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Author Topic: Pollution  (Read 59361 times)

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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #240 on: September 01, 2015, 01:08:58 am »

Web Site for the above Interactive Air Quality Map which can be zoomed to your area:

http://www.epi.yale.edu/visuals/airmap/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #241 on: September 02, 2015, 09:00:39 pm »
Shilling for Dollars

Front groups with official and impressive name such as Medicine and Public Health at the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) tend to lend an air of authoritative credibility to a given issue. It carries the impression of being an expert source.

To increase the “expert credibility” image, add someone with a few letters before and/or after their name to the staff.

But is the front group or its representatives really an expert and credible organization? 

Full article:
https://frackorporation.wordpress.com/2015/08/15/shilling-for-dollars/

Agelbert NOTE:
The short answer is NO. The ACSH is funded by a rogues gallery of polluters. The scientists they employ are bought and paid for to distort, dissemble and twist the science of applied physics (see "High Energy Density" of fossil fuels happy talk) and climate science along with several other pro-corporate and anti-people propaganda). The ACSH exists to perpetuate the profit over planet polluting status quo, PERIOD.



Why You Can’t Trust the American Council on Science and Health

Posted on April 17, 2015 by Gary Ruskin

The American Council on Science and Health is a front group for the tobacco, agrichemical, fossil fuel, pharmaceutical and other industries.

Personnel

ACSH’s “Medical/Executive Director” is Dr. Gilbert Ross.[2] In 1993, according to United Press International, Dr. Ross was “convicted of racketeering, mail fraud and conspiracy,” and was “sentenced to 47 months in jail, $40,000 in forfeiture and restitution of $612,855” in a scheme to defraud the Medicaid system.[3]
ACSH’s Dr. Ross was found to be a “highly untrustworthy individual” by a judge who sustained the exclusion of Dr. Ross from Medicaid for ten years.[4]


Funding
 

ACSH has often billed itself as an “independent” group, and has been referred to as “independent” in the press. However, according to internal ACSH financial documents obtained by Mother Jones:

“ACSH planned to receive a total of $338,200 from tobacco companies between July 2012 and June 2013. Reynolds American and Phillip Morris International were each listed as expected to give $100,000 in 2013, which would make them the two largest individual donations listed in the ACSH documents.”[5]

“ACSH donors in the second half of 2012 included Chevron ($18,500), Coca-Cola ($50,000), the Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation ($15,000), Dr. Pepper/Snapple ($5,000), Bayer Cropscience ($30,000), Procter and Gamble ($6,000), agribusiness giant Syngenta ($22,500), 3M ($30,000), McDonald’s ($30,000), and tobacco conglomerate Altria ($25,000).

Among the corporations and foundations that ACSH has pursued for financial support since July 2012 are Pepsi, Monsanto, British American Tobacco, DowAgro, ExxonMobil Foundation, Philip Morris International, Reynolds American, the Koch family-controlled Claude R. Lambe Foundation, the Dow-linked Gerstacker Foundation, the Bradley Foundation, and the Searle Freedom Trust.”[6]

ACSH has received $155,000 in contributions from Koch foundations from 2005-2011, according to Greenpeace.[7]

Indefensible and incorrect statements on science
ACSH has:

Claimed that “There is no evidence that exposure to secondhand smoke involves heart attacks or cardiac arrest.”[8]

Argued that “there is no scientific consensus concerning global warming. The climate change predictions are based on computer models that have not been validated and are far from perfect.”[9]

Argued that fracking “doesn’t pollute water or air.”[10]

Claimed that “The scientific evidence is clear. There has never been a case of ill health linked to the regulated, approved use of pesticides in this country.”[11]

Declared that “There is no evidence that BPA [bisphenol A] in consumer products of any type, including cash register receipts, are harmful to health.”[12]

Argued that the exposure to mercury, a potent neurotoxin, “in conventional seafood causes no harm in humans.”[13]

Footnotes

[2] “Meet the ACSH Team,” American Council on Science and Health website.

[3] “Seven Sentenced for Medicaid Fraud.” United Press International, December 6, 1993. See also correspondence from Tyrone T. Butler, Director, Bureau of Adjudication, State of New York Department of Health to Claudia Morales Bloch, Gilbert Ross and Vivian Shevitz, “RE: In the Matter of Gilbert Ross, M.D.” March 1, 1995. Bill Hogan, “Paging Dr. Ross.” Mother Jones, November 2005. Martin Donohoe MD FACP, “Corporate Front Groups and the Abuse of Science: The American Council on Science and Health (ACSH).” Spinwatch, June 25, 2010.

[4] Department of Health and Human Services, Departmental Appeals Board, Civil Remedies Division, In the Cases of Gilbert Ross, M.D. and Deborah Williams M.D., Petitioners, v. The Inspector General. June 16, 1997. Docket Nos. C-94-368 and C-94-369. Decision No. CR478.

[5] Andy Kroll and Jeremy Schulman, “Leaked Documents Reveal the Secret Finances of a Pro-Industry Science Group.” Mother Jones, October 28, 2013. “American Council on Science and Health Financial Report, FY 2013 Financial Update.” Mother Jones, October 28, 2013.

[6] Andy Kroll and Jeremy Schulman, “Leaked Documents Reveal the Secret Finances of a Pro-Industry Science Group.” Mother Jones, October 28, 2013. “American Council on Science and Health Financial Report, FY 2013 Financial Update.” Mother Jones, October 28, 2013.

[7] “Koch Industries Climate Denial Front Group: American Council on Science and Health (ACSH).” Greenpeace. See also Rebekah Wilce, “Kochs and Corps Have Bankrolled American Council on Science and Health.” PR Watch, July 23, 2014.

[8] Richard Craver, “The Effects of the Smoking Ban.” Winston-Salem Journal, December 12, 2012.

[9] Elizabeth Whelan, “’Global Warming’ Not Health Threat.” PRI (Population Research Institute) Review, January 1, 1998.

[10] Elizabeth Whelan, “Fracking Doesn’t Pose Health Risks.” The Daily Caller, April 29, 2013.

[11] “TASSC: The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition,” p. 9. Legacy Tobacco Documents Library, University of California, San Francisco. November 21, 2001. Bates No. 2048294227-2048294237.

[12] “The Top 10 Unfounded Health Scares of 2012.” American Council on Science and Health, February 22, 2013.

[13] “The Biggest Unfounded Health Scares of 2010.” American Council on Science and Health, December 30, 2010.

