chemical after feeding on a plant’s sweet juices. A neonicotinoid blocks a receptor in the brain and causes an excess amount of acetylcholine. The excess creates paralysis and then death in the victim.

France has banned imidacloprid, sold thereunder the name Gaucho, for use on sunflowers since 1999 after one-third of all the country’s honeybees dies after a season of wide-spread usage. The French further banned the chemical on sweet corn, and last year, decided not to approve its use at all. Germany banned imidacloprid and its 8 neonicitinoid cousins last year after a huge die-off of honeybees following an application of the pesticide, clothianidin. Furthermore, imidacloprid’s maker, Bayer, is being sued by various groups, from farmers to local and national environmental groups.

What you can do

You can write to the EPA calling for action. Click here for the NDRC action site to send a pre-written letter to the Office of Pesticide Programs.

Also, buy organic produce and support farmers that eschew chemical pesticides.

EPA, pesticide, agriculture, imidacloprid, neonicotinoid, honeybees, colony collapse disorder, bees, toxicity, chemicals, organic, France, US, Gaucho, corn, farming, Germany, banned, Europe, clothianidin, acetylcholine, brain, nervous system, insects, plants

This is just like the whole Clean Coal ad campaign of which I am a big fan. You can read some of my odes here and here.

Now, let me tell you something, Smart Black Lady who is ironically more at risk for the disease that high fructose corn syrup is known to cause — Diabetes.

A little history on the corn industry — think again, if you think it’s all just quaint little family farms growing corn on their daddy and granddaddy’s land. Too often, those who live in the cities have a very naive view of farming and where their food really comes from. Those little guys were bought out years ago, and now huge corporations are farming a big percentage of America’s farmland. And due to some crazy farm laws, corn growers get subsidized to grow corn. That’s right. Big corporate farms make money just to grow corn on top of what they sell it for, and then they get tax breaks that mean they make more on selling their product. And gee, I wonder how you can make even more money from this magical crop?

Yes, find more uses for corn. I mean, come on, who can eat corn for every meal, right? So, let’s process that corn and strip it down to its basic components, namely the glucose. Add an enzyme and you can make fructose. Blend that fructose with the right ratio of sucrose, and viola, you get HFCS, a fine substitute for expensive cane or beet sugar. But the problem is that by “watering down” the sucrose, you are creating a larger problem within your body. You see, it’s sucrose that helps you feel satisfied, and studies are indicating that your body does not process fructose in a way is regulated. Sucrose needs sucrase to break it down, and your body only produces so much of it. Think of sucrose like wheat bread with fibre, and fructose as white bread. Fibre helps you feel full, which in turn helps you stop eating. And Americans don’t stop eating…

Anyway, the corporate farmers figured that if they can convince American food processors to use more HFCS in place of sugars, then that is a whole new market in which to make billions. Real sugar is more expensive than sugar, so food processors and soft drink makers were more than happy to use a ready-to-mix liquid that can save them money. And guess what? The same corporations that own the farms also own the companies that make the processed food. So essentially, corporations like Cargill and ArcherDanielsMidland, grow corn to make into HFCS and then use that cheaper HFCS to make the foods we all know and love, foods that are sold with mascots and big advertising campaigns. And it’s all making us fat and unhealthy, which in turn makes us spend more on health costs, which in turn means that American pharmaceutical and insurance companies are making money.

Do you ever get the feeling that the US Government has really sold us out?

And long-term testing…what long term testing? We see it all around us. Americans not only drink the stuff in soft drinks, but with more and more people using packaged, processed ready-to-eat meals (made by the same corporations that grow the corn and make the HFCS remember), and, well, the hens are coming home to roost.

Mmm…chicken.

Don’t get me started on the Chicken Industry.

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Americans don’t seem all that keen on their fruits and veggies, or at least not as keen as they should be, unless we are talking potatoes. And especially when they eat out, Americans are more concerned about proteins and starches, relegating the veggies to mere side dishes, if included in the meal at all.

And then, add the seasonality of fresh fruits and veggies, and we can see that sometimes eating fresh produce is hard to do, especially if you are on a budget or if you don’t want to purchase imported produce that requires fuel and produced more carbon emissions to ship to your local grocery chain. Also, keep in mind that so-called fresh produce was most likely picked unripe (which means that it did not spend enough time “on the vine” to develop all its healthy nutrients) and has been traveling for a week or more before it even gets to your store.

What’s an urban ecoist to do?

Two options are canned or frozen vegetables and fruits. But which is better?