Food For Thought, Hall of Shame

http://usrtk.org/hall-of-shame/why-you-cant-trust-the-american-council-on-science-and-health/

Agelbert NOTE:
Here is an excellent example of pseudo scientific baloney published by the ACSH (it's three years old but the same baloney continues to be peddled by fossil fuelers and those that swallowed their mendacious propaganda):

Energy Density: Why Gasoline Is Here To Stay 

By Hank Campbell    | August 2nd 2012 11:00 PM

SNIPPET 1 - The Pretense of Objectivity Wind Up (i.e. tough love "real world" baloney mixed with sympathy laced rhetoric):

Like people who approach geopolitics with the attitude of "If people would just talk to each other, we would all along", there are a lot of naïve assumptions about just dumping gasoline.

We know it causes emissions, and emissions are bad, we know a lot of the money paid for oil goes to fund Middle Eastern terrorism, and that is bad - those things should cause both the left and the right in America to want gasoline gone. And yet it is not gone. The reason is simple: gasoline is a lot more efficient than alternative energy proponents want to believe.


SNIPPET 2 - The pitch:

Energy density is the amount of stored energy in something; in the case of gasoline we talk in America about a 1 gallon volume but I will use both metric and standard for the values. Gasoline has an energy density of about 44 megajoules per kilogram (MJ/kg), converted to American values that is 1.3 × 108 J/gallon.


SNIPPET 3 (Just ONE of SEVERAL real world AND applied physics LIES):

Ethanol was the last craze of the Anything-But-Oil contingent yet even they had to succumb to reality and recognize that the lower energy density meant 25% worse gas mileage - worse for people, worse for food prices and worse for the environment.
http://www.science20.com/science_20/energy_density_why_gasoline_here_stay-91403


Agelbert NOTE: To begin with, ethanol is not a "craze". It was not a craze in 2012 and, because presently 15 billion gallons of it are made a year, it certainly isn't one now.

But the fact that the author is so ignorant of history (Edison labs in partnership with the U.S. Navy, in the first decade of the 20th century, PROVED that ethanol was a superior fuel to gasoline - It was rather convenient for Standard Oil that Prohibition just happened to come along after Rockefeller funded the temperance movement to the tune of several million dollars...) is informative about the questionable scientific objectivity of the author.  ;)

The author puts up a happy talk graph showing gasoline as the high energy density champion over E85. He leaves out E100 (an informative omission that points squarely at a fossil fuel bias).

The chart is accurate. So what's the problem? The problem is that energy density of gasoline and ethanol is a process determined in the lab, by scientists, in certain standardized conditions. I'm CERTAIN fossil fuelers know this. The energy density of about 44 MJ/kg) for gasoline is determined by heating water, in an open flame in standard atmospheric conditions (a fixed temperature and pressure - sea level at 59 degrees F). 

If the above appears irrelevant to you, let me remind you that heating water in an open flame is an EXTERNAL combustion process. It is true that gasoline will heat that water quicker than ethanol.  ;D

But, unless you have a steam engine running your car, you need to consider how much WORK you can get from gasoline versus ethanol in an INTERNAL combustion engine.

The author neglected to mention that ethanol (E100) has a higher octane rating than non-leaded gasoline, even though E100 has a lower energy density.  ;D High octane ratings give a fuel better mileage as long as you oxidize them in a high compression internal combustion engines. That is why tetra-ethyl lead was invented to help our children's IQ... You see, ethanol was outlawed for fuel thanks to Prohibition... And, by the way, leaded gasoline is STILL LEGAL for use in aircraft internal combustion engine, all of which are high compression engines. Do you live under the approach to general aviation airport? Then you are getting the "benefit" of still another "externalized" cost thanks to the fossil fuel industry.

When you mix gasoline with ethanol (e.g. E85) you LOWER the octane rating. IOW, you are making it LESS efficient. You are making it LESS competitive with gasoline. You are getting the waste heat disadvantage of gasoline and losing the a part of the high octane rating of ethanol. That is Inefficient. That is unscientific. That is STUPID. But that is convenient and profitable for the fossil fuel industry. You might ask yourself why E100 is in common use in Brazil, but not in the USA. I'll give you three guesses - the first two don't count;)

Why ethanol's octane rating is higher than that of non-leaded gasoline if ethanol has a lower energy density? Because ethanol is of uniform chemical structure. Consequently, it burns evenly and does not suffer from pre-ignition (like low octane gasoline DOES) which can severely damage an engine.

More thermodynamically important, however,  the consistent chemical structure of E100 ensures complete combustion, aided by the fact that it carries it's own oxygen.

In addition, ethanol has extremely low waste heat because, unlike gasoline, it doesn't produce carbon deposits from incomplete combustion on the cylinder walls that increase friction and decrease engine life.

Unlike an engine running on gasoline, you can touch the block, or the manifold, of an engine running on ethanol with your hand AND KEEP IT THERE without getting burned. This has huge savings implications for engine design that the fossil fuel industry has done it's best to keep from internal combustion engine designers and manufacturers (more on that below).

IN SUMMARY, "High energy density" calculations  are based on EXTERNAL thermodynamic combustion processes. It is true that gasoline will boil water in an open flame faster than ethanol will. That doesn't have beans to do with automobiles.

But when INTERNAL combustion is involved, ethanol produces more useful work than gasoline. That has EVERYTHING to do with automobiles.

But there is more the fossil fuel industry does not want most people to know. Due to the fact that ethanol burns so cleanly and has such low waste heat, a high compression internal combustion engine specifically designed for ethanol would be about 30% lighter (i.e. a lot cheaper) because the metal alloys involved would not have to be engineered to withstand the engine stressing waste heat that gasoline generates. Of course, said internal combustion engine (ICE) could not be approved for running gasoline. Gasoline would trash an engine designed specifically to run on ethanol in short order. The fossil fuel industry would not like that at all.

A lighter ICE running ethanol would then get even more mechanical energy (i.e. WORK) out of each gallon because less engine weight would need to be moved along with the car and occupants.

The Fossil Fuel Industry knows all that. That is why they continuously try to demonize and talk down ethanol biofuel with mendacity and dissembling about "low ERoEI", "water in the fuel" and "corrosion".

I, and many others, have exposed all that fossil fuel industry self serving propaganda. But they just keep throwing it out there to try to preserve the TOTALLY unscientific basis for claiming fossil fuels are a "better fuel" than E100 (pure ethanol).

Don't believe them. And check to see who is doing the funding when you read happy talk about fossil fuels.

The American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) is not objective, science based or credible. Hank Campbell, like the fossil fueler MKing that haunts the Doomstead Diner, is not interested in scientific objectivity; preserving the fossil fuel profit over planet status quo with mens rea mendacity is behind everything they write.



Further reading that methodically takes apart some relatively recent pseudo scientific baloney by the "illustrious" Professor Charles Hall, friend of fossil fuelers everywhere. 



 

 
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #242 on: September 04, 2015, 06:29:24 pm »

Why Did 60,000 Endangered Antelopes Mysteriously Die in Four Days?  ???

Lorraine Chow | September 4, 2015 11:42 am

This past May, a large herd of saigas—a critically endangered antelope in Kazakhstan—died en masse, to the horror of conservationists worldwide. More than 120,000 of these creatures had mysteriously died across the Central Asian country in two weeks, including a whopping 60,000 saigas in central Kazakhstan in just four short days.

In a few short weeks, one-third of the worldwide population of saigas—known for its distinctive bulbous nose and for its key role in steppe grassland ecosystems—were found dead. Scientists had no idea why.  :(

“I’m flustered looking for words here,” Joel Berger, a senior scientist at the Wildlife Conservation Society, told The New York Times in June. “To lose 120,000 animals in two or three weeks is a phenomenal thing:o  :(

The horrendous population dive stopped suddenly that June, causing even more confusion.

But now, as Live Science reported, scientists believe they have pinpointed the culprit—a common and normally harmless bacteria that lives in the animals’ bodies.

According to Live Science, an extensive analysis revealed that that toxins produced by Pasteurella and possibly Clostridia bacteria caused extensive bleeding in the animals’ organs. Pasteurella, a gut bacteria found in all ruminants such as saigas, is harmless unless the animal already has a weakened immune systems.

The current saiga antelope distribution. Photo credit: Google maps

Scientists have yet to figure out why this typically harmless bacteria has led to mass death.

One possible theory, according to wildlife vet and lead investigator Steffen Zuther, is an exceptionally cold winter followed by a very wet spring that could have caused the bacteria to become widespread in the environment, Live Science reported.

Zuther said that female saigas, which cluster up to calve their young, were hit the hardest. The mothers died first followed by their calves, as they are too young to eat any vegetation. This suggests mothers’ milk transmitted whatever was killing the animals.

Mass die-offs of the antelope—as well many other animal populations—are not unusual in nature. As Inquistr noted, about 270,000 saigas died in 1988, and 12,000 in 2010, but scientists are concerned that another hit could devastate the entire saiga population.

Saigas are listed as critically endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. A few herds live in Kazakhstan as well as one small herd in Russia and Mongolia. It’s currently estimated there are around 50,000 left.


Saiga antelopes are one of the fastest declining mammal species on our planet today. Photo credit: Saiga Conservation Alliance[/i][/size][/center]

E. J. Milner-Gulland, a conservation biologist at Imperial College London, spoke to The Guardian about the saiga die-offs in June, and the importance of future research into this area.
Quote

If we understand the factors that contribute to these events, we may be able to mitigate or prevent them in the future,” she said. “This is important because three of the four remaining populations of saiga are at such low levels that an event like this could wipe them out completely.”

She also spoke about another very common but serious threat: humans.

“Hunting is a serious problem,” Milner-Gulland said. “We need to get all these populations to a level that is actually resilient enough to cope with the natural mass mortalities that happen in the saiga antelope. Anti-poaching needs to be a top priority for the Russian and Kazakh governments.”

According to the Saiga Conservation Alliance, poaching is a main factor driving the animal’s population decline. “The saiga’s meat and hide are traditionally valued, but nowadays saiga are primarily hunted for their translucent amber horn, which is used Southeast Asian countries for Chinese Traditional Medicine,” the alliance said.
https://ecowatch.com/2015/09/04/antelopes-mysteriously-died/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #243 on: September 06, 2015, 02:10:31 pm »
Real-Time Map Reveals China’s Deadly Air Pollution  :(
Cole Mellino | September 6, 2015 9:19 am

Using Google maps and new data on China’s air pollution, Berkeley researchers created a real-time map of the country’s appalling air quality. The map is based on findings that the scientists published last month in the journal PLoS One. Using hourly air pollution data from more than 1,500 sites, researchers concluded that air pollution is responsible for the deaths of an estimated 1.6 million people in China every year, or about 4,400 people a day. That’s roughly 17 percent of all deaths, or put another way, nearly 1 in 5 deaths can be attributed to the country’s toxic air pollution.

A near real-time map developed by Berkeley researchers exposes how widespread China’s air pollution problem is.

“Earlier studies put China’s annual air pollution death toll at one to two million, but this is the first to use newly released Chinese air monitoring figures,” says South China Morning Post. The authors of the study are members of Berkeley Earth, an independent nonprofit devoted to “expanding scientific investigations, educating and communicating about climate change, and evaluating mitigation efforts in developing and developed economies.”

Though pollution in China’s northeast corridor running from Beijing to Shanghai is “particularly intense,” the problem is widespread. “Consistent with prior findings, the greatest pollution occurs in the east, but significant levels are widespread across northern and central China and are not limited to major cities or geologic basins,” said researchers. They found that during a four month period from April to August 2014, 92 percent of the population experienced more than 120 hours of “unhealthy air” based on the standards of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. And 38 percent experienced long-term average concentrations that were unhealthy.

“[The] map provides near real-time information on particulate matter air pollution less than 2.5 microns in diameter (PM2.5),” researchers said. PM2.5 is microscopic particulate matter that is small enough to “lodge deep inside a person’s lungs and cause health problems in the long term,” says South China Morning Post. “Under typical conditions, PM2.5 is the most damaging form of air pollution likely to be present, contributing to heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, respiratory infections and other diseases,” say the researchers.

Today, the map shows the areas around Shanghai, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Nantong, Nanjing, Yichang, Luzhou, Qíngdao and Laiwu as having “unhealthy” air quality.

Large portions of the map fall under the category of “unhealthy for sensitive groups” and the vast majority of the mapped area falls under the “moderate” health category. Only a very few small areas fall under the category of “good.” The most unsafe air quality index (180.9) can be found near the city of Yichang, a major economic hub for the region. Its PM2.5 air pollution concentration is 113.4.

To put China’s air pollution problem in perspective, look at Madera, California. The American Lung Association lists Madera’s air pollution as the worst in the country. And yet, “99.9 percent of the eastern half of China has a higher annual average for small particle haze than Madera,” said the study’s lead author, Dr Robert Rohde. “In other words, nearly everyone in China experiences air that is worse for particulates than the worst air in the U.S.”

Earlier this year, a documentary exposing China’s abysmal air quality went viral within days of its release. The film was hailed by some government officials, but was ultimately banned by the state. 
http://ecowatch.com/2015/09/06/china-air-pollution-map/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #244 on: September 07, 2015, 07:50:03 pm »
Canada Clears Way for Ecuadorean Case Against Chevron Over ‘Amazon Chernobyl’

Posted on Sep 6, 2015

Canada’s Supreme Court ruled Friday that Ecuadorean villagers can go after Canadian assets of the U.S.-based oil company Chevron. The lawsuit has been one of the most bitterly contested environmental cases in history, involving contamination that environmentalists have dubbed the “Amazon Chernobyl.”