The canning process involves heating, which will kill any microorganisms that may be living on or in vegetables and fruit. It is very rare that a canned product will carry food-borne illness (which has become a problem with fresh produce lately). However, some nutrients withstand the canning process better than others. Vitamin C and folate are two such nutrients that can be lost during canning.

Frozen produce may be a better choice for most fruits and veggies. Produce undergoes freezing soon after it is picked, so there are less nutrients lost due to age, which may make frozen produce better than some imported “fresh” produce.

Of course, we wouldn’t be very responsible ecoists if we didn’t take some other things into consideration, such as packaging. Cans are highly recyclable and can be reprocessed almost infinitely, but more and more cans are lined with a plastic that contains Bisphenol-A (BPA), which more and more research is showing to leach into foods (especially acidic ones, like tomatoes). Scientists are finding evidence that BPA may cause developmental damage in humans. The EPA is working with some manufacturers to voluntarily reduce BPA use in cans, but I can forecast a day soon when you will be looking for a “no BPA” label on canned goods.

Frozen produce are usually packaged in plastic bags, and the plastic, usually HDPE (#2), used is not as easily recyclable and rarely included in curbside recycling programs. Unfortunately, even the cardboard packaging used with frozen produce is lined with plastic, which also makes it harder to recycle.

Another consideration is where those canned and frozen fruits and vegetables are coming from, and usually that’s a factory farm. Depending on where you live, that can of peas may have traveled thousands of miles to get to your grocery store shelves.

Geez, it’s not easy being green…but if you are serious about it, you may want to can or freeze your own veggies and fruits. When you are at your local farmers market or farm stand this summer, buy larger quantities of fresh produce and process them yourself for winter consumption. Start out freezing fruits like berries, which are easy, and as you become more comfortable and savvy, try your hand at tomatoes.

I remember the cellar at my great-grandfather’s house in Dearborn, Michigan and the shelves stocked with mason jars full of stuff like tomatoes and pickles. He grew everything in his own urban backyard. It’s too bad that as a society, we have become more and more reliant on grocery stores to bring us our produce, when really we could be providing our own — saving money and nutrients at the same time.

fruits, vegetables, healthy eating, nutrition, frozen, canned, produce, carbon emissions, seasonality, BPA, Bisphenol-A, plastics, HDPE, recycling, home canning, factory farm, farmers market, fresh produce, imported produce, EPA, vitamin C, folate

A new study came out that finds that by cutting pollution in your city, you can live longer.

More importantly, the study found that life expectancy increased by 3 years over the last 20 years (approximately) in 50 cities across America. It may be in all cities, and I’m sure you could draw that conclusion; I only add the 50 cities because that is what the study included. The researchers behind the study analyzed data sets comparing life spans and levels of particulate pollution from 1980 and 2000. As pollution levels dropped, life expectancy rose. Seems simple enough…

Actually, to put a finer point on it, your life was extended by 5 months because of a drop in air pollution. How they came up with five months, I don’t know, but wait, the article mentions that factors such as “such as changes in demographics, income, migration, population, education and cigarette smoking.” So I guess due to all those factors, we urbanites in the 50 cities included in the study are living 2.72 years longer than we did back in 1980. The air pollution accounts for 15% of that increase.

Neat.

Some of the very dirtiest cities saw an increase in life expectancy of 10 months due to the reduction in air pollution, thanks to the Clean Air Act. Although even relatively clean cities show a benefit to public health standards from additional reductions in air pollution levels.

This is good news for many reasons — longer, healthier lives for one — but this is good timing for all those who are trying to undermine the intentions of the Clean Air Act by ignoring some pollution and/or not enforcing limits on things that are produced by burning, say, gas or coal. Hopefully, with a new Administration and a new EPA administrator, the EPA will start regulating such things as carbon dioxide, and then new studies will show us in twenty years how we lengthened our lives by doing so.

Just a thought.

air pollution, health, life expectancy, cities, urban, America, US, Clean Air Act, pollution, particulates, gas, coal, public health

Despite my reluctance to admit that I read USA Today occasionally, I read USA Today occasionally. My aunt and uncle subscribe, and spending the holidays at their house, well, it’s here, and I tend to read anything within an arm’s reach.

USA Today has been publishing special investigative reports on “The Smokestack Effect: Toxic Air and America’s Schools“, and I happened upon this week’s installment in what seems to be a pretty expansive series. Monday’s paper had a scary article on the alarming proximity of industrial facilities and elementary schools and pre-schools.