From Al-Jazeera:

The plaintiffs, who include about 30,000 villagers and indigenous people, decided to go after the energy giant’s assets in Canada, Brazil and Argentina after the company contested a ruling by Ecuador’s highest court to pay $9.5 billion to clean up the contamination site.

Communities in the Lago Agrio region of Ecuador allege that Texaco, which was acquired by Chevron in 2001, dumped some 16 billion tons of oil and toxic waste in the Amazon rainforest as a cost-saving measure between 1964 and 1992, Telesur reported. That’s 80 times the amount of oil spilled in the 2010 British Petroleum Gulf of Mexico oil disaster, the Latin American news website added.

Ecuadorian villagers and indigenous communities affected by the contamination allege that it has resulted in illness and death, Telesur reported in June, and that they are still suffering the consequences of Texaco’s actions.

Plaintiffs claim that
Texaco attempted to hide the dumping by covering nearly 1,000 oil pits with vegetation. People eventually built homes over some of the pits, and began coming down with mysterious illnesses, it is claimed.

“It has been 33 years … and I never knew that this was a covered pit,” local resident Serbio Curipoma told Telesur.  :(  >:(

“And my water well is only 4 or 5 meters away. My children and myself are always sick, we get skin rashes, high temperatures from fevers, everything,” he added. “It is unfortunate, and I am worried about my family living in these conditions, my wife has had problems with her uterus.” :(  >:(

Friday’s ruling upheld a 2013 decision by the Ontario court of appeal, confirming that Canada was an appropriate jurisdiction for the case. Because Chevron has no assets in Ecuador, plaintiffs pursued its subsidiary Chevron Canada. The case will now proceed to a lower court in Ontario.

“Canadian courts, like many others, have adopted a generous and liberal approach to the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments,” the Canadian Supreme Court said in its ruling.

The plaintiffs, who have been fighting for compensation for more than 20 years, initially sued Texaco – which later merged with Chevron – over the mass contamination.

The Canadian court clarified that it was not taking a position on the merits of the case, only providing an opportunity for it to proceed.

“A finding of jurisdiction does nothing more than afford the plaintiffs the opportunity to seek recognition and enforcement of the Ecuadorian judgment,” Justice Clement Gascon wrote for the court, according to Global News.

Chevron said in a statement that it would continue to fight the Ecuadorian judgment, which it characterized as “the product of fraud and other misconduct, and is therefore illegitimate and unenforceable.”

In 2014, a U.S. judge ruled that an American lawyer working on behalf of plaintiffs to secure the $9.5 billion settlement in Ecuadorian court used corrupt means. That ruling was appealed.
Quote

“It is clearer than ever that Chevron’s long run from justice is coming to an end,”   
Aaron Marr Page, a U.S. lawyer for the plaintiffs, said in a statement.

The villagers and indigenous communities affected have vowed to see the case against Chevron through until the corporation cleans up the contamination and adequately compensates them for their losses.

 



http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/9/4/canada-ecuadorians-can-sue-chevron-in-ontario.html
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #245 on: September 12, 2015, 07:07:15 pm »

Quote
Nick Breeze interview with East Siberian Arctic Shelf researcher (ESAS) Dr. Natalia Shakhova on why the important news about methane news is not reaching mainstream news. Powerful interests seem to be in the way of Arctic methane education.

UB,
Palloy can tell us what a mathematician's definition of a low probability event or a high probability event is. But, if that is an existential threat, what is the cognitive threshold approximate percentage that would spur the average person to dispense with supporting incremental measures to prevent that threat and demand immediate and massive measures?

IOW, do we perceive a 20% or greater chance of Near Term Human Extinction, even though that is technically a relatively low probability (although a statistically significant one!), as a high probability?

Threat response is a bag of worms even without people making money form convincing people to keep bathing in that river in Egypt.  :P

But isn't part of that denial a refusal to OWN the responsibility for the possibility that the threat is significant enough to merit immediate action, rather than incremental measures?

I go blue in the face every time Monsta brings up his "we are all to blame because of population overshoot" business. But at least he recognizes that there IS an existential threat, even if he has difficulties reading pie charts.



Anyone can see that if you CULL 80% of human population (ALL the poor and MOST of the middle class), you will not DENT the level of pollution being generated by the rest of Homo Sapdom. Monsta doesn't get that. He really thinks that all those dead people will convince the surviving predators to be nice to the environment. 


And there is that Monsta's wet depopulation dream will solve our environmental problems, not simply because the polluting industry facts state otherwise, but because the morally challenged Predators 'R' US world view of the top 20% is at the ROOT of the degradation of democracy and the biosphere.

But Monsta will not go there. And he will not go there because, if he did, the whole population overshoot thing would be exposed for the scapegoating, blame the victim, ethics challenged rhetoric that it is.

NO, Monsta, all those high resource users will NOT use less resources because 80% of the population died.

THAT is because THAT 80% DOES NOT participate significantly  in the MARKET (see GDP fun and games) for all that industrial STUFF we produce in the piggy counties. the FACTORIES will NOT slow down to a sustainable biosphere 'roar' just because the bottom 80% get offed, as you seem to believe.

Thought Experiment (backed up by U.N. study FACTS): About 20% of the Population of humans does about 80% of the damage to the biosphere. Would it then be logical to reduce the population from the main polluters in equal proportion to the low carbon footprint 80%?

Only if you are logic challenged AND belong to the less than 20% doing more than 80% of the damage.

However, if you think critically, you would understand that the culprit is the carbon footprint of the less than 20% pig humans that everybody posting here belongs to. You would also understand that culling the low carbon footprint masses is, besides being useless to stop the environmental damage, a cruel cop out.

The problem is industrial pollution BY THAT less than 20% group AND their big meat and big ag pollution on top of that.

The solution REQUIRES, WITHOUT DELAY, a maximum carbon footprint allowed, FIRST OF ALL, to our polluting piggy 20%.

That means we get OFF of fossil fuels, nuclear power and we start eating insect protein instead of animal protein along with organic veggies.

THEN, an only then, can we address the human population problem.

Here's a nice picture from the U.N. that shows the REAL world out there. Your idea of killing most of humanity will not put a DENT in the pollution problem as long as we in the polluting piggy 20% keep doing what we do.



http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/forum/index.php/topic,811.msg85182.html#msg85182
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #246 on: September 19, 2015, 12:01:09 am »
More evidence for the reality of genetic entropy

by Robert W. Carter

My colleague John Sanford and I have recently published a paper in a secular journal with what we believe are profound implications.1

Our basic claim is that ‘genetic entropy’ works in the real world, which brings questions about the role of natural selection and the long-term survival of species into the future.

A new look at an old virus

The paper analyzed mutation accumulation in the human H1N1 influenza genome using over 95 years’ worth of genetic sequences (figure 1).


Figure 1. Mutation accumulation in human H1N1. The published Brevig Mission strain from 1918 was used as the baseline (bold line) for comparison with all available human-infecting H1N1 genomes. There are two distinct trend lines in the data. The 2009–2010 outbreak samples and additional samples from 2011–2012 are circled. These and the scattered points are all derived from swine H1N1 versions. The remaining points represent mutation accumulation in the ‘human’ version of H1N1: from 1918 to its initial extinction in 1957, a break of 19 years, its re-introduction in 1976 (of a strain from approximately 1955, after which the mutation count picks up where it left off), and a second disappearance in 2009.

This type of data is a rarity in the world of genetics, since most sequence data are from recent organisms with long generation times. The influenza virus, however, has been isolated and sequenced from human tissue samples all the way back to 1918.

With a human-to-human transmission on average every three days or so, this makes over 11,000 disease generations and many times more than that number of viral generations.

The number of viral generations is possibly comparable to the number of generations since the supposed human-chimpanzee split.


Full article:
 

http://creation.com/evidence-for-genetic-entropy
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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #247 on: September 19, 2015, 03:40:46 pm »
Monsanto Charged with Chemically Poisoning Farmer

Michelle Schoffro Cook
September 18, 2015

Three years ago a French farmer sued Monsanto and won, stating that the company’s pesticide product known as Lasso had poisoned him, causing neurological problems. The company appealed the court decision by taking the lawsuit to a higher French court. Just days ago, the French court upheld the original decision that Monsanto’s product Lasso poisoned the French farmer, causing his neurological concerns. 

While it is likely that Monsanto will appeal the court decision yet again, the victory is being celebrated by many people worldwide as one that sets a precedent for future rulings against the biotechnology giant. Monsanto no longer sells Lasso in the United States, Canada, Britain, France or Belgium, citing commercial reasons for phasing out the product in these markets.

Lasso was specifically an herbicide—used to destroy weeds and grasses—marketed to farmers.

In the U.S. government’s own Health and Human Services Household Products Database, Lasso is warned to cause blindness, respiratory irritation, liver damage, kidney damage, eye nerve inflammation, jaundice, bladder inflammation, the destruction of red blood cells and blood in urine, as well as other serious health effects.

The U.S. government’s database is self-regulated , meaning that companies report whether their own products are toxic, and if so, in which ways. As a result, the database includes little toxicity information about its product Roundup. 

 The database reports that Monsanto has not provided any information about any possible chronic health effects from use of or exposure to Roundup.  However, the company warns: “When using [Roundup] do not eat, drink or smoke. Wash hands thoroughly after handling or contact. Thoroughly clean equipment after use. Do not contaminate drains, sewers and water ways when disposing of equipment rinse water.”

Yet, because the product is sprayed on soil, it finds its way into water ways and sewers.

Monsanto now focuses its attention on manufacturing and distributing other pesticide products like Roundup as well as genetically-modified seeds. Roundup has also received international attention. In the spring of this year, the World Health Organization indicated that glyphosate—an ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup—as well as other pesticides are probable carcinogens to humans. While the research confirming that the pesticides cause cancer was conducted by a team of nineteen international cancer scientists and published in The Lancet, a peer-reviewed medical journal, the company demanded a retraction from the World Health Organization, claiming the research to be “junk science.”

While it is not clear yet how the French farmer will be remunerated for his neurological illness that includes memory loss, stammering and headaches, Monsanto’s lawyer  indicates that the company will appeal the decision again.  Stay posted to find out how the lengthy lawsuits will end.

http://www.care2.com/greenliving/monsanto-charged-with-chemically-poisoning-farmer.html#ixzz3mDL0jgCo

 

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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #248 on: September 20, 2015, 07:14:01 pm »
Tuna and mackerel populations suffer catastrophic 74% decline, research shows

WWF and the Zoological Society of London found that numbers of the scombridae family of fish, which also includes bonito, fell by 74% between 1970 and 2012, outstripping a decline of 49% for 1,234 ocean species over the same period. 

The conservation charity warned that we face losing species critical to human food security, unless drastic action is taken to halt overfishing and other threats to marine life.

Louise Heaps, chief advisor on marine policy at WWF UK, said:
Quote
"This is catastrophic. We are destroying vital food sources, and the ecology of our oceans.”


Full article:

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/sep/15/tuna-and-mackerel-populations-suffer-catastrophic-74-decline-research-shows

Agelbert NOTE: The typical reaction (by the fossil fuelers and N.T.H.E. threat denying wishful thinkers) to the above will be the wailing and gnashing of teeth about "overpopulation"  . However, Global Warming caused CO2 ocean acidification and other industrial and big ag pollutants like chemical fertilizers will be, uh, mentioned in passing, THUS: "we are solving all that with incremental measures. No need to get so excited. We must weigh the benefits to society of business as usual against the "minor" cost of collapsing tuna, mackerel, shellfish, sea cucumbers, sea turtles, etc., populations. There is no reason to let this alarmist news stampede us in to any rash activity that might threaten GDP!". 

Right after that they will scream for all those "useless eaters" out there to stop driving tuna sandwich prices up! The "job creator" one percent wants to serve champagne and caviar, not tuna casserole! 

Palloy tries to downplay the above marine species extinction threat. Palloy does not get it. I will explain why.

At the risk of being called a shill for the fossil fuel industry by AG, again, I should just like to point out that the pH of the oceans varies between 8.1 and 8.4, and that so far climate change hasn't altered that by 0.1 anywhere at all.  It would happen in time of course, IF we continued to burn fossil fuels at the same, or increasing rates.  But if you believe in Peak Fossils then that won't happen - not because THEY wouldn't want to, but because they won't be able to make money out of it.  That's when they will stop extracting fossil fuels, and industrial civilisation will collapse.

Temperatures will continue to rise maybe until 2045, and ocean acidification will continue, but industrialised fishing will be over almost instantly, and fish stocks will replenish quickly.  The mix of species will be different, no doubt, but they have always been different, and nobody is really aware of what the mix is anyway.

So don't worry, just pray the collapse happens soon.

Sigh, you mathematicians don't do much biosphere math, do you? What YOU call "insignificant" pH (you know, the negative logarithm of the hydrogen ion concentration) differences have VERY significant (as in homeostatic band required) effects on living systems (you know, the stuff we eat!).

Homeostasis REQUIRES that strict pH (and temperature and pressure and dissolved CO2 and dissolved O2, etc.) bands be adhered to or the organism dies. The reason it dies is because thousands to millions of biochemical reactions per second, vital to living processes, will not take place outside those homeostatic bands.

For mathematicians, the numbers are "significant" if they are, say, 2% or more and INSIGNIFICANT when they vary less than that.