USA Today found that more than 20,000 schools are located within one half-mile of an industrial plant that emits some rather dangerous pollution. That is one in every six schools. And to make matters worse, half od those schools are elementary schools and early education centers such as pre-schools. That is just unacceptable.

Children are kind of like our canaries in the coal mine. Think about it. Kids are smaller, so any chemical that is taken in is naturally going to become a higher amount percentage-wise than in adults. And here’s where it becomes downright negligent — the EPA only tests chemicals in terms of how they may affect an adult body.

Too little is understood about the impact of thousands of chemicals on children. In part, that’s because most government assessments of the dangers assume those exposed are adults.

“The science doesn’t know — it can’t establish — what a safe level is” for children, says Stephen Lester, the science director of the Center for Health, Environment & Justice, an advocacy group that focuses on children and schools. “There’s no tool, scientifically, for evaluating cumulative risk.”

Landrigan says the lack of detailed knowledge on safe levels of exposure, coupled with today’s rates of childhood cancer, asthma and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, begs “the obvious question: Is there a cause-and-effect relationship?” –USA Today

One of my pet research projects, and biggest gripes, is that many, many, way too many chemicals are not thoroughly tested before being approved for general consumption. Look at bisphenol-A. And in the case of many industrial facilties, chemicals are being pumped into our air with hardly a thought given to how those chemicals affect people over the long term.

USA Today, chemicals, pollution

So, last week, I wrote a post about turkeys, and I really meant to continue on the whole tip-sheet on being more sustainable in your giving of Thanks to our corporate benefactors. I was planning on writing about vegetables and their seasonality, making your own gravies and stocks and soups, buying organic, you know all that good stuff, but then I got other ideas for things to bitch write about, and here we are. I could try to cover things in this post today, maybe extend it through tomorrow, but you have most likely figured it all out last week when everyone else wrote about sustainable or “green” Thanksgivings.

Instead of rehashing what others are rehashing, today, I am thinking about generations, namely that of my grandparents and mine. I was raised by my grandparents, who were really fantastic people that made me who I am today, and their generation was born during the Great Depression. My grandfather fought in Korea and married my grandmother soon afterward in 1953. Their generation saw great hardship, and it was from this time that the Agricultural Revolution was born.

My great-grandparents passed down recipes and gardening skills to their children, and my grandparents were into farmers markets and making things from scratch. And then my grandmother started getting lazy…

She admitted, so it’s not like I am calling her out here. She started buying graham cracker crusts at the grocery store for her cheesecake. My grandfather would make little digs about it, saying it was not how he remembered it, or not as good as his mothers. My grandmother would remind him of his diabetes and maybe he shouldn’t be eating cheesecake.

The Agricultural Revolution did increase yields and provided this nation with a great deal of food, and some of that food went to countries around the world, preventing millions from starvation. But the AR also lead to the rise of the Processed Foods Industry. The Archer Daniels Midlands and Cargills lead to the Sara Lees and the Krafts, which filled our kitchen cupboards with all sorts of partially-hydrogenated deliciousness and high-fructose goodness. Just today, a new Government Accounting Office report finds that farm subsidies are profiting millionaires (and corporate farms) rather than that small, family-based farm, and health doesn’t get in the way of big profits.

Enter my generation. Actually, I doubt that I can speak that generally about my generation. I live in two bubbles when it comes to food. I live in Portland, which is a localvore’s dream, and I have spent many years working in pretty decent restaurants that at least tried to source locally, even in Michigan. That and being raised by an older generation that didn’t always rely on buying everything in a handy box-kit or frozen prepackaged, I may not be as common as I like to think I am. But the fact that more and more organic food is available and more and more people are talking about organic produce (and fabrics, furniture, cleaners, etc), I am convinced that my generation is making progress.

Funny how things come full circle. Now, it’s all the rage to make your own stocks and sauces, compost your vegetable peelings, recycle your glass jars. For my grandparents, and their parents, and their parents, you had to make your own stocks. Composting wasn’t called composting, it was just burying the kitchen scraps, because what else are you going to do with them. Jars were precious commodities for “canning” the vegetables from your summer garden, and insuring that you had food for February. Sure, the Agricultural Revolution may have freed us from the seasons, but at what cost?

Thanksgiving, sustainable, green, organic, vegetables, generations, Great Depression, Agricultural Revolution, farming, processed foods, junk food, agriculture, Archer Daniels Midland, ADM, Cargill, Sara Lee, Kraft, partially hydrogenated, high fructose, subsidies, Government Accounting Office, composting, recycling

Ah, traffic. It really is the worst thing about city-living, and more and more cities across the globe are following the American model of individual vehicles for each driver. Our freeways are congested, and commute times rival the time you’d spend watching a sports game. If you have ever driven during rush hour on the interstate system in Atlanta, LA, Detroit, San Francisco, Tampa, Miami…you know what I am talking about. Well, more and more global urban centers are starting to see what I am talking about.

Location: Beijing, China — we all heard that some draconian driving laws started a little before the Olympic Spectacle began. Recent reports from China are detailing the utter confusion that most Beijing drivers are feeling with some of the new laws and their post-Olympic variants. It seems that back in July, Beijing made alternate-day driving a rule for two months…

Beijing launched new driving restrictions on Sunday [July 20] that will ban more than a million cars from its streets in a bid to rein in the city’s notorious air pollution and traffic for next month’s Olympics.

Traffic on the capital’s normally bustling streets was noticeably light on Sunday, even for a weekend, amid the new rules that will ban cars with odd- and even-numbered licence plates from the roads on alternate days for two months.–France 24/AFP

…and it was good.

Many in China seemed to approve, taking to the Internet to mostly praise the measures, which in the end produced bluer skies and generally smoother traffic flows. A survey of 5,058 people by the New Beijing News last month showed 68.9 percent supported the traffic controls based on odd- and even-numbered license plates, 19 percent objected to them and 12.1 percent had no opinion. Asked what they would do if the restrictions were to continue, 18 percent of interviewees said they would buy another car.

“Recently, it takes me nearly twice as long to commute than it did during the Olympics,” said Zhang Fengyan, 30, an appliance salesman. “The difference is too big. I’d love it if they can make this rule permanent.” –Washington Post Oct. 2

However, it seems that the more severe alternate day driving was easier to understand for most people. The one car-less day a week is further complicated when the day changes.

BEIJING (Reuters) - Beijing car owners, many apparently puzzled by no-driving days designated by the last digit of their license numbers, now face revised rules which threaten even greater confusion.

The no-car days, introduced on Oct 11 to reduce gridlock and pollution, have apparently left so many drivers scratching their heads that one Beijing newspaper runs front-page notices each day to remind drivers which weekday they aren’t allowed to drive. –via ENN

I guess this week, the day you could not drive was moved back a day, and it threatening to destroy the whole system. Ok, I made that destroy thing up, but it is a little confusing when the days change on you, kind of like when your trash/recycling pick-up day is if it’s a holiday week.

Unfortunately, Beijing is only an example and a beginning to bigger headaches when it comes to transportation and its infrastructure and all of those darn cars polluting our skies. Think about it. Beijing has 3 million cars for its 17 million residents. That is one car per 5.6 people. In the whole of the United States, we have 250 million cars/trucks per 305 million people. So that is one car per 1.2 people. Think what Beijing would be like if it’s car ownership rate were the same as the United States.

Wait. Is it fair that I would compare Beijing to the whole of America and its multiple car households, instead of comparing Beijing’s numbers with another major urban center, such as New York City. It seems that Beijing is more like New York, if you look at these numbers.

From the New York Department of Motor Vehicles, in 2007, there were 1,738,970 registered personal vehicles in the whole NYC area. The population of the area is approximately 8,250,000 as of 2006. That’s about 0.2 cars per person in NYC. Beijing is 0.17, so it’s not far off from the US’s largest metropolis. The real problem is that Beijing is adding 1,000 new vehicles a day — if you figure 365,000 new cars a year, that represents a 12% increase. That 12% means that Beijing’s number of cars will double in less than seven years.

If I haven’t advocated it enough, this world really, really needs to figure out mass public transportation. It’s not so much that it is not available in some cities, it is that it’s seemingly ineffective. People don’t want to spend an hour on a bus or a train if they can drive themselves in their car in twenty minutes. Or what on a good traffic day is twenty minutes. More cars will mean more roads, more delays, and despite our best efforts at switching over to fuel-efficient vehicles and even electric cars, if we don’t cut the overall number of vehicles, we are all screwed.

Get a bike. Avoid suburbs.

Beijing, driving, traffic, Atlanta, Detroit, LA, San Francisco, cars, vehicles, Tampa, Miami, China, alternate day driving, laws, rules, per capita, New York City, NYC, New York, mass transit, public transit, bus, train

A Superfund site involves the cleanup of hazardous waste. It’s a term used by the US Environmental Protection Agency to designate a program to clean up abandoned hazardous waste. The Superfund program, full name being Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act of 1980 (CERCLA), was a result of disasters like toxic waste dumping sites Love Canal and Times Beach. You see, it seems that some business owners feel it is okay to dump toxic waste, and just cover it up and sell the land to unsuspecting buyers or mix toxic waste into something else, but not mention it to anyone until people start dying. Not that all Superfund sites are the result of such egregious behavior, but there is at least a degree or two of negliglence.