For biologists, the numbers are homeostatic band life or death SIGNIFICANT when they vary by 0.01 % - often even less!).

This is so because the enzymes (catalysts made by living systems to lower the energy of activation for chemical reactions so the organism does not overheat and die from chemical reaction waste heat inefficiencies) will NOT take place when the pH (in combination with the other factors I mentioned) varies by a very small percentage. And all these bands vary in different parts of the human body. The pH band your bloodstream can handle is far less than the one the water in your tissues can handle.

There is a LOT MORE to this.

For example, I'm sure you would agree that being drunk is hazardous to your health because it slows your reflexes, dehydrates you, stresses your kidneys and liver and blinds you to reality because the system thinks it is pigging out on cheap energy - sends your brain a signal that everything is amazingly great (that's called being high).

The change in concentration of alcohol in the blood required to effect all these deleterious changes (that the organism itself perceives INCORRECTLY  as  "good" because it FEELS good") is, from your point of view, tiny.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Relative_risk_of_an_accident_based_on_blood_alcohol_levels_(linear_scale).jpg

Biosphere math is DIFFERENT from the math applied to non-living matter, Palloy. Stop trying to apply your math to living systems. It is tantamount to peddling rose colored glasses about the severity of our environmental plight.   

Here's one more example of how a pollutant in our atmosphere that kills life is actually made by living systems to preserve life. It's all in the percentages, Palloy. It's all in where the polluting gas is and how much of it there is. The life or death differences in percentage are FAR LESS than 0.01%.

The gas I refer to is Nitric Oxide (NO).

Environmental effects

Nitric oxide in the air may convert to nitric acid, which has been implicated in acid rain. However, it is an important source of nutrition for plant life in the form of nitrates. Furthermore, both NO and NO2 participate in ozone layer depletion.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitric_oxide


Humans make Nitric oxide in their noses to kill bacteria before it gets to their lungs. This is why breathing through your nose is a good idea.  ;D

But the percentage is so tiny that a fellow like you would claim it was "insignificant" if it was no longer there (which would guarantee bacterial attacks on the lung tissue  :P).

On the other hand, if we breath too much  Nitric oxide because it's in the atmosphere as a pollutant, it can destroy tissue. And before it does that, it will vasodilate the begeezes out of your blood vessels, depleting your ability to get oxygen to your brain and everywhere else in your body. Too much, by a very small percentage, will kill you.

This is what homeostasis is ALL ABOUT. This is why Lovelock used the homeostatic analogy in his Gaia hypothesis. He understood the incredibly small percentage of variation that our biosphere REQUIRES to be viable. The fact that most people are not aware of this is used by the deluded wishful thinkers to claim the gravity of our situation can be solved by killing off most of the human population. NEVER MIND that the top 20% will still be there doing 80% of the damage.


The collapse of the human population will not allow the fish populations to rebound simply because EATING the fish, though a contributing factor, is not the main reason they are headed for extinction.

Your post is biosphere reality challenged. It's time for you to take of the "culling the population will solve all our problems" rose colored glasses.

 



Palloy said,
Quote
At the risk of being called a shill for the fossil fuel industry by AG, again, I should just like to point out that the pH of the oceans varies between 8.1 and 8.4, and that so far climate change hasn't altered that by 0.1 anywhere at all.

How can Palloy be right about percentages and WRONG about the deleterious impact on marine species at the same time?  :icon_scratch:  First of all, he refused to state the TREND when he said that  "pH of the oceans varies between 8.1 and 8.4". This is double talk for, "it's no big deal". To cover his illogical ass he then says that "eventually" it's gonna happen. LOL! A brain dead person knows that! His entire post lowballs the  existential threat for marine species due to CO2 caused ocean acidification. This is what irresponsible defenders of the polluting energy status quo DO.   


Quote



OA Observations and Data

Follow the links below to access ocean acidification data for each of our observation programs

The field of carbon cycle science depends on well-designed, well-executed, and carefully maintained observations.  The PMEL carbon group primarily focuses on large scale observations of ocean interior carbon through hydrographic cruises and surface ocean carbon dynamics through measurements made on volunteer observing ships, buoys, and other autonomous systems. We work in both the open ocean and in coastal environments. We maintain long-term time series observations as well as conducting short term process studies or exploratory studies.  Since ocean acidification emerged as an important scientific issue, we have been augmenting and expanding our observational capacity by adding pH and other biogeochemical measurements to the platforms listed below.

http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/co2/story/OA+Observations+and+Data
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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #249 on: September 20, 2015, 07:34:36 pm »
Your alcohol analogy might be just the key to get through to the sceptics. The good time now and hangover later just last a lot longer.

Agreed. But, as you have correctly pointed out in past posts, the "skeptics" with an agenda will remain "unconvinced", so to speak.  :evil4:

We all agree that MKing, Palloy, Snowleapard, Alan, Ashvin, etc, et al are not stupid. So, low IQ is no excuse for being biosphere math challenged.

We all agree that they support incremental measures, rather than drastic ones, to address the environmental problems.

We all agree that they,  even if they aren't biologists or medical doctors, can read scientific journals and watch videos by credentialed climate scientists. 

So, the excuse, often repeated by some of the above luminaries, that "they don't know that much about biology or climate science" does not hold water.

Having an agenda to downplay the existential threat does (see shoe sizes     ).

To anyone I failed to mention in the list of irresponsible and criminally negligent homo saps that downplay the existential threat to humanity of CO2 Pollution:

UB, I recommend you save his image. It might come in handy when you are debating prevaricating forks.  ;D

http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/forum/index.php/topic,5598.msg85816.html#msg85816

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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #250 on: September 22, 2015, 07:16:32 pm »
Air Pollution Near Kids’ Homes Linked to Lower Grades at School  :(

Academic performance of minority students shows disproportionate effects from air pollution, according to a study in El Paso.

By Alana Fichman

More than 760,000 trucks pass through El Paso’s two entry points from Mexico each year; it is the highest-ranked city for carbon monoxide levels in Texas and rates eighth in the nation for particulate pollution. Traces of air pollution can be found in the school classroom, affecting minority students disproportionately.

Researchers from the University of Texas show that the overall GPA of fourth- and fifth-graders in public schools dropped 0.02–0.04 points for every one standard deviation increase in greater exposure to toxic substances in the air. Despite excessive truck traffic, non-road sources were shown to have the greatest effect, including pollution from an international airport, a bi-national freight station, and a military base.

Not dramatic, but significant

The effects on student grades aren’t dramatic, acknowledges Sara E. Grineski, Ph.D., University of Texas–El Paso, but she argues that we should definitely still pay attention. 

According to the study, “Air toxic exposures may not dramatically affect children’s school performance at a population level,“ but, researchers add, “Effects appear to be insidious, since they are mild, unlikely to be perceived, and hence unlikely to be addressed in any way.”