Do you know how many Superfund sites there are?

This map is not complete, but shows the worst of the bunch. Click on map for better detail.

Let me put it this way, as the Superfund site list (actually called the National Priorities List or NPL) is an ever-changing one, so far, assessments have been completed for over 40,000 sites. Are all of those terrible waste dumps — no, but they all have something toxic involved to some degree.

Actually, this is a little off topic, but when you talk about Superfund sites, it is hard to not also bring up the idea of environmental justice, or EJ for those in the know. Environmental Justice involves the whole issue of toxic waste and what neighborhoods or towns you find it in. Check out East St. Louis or West Dallas to see what I mean.

So you see, Superfund sites are often an urban problem.

Newtown Creek, an estuary between Queens and Brooklyn. Click here for story.

How can you find out where the Superfund sites are in your neck of the concrete woods?

May I recommend the EPA’s Superfund Sites Where You Live page (click on the title for the link)? I must warn you, it is somewhat depressing.

Superfund, site, sites, National Priorities List, EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, United States, toxic, waste, hazardous, Love Canal, Times Beach, environmental, justice, East St Louis, West Dallas, NPL, urban

Honestly, I think that is what Thanksgiving is all about — sustainability. The newly arrived, brass buckled English at Plymouth Rock had to learn that pretty quickly anyway.  It started out as then and still is a harvest festival, and to have a harvest year after decade after century, one must be sustainable.  Do your part even if you are not a farmer. Support the sustainable farmer.  Instead think of yourself as a pilgrim to brighter shores, a newcomer to an age of environmental awareness, a refugee to the land of green, a — ok, I’ll stop.

Today let’s talk Turkey.

Let’s face it, Americans love turkey for Thanksgiving. I am not exception. However, once I got older, I noticed that the dry turkey my mom made every year was not exactly her fault. She bought the brands she knew, namely Butterball. Granted, some years, it turned out pretty good, but I never really got into the Thanksgiving turkey thing (sorry, Mom).

Then I had wild turkey. And suddenly, turkey was good. I got it. But I still don’t get why so many people still go for the factory birds. My mom was a product of the 1950’s agricultural… cough, revolution that lead to the rise of the factory farm, so she could not really help it. Marketing works. It was funny that my parents were big farmers market people for produce, but didn’t know jack about where meat came from. And I don’t think it was just my parents. Americans have been kept in the dark when it comes to how our meats are produced, and most Americans liked it that way. Now, you have to look for organic, and free range, and no antibiotics.

Well, there’s a reason for that.

Even if you don’t want to get all hippie on the checklist of environmental buzz words, if there is any more compelling a reason to go with an organic turkey, I cannot think of it. Taste. Turkeys are not meant to be confined to cages. Turkeys are not meant to be so breast-heavy that the bird cannot reproduce without artificial insemination. Turkeys are not meant to be injected with oils and salt water in order to taste better.

The less you do to a turkey, the better it will taste. Turkeys are meant to cover a wide area, eating grubs and insects and small plants that turkeys eat. When you taste a turkey that is raised outside of the factory farm system, you will be a convert. Be careful not to fall for the word “natural” on the label. Look for the organic certification on the label. Unless you happen to get your turkey at a small local farm, since sometimes the smaller farms will not pay the cost of getting certified, and instead rely on talking to customers directly about their farming practices rather than a logo on a package.

Also, besides taste and flavor, there are other reasons to go organic. Factory farms feed their turkeys grain, which is grown with the use of unsustainable and ultimately detrimental farming practices, such as pesticides and genetically modified seed. The antibiotics that those turkeys are given ultimately end up in the water system.

And if you get your turkey from a local source, you can count on the fact that less fuel was needed to get that turkey to your table.

Factory Turkey Stats
Top 10 Turkey Producing States in 2007 (in order)

* Minnesota
* North Carolina
* Arkansas
* Virginia
* Missouri
* California
* Indiana
* Pennsylvania
* South Carolina
* Iowa

Top U.S. Turkey Processors
Live Weight Processed (Million Pounds) *
Butterball, LLC 1375
Jennie-O Turkey Store 1255
Cargill Value Added Meats 1112

*Estimates for 2007 from February 2008 Watt Poultry USA

The next farm on the list produces only 271 million pounds of turkey, which is still a lot, but Butterball, Jennie-O and Cargill are the big boys. I would avoid their products in general, and if you really care about your family and loves ones, give them a real feast on Thanksgiving.