Researchers measured air toxicity based on the the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s National Air Toxics Assessment (NATA). All but one substance was shown to correlate negatively with student performance.

This is not the first study to correlate pollution and academic performance. However, previous studies have used standardized testing and air pollution levels based on school locations rather than students’ homes, where kids spend the majority of their time.

How school performance relates to air quality

School performance and absenteeism are predicted to relate to air toxicity in at least two ways:

•as a cause of asthma and respiratory illnesses, preventing attendance

•as a directly damaging impact on cognitive and neurological development

These researchers “underscore the continuing need to emphasize children as a vulnerable population in EJ [environmental justice] research and activism.”


https://www2.buildinggreen.com/article/air-pollution-near-kids-homes-linked-lower-grades-school
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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #251 on: September 26, 2015, 01:26:36 am »



Designed For The Dump     

Quote
Here is another brilliant, amusing and informative presentation from The Story Of Stuff creator Annie Leonard.

 We know that e-waste is a problem - but Ms. Leonard makes the point clear: it is a global toxic emergency.

 Gadgets are made from thousands of different materials shipped to assembly plants all around the world. They release toxins at every stage of their life cycle, from mining the metals to assembly and production. In the end, whether they sit in landfills or are taken apart for precious materials inside -- toxins continue to be released.

 As it is now, externalizing the costs of the mountains of e-waste allows companies to keep designing for the dump. Good News: there are emerging Product Take Back laws gaining traction in Europe and Asia that may begin to make manufacturers accountable for their products.

 What if electronics designers instead could compete for the longest lasting, most toxic free products? What if gadgets were created in a way that enabled them to be...repaired?

 --Bibi Farber

 This video was produced by the Story of Stuff Project
http://www.nextworldtv.com/videos/what-isnt-working-1/the-story-of-electronics.html#sthash.8K0AP016.dpuf
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AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #252 on: September 27, 2015, 10:09:46 pm »
Forest Loss and Land Degradation Fuel Climate Crisis 

Posted on Sep 25, 2015

By Tim Radford, Climate News Network

LONDON—The planet’s forests have dwindled by 3%—equivalent almost to the land area of South Africa—in the last 25 years, according to a new assessment by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation.

While the planet continues to lose its forests—albeit at a slower rate—through felling, burning or being turned into farmland, another UN study predicts that the economic cost of degraded agricultural land in the form of lost ecosystem services now amounts to up to US$10 trillion a year.

Within 10 years, 50 million people could have been forced to abandon their homes and livelihoods to become migrants. If all those people were assembled in one place, they would constitute the planet’s 28th biggest nation in terms of population.

Increasing levels 
 

Forest loss and farmland degradation are both part of climate change accountancy. The rise in greenhouse gases is in part linked to the loss of forest cover to soak up the carbon dioxide released by the burning of fossil fuels.

But increasing levels of heat and drought are likely to accompany climate change, increasing the area of desert or land too arid to support life and industry.

So in losing forest, and in watching farmland become saline because of over-irrigation, or exhausted by intensive cultivation or overgrazing, or simply increasingly too arid to support vegetation, humans are witnessing the loss of all sorts of valuable services not normally recorded by accountants.

Ideas such as “natural capital” and ecosystem services are attempts to place a practical value on things that nature normally delivers for free.

The percentage of global land area hit by drought doubled between the 1970s and the early years of this century.   

That is because living things—plants and soil fauna in particular—provide food, fibres, medicines and building materials, as well as helping to provide clean water, regulate disease, and recycle nutrients.

The United Nations University report believes that the loss of these services could now be between $6.3 trillion and $10.6 trillion a year in value. This is between 10% and 17% of global gross domestic product.

Alternatively, the “lost services” per square kilometre amount to between $43,000 and $72,000. Or, to put it yet another way, that is between $870 and $1,450 per person per year for everyone on the planet.

And 57% of world agricultural land is now either moderately or severely degraded, the report says. The percentage of global land area hit by drought doubled between the 1970s and the early years of this century.

Ecosystem services

One-third of Africa is threatened by desertification , and land cover changes since 2000 are responsible for half to three-quarters of the value of lost ecosystem services.

Separate from this, but also part of the overall climate change accounting equation, has been the steady loss of forests.

Researchers recently completed the first realistic “census” of the planet’s forests, and arrived at an inventory of more than three trillion trees, but also the conclusion that humans were destroying forests at the rate of 15 billion trees a year.

The latest UN global forest assessment acknowledges that, 25 years ago, around 7.3 million hectares were being lost each year. This slowed to 3.3m hectares a year between 2010 and 2015.

Tropical forests were hardest hit     , with a loss rate of 10%. A decline in “natural forest” has been offset by a 66% rise in planted forest, and Australia in particular has actually gained 1.5m hectares of forested land in the last five years.

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/forest_loss_and_land_degradation_fuel_climate_crisis_20150925

Agelbert NOTE:
Virtually ALL the biodiversity hotspots for mammals on planet Earth are in the tropics (Professor Gerardo Ceballos in video slide presentation at bottom).

The Earth has entered a new period of extinction, a study by three US universities has concluded, and humans could be among the first casualties.

The report, led by the universities of Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley, said vertebrates were disappearing at a rate 114 times faster than normal.

The findings echo those in a report published by Duke University last year.

One of the new study's authors said: "We are now entering the sixth great mass extinction event." The last such event was 65 million years ago, when dinosaurs were wiped out, in all likelihood by a large meteor hitting Earth.

"If it is allowed to continue, life would take many millions of years to recover and our species itself would likely disappear early on," said the lead author, Gerardo Ceballos.

He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #253 on: September 29, 2015, 02:24:39 pm »
Campaigners welcome Drax’s decision to pull out of destructive energy project:   


Biofuelwatch Media Advisory, 25th September 2015

Environmental campaigners welcome today’s news that Drax Plc has withdrawn from the proposed White Rose Project. The power station would have been the UK’s first new coal plant since 1974, and the EU’s first commercial power station designed  ;) for Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS).  ::)

In June this year, Biofuelwatch, together with the London Mining Network and Coal Action Network, handed a petition signed by over 110,000 people to DECC, urging them not to subsidise the White Rose (1).   

The plant would have burned at least 85% coal and up to 15% wood pellets. Drax’s existing power station imports some of its coal from Colombia, where whole villages have been evicted for opencast coal mines. The mines pollute and deplete water and soils, and have serious impacts on small farming communities (2). Much of the wood burned at Drax is imported from the southern US where conservation NGOs have documented that wood from clearcut, highly biodiverse wetland forests is being turned into pellets destined for Drax in Yorkshire (3). Although the White Rose would have been designed with carbon capture and storage infrastructure, there would have been no legal obligation for it to actually capture any CO2.

The UK government has already spent £50 million   >:( on a feasibility study for this plant and were expected to announce up to £900 million in further upfront subsidies.





Almuth Ernsting from Biofuelwatch states: “Drax’s decision to pull out of the White Rose project should spell the end for this destructive project. It would have resulted in more carbon emissions, more environmental destruction and pollution from coal mining, and more forest destruction for wood pellets. DECC should be supporting sustainable and low carbon renewable energy, such as sustainable wind and solar power, as well as energy efficiency and conservation – not coal, big biomass and false techno-fixes like CCS.”

Biofuelwatch continues to campaign for an end to the vast subsidies that Drax’s existing power station receives (4).

—————————————END————————————————————————

Notes:
•The petition was ran by Care.2:
 http://www.thepetitionsite.com/857/945/308/whiterose/, see

http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/2015/giant-white-elephant-delivers-over-110000-signatures-against-white-rose/ about the hand-over of the petition.

•See http://londonminingnetwork.org/?s=Cerrejon
•http://www.dogwoodalliance.org/2015/06/uncovering-the-truth-investigating-the-destruction-of-precious-wetland-forests/
•http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/axedrax-campaign/
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

AGelbert

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Re: Pollution
« Reply #254 on: October 01, 2015, 07:42:02 pm »
K-Dog,

Your posts about methane got to people too. It doesn't matter if they can "handle it" psychologically. What matters is the fact that there isn't any way in hell we are going to avoid the methane bomb if we don't stop burning fossil fuels, like, YESTERDAY. When they don't jump on you here and call you a hysterical, sensationalist, scaremongering nihilist, consider yourself to have scored some debating points.   ;D

As to your view on the Cowspiracy and your, admittedly valid, claim that our meat consumption is unsustainable, I think you lack the proper perspective on the relationship of our unsustainable meat eating habits with the Sixth Mass Extinction Event we are in.

By going vegan the amount of the earth needed to keep a human alive drops by an order of magnitude thus making human survival possible.

Does "going vegan" allow Insect  & Mollusk consumption?

I am OK with this if I can still eat Grasshoppers & Snails.  Also, is it OK to feed Flies to my Frogs and then eat their legs?

RE

In my view yes.  Even just dropping meat and keeping dairy would probably be enough if everyone did it.

Professor Gerardo Cebellos, lead author of the latest study on the evidence we are in the Sixth Mass Extinction, disagrees. So do I.  8)

I prepared a post to counter Ashvin's view, and it seems your your view as well, that concentrated feed operations are a bigger threat than CO2 pollution. I will post it here soon.

The point is that that meat eating is a subset of our unsustainable activity, not the proximate MAIN cause of environmental degradation.

We do have to switch to insect protein, of course. That's a no-brainer. But you are dreaming if you think that is going to stop the Sixth Mass Extinction in any significant way.

WHY? Because there is a LOT more going on out there, due to the CO2 build up, that is contributing to the main cause of BOTH land and marine mammalian vertebrate species extinctions.

Yes, eliminating the concentrated animal feeding operations and all the crop land needed to raise food for them from the energy mix would reduce our CO2 emissions. So we must do that. But, if we don't go 100% renewable energy, it will not be enough to STOP the mass extinction going on now that threatens vertebrate mammals,  which we just happen to be, in particular. WE are destroying OUR habitat by burning fossil fuels, along with the habitat of countless other species.

Since Ashvin appears to have gone away for a while WITHOUT answering the question I asked him on the last post, I'll just post the abridged version of my post. I'll post the whole enchilada with references in an article when I get to it.  ;D Enjoy the short version:

I am all for switching to insect protein powder for yummy hamburgers.
I am all for putting wildlife corridors on all agricultural land where humans (biologist caretakers armed to deal with trespassing humans excluded) are not allowed and will be shot on sight with arrows and used for owl and eagle species recovery efforts.

We need to do that. We need to free range whatever animals we raise and we need to severely cut back on how many of them we raise. We need to make more efficient use of farmed animal droppings for the express purpose of totally eliminating chemical fertilizers.

But if we do all that BEFORE we address the CO2 problem, and continue to burn off present estimates of global carbon reserves, the wildlife extinction will accelerate, not slow down.
WHY?

Figure 6: The Paleocene-Eocene boundary thermal maximum.

THIS was February of 2013:
Another link between CO2 and mass extinctions of species

In February 2013, CO2 levels had risen to near 396.80ppm at Mauna Loa Atmospheric Observatory, compared to 393.54ppm in February 2012. This rise - 3.26ppm per year - is at the highest rate yet recorded. Further measurements show CO2 is at near 400ppm of the atmosphere over the Arctic. At this rate the upper stability threshold of the Antarctic ice sheet, defined at about 500–600ppm CO2 would be reached later this century (although hysteresis of the ice sheets may slow down melting).

Our global carbon reserves - including coal, oil, oil shale, tar sands, gas and coal-seam gas - contain considerably more than 10,000 billion tonnes of carbon (see Figure 5). This amount of carbon, if released into the atmosphere, is capable of raising atmospheric CO2 levels to higher than 1000ppm. Such a rise in atmospheric radiative forcing will be similar to that of the Paleocene-Eocene boundary thermal maximum (PETM), which happened about 55 million years-ago (see Figures 1, 2 and 4).

Ashvin, please digest the following sentence about the 3.26ppm per year rate referenced above.

But the rate of rise surpasses those of this thermal maximum by about ten times.

Now please look at this graphic:
Mass extinctions due to rapidly escalating levels of CO2 are recorded since as long as 580 million years ago. As our anthropogenic global emissions of CO2 are rising, at a rate for which no precedence is known from the geological record with the exception of asteroid impacts, another wave of extinctions is unfolding.

Ashvin, the most important issue of our time is the existential threat we face from CO2 pollution. The other empathy deficit disordered activites humans are foolishly, greedily and stupidly pursuing need to be addressed. Those activities produce habit a destruction.

But CO2 is the elephant in the high extinctions rate room.

The MOST negatively impacted areas of our biosphere (i. e. THE TROPICS from land deforestation and desertification and ocean acidification plus heat  MORE than from atmospheric temperature increase) from CO2 pollution are PRECISELY where the our biosphere's BIODIVERSITY is concentrated.







The evidence is clear. That is, along with the increase in CO2 ppm, the annual RATE of rise of annual CO2 is increasing too.

The most important issue of our time is the existential threat we face from CO2 pollution. That is causing far more habitat destruction than all the other unsustainable human activities.

CO2 is the elephant in the high extinctions rate room. If the above has not convinced you of that, I fear hard experience starting around 2040 will.
« Last Edit: October 30, 2015, 08:56:20 pm by AGelbert »
He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Matt 10:37

 

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