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If you are a city dweller, an Urban Ecoist if you will, you may have some stuff in your backyard of which you may not be aware.

Lead

Lead may be in your backyard, especially in older neighborhoods, as the houses at one point, more likely than not, had lead paint on the exterior. The lead paint may have flaked off and fallen into the soil around the house, and the lead from the paint on the exterior may have leached into the soil as well. Most lead contamination around residential homes are within a few feet of the house.

If your house is on a busy street, you may have lead in the yard from car’s long ago that ran on leaded gasoline. Even if you are a not-so-city-dweller, and instead opted for the ‘burbs, if your house is on former orchard land, the pesticides used in the past, in the form of lead arsenate, may be in your soil.

Born in the ’70’s? No wonder you don’t read so well.

Hmm. Lead. Doesn’t that cause developmental problems in children? Doesn’t severe lead poisoning lead to seizures and possibly death? Yeah, that’s lead. Heck, it even affects adults in the form of memory loss and hypertension.

The US Environmental Protection Agency considers garden soil contaminated if it has 400 parts lead per million parts of soil.

The University of Massachusetts at Amherst’s Soil and Plant Tissue Testing Lab, which charges $9 a sample, normally receives about 10,000 soil sample requests a year for soil to be tested for a suite of contaminants, including lead. This year, the lab is on track to get about 16,000. Lab director Steve Bodine said he does not know exactly why people are sending in more soil samples, but believes it is at least in part because of an increased interest in vegetable gardening. Typically, about 10 percent of the homes tested show unsafe levels of lead. — Boston Globe

First…what can you do about lead in your backyard?

Really, not much. If it is a major problem, you can have your soil dug up and replaced, which is pretty pricey. Hopefully, if you do have lead in your yard, it won’t be above the EPA limit for what is safe. Except if you grow vegetables. Read on.

A good number of urbanites rent their homes, and if that is the case, there is a regulation that if the house you will be renting has lead contamination, the landlord must notify you of that fact. The same disclosure rule is in effect if you plan on selling or buying a house. However, there is no regulation that landlords or sellers have to test their properties. Nice loophole, huh?

Not sure about lead in your rented backyard? If it is an older home, you may want to assume that there is some lead. You can have it tested, but just to be sure, plant all vegetables in pots or raised-bed gardens. Lead doesn’t usually leach up into soil, so a raised garden will alleviate even a small amount of lead contamination.

Oh, yeah, and avoid bare soil in your yard. Tracking it inside does no good for anyone. Also, pets tend to seek out soil, so give them few opportunities. Even a good, deep layer of mulch can help in that department.

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Seems there may be a problem with granite countertops, and if you have them, you may have invited radon into your home.

Does that mean that you should go to the expense and bother of removing said countertops? Probably not, as the radon emitted by the small amounts of uranium that may be present within that granite, are equally small. You probably breathe in more radon every day simply breathing.

However, some countertops or any other granite surfaces that are used for decorative facades do have some rather high levels of uranium. Not only is uranium radioactive, which is bad enough in and of itself, but as uranium decays it gives off radon. Radon is odorless and colorless, so it is not like you can see radon. Some houses’ basements also pose a danger of emitting radon, depending on the surrounding rock and soil.

You can have your house tested for radon. There are also radon test kits that are commercially available, usually costing around $25. If you find that you have elevated levels of radon in your home, you should contact your state radon office by accessing the EPA website’s list here.

The Environmental Protection Agency (if you trust it) claims that there is no conclusive evidence of danger from granite, but of course, you never know when you just happen to get that one countertop that just happens to have really high levels of uranium, coupled with the fact that your house sits on soil that also emits high levels of radon, and well, you see where I am going with this.

This remodel may have gone a bit overboard with the radon…er, I mean granite.

Radon is a carcinogen, that is it causes cancer. In radon’s case, it causes lung cancer, and the EPA estimates that 7000 to 30000 deaths from lung cancer may be attributable to radon every year. Radon may also cause emphysema, pulmonary fibrosis, and chronic interstitial pneumonia.

If you are thinking about putting in new countertops, you should check out all the recycled materials that are available, like icestone (at right), which is made from recycled glass, or even materials like concrete and bamboo.

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