Monthly Archive for December, 2010

Devastation From Above

Published on 12/30/2010 in contaminated water, groundwater, mining, oceans, oil, products, rivers, wastewater and waterborne diseases. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

"Eleven percent of the world's fresh water goes to make paper," Fair says. "How wild is that?" In a waste-treatment pond at a Louisiana mill that manufactures paper towels, circles form around aerators that churn the water to speed digestion of organic byproducts. Photo retrieved from: www.smithsonian.com

“J. Henry Fair was stumped. He couldn’t figure out how to photograph whatever might be hiding behind the walls and fences of industrial plants. Then, on a cross-country flight about 15 years ago, he looked out the window and saw a series of cooling towers poking through a low-lying fog. “Just get a plane!” he recalls thinking.

Today Fair, 51, is known in ecological as well as art circles for his strangely beautiful photographs of environmental degradation, most of them made out the open windows of small airplanes at about 1,000 feet. Fair has flown over oil refineries in Texas, paper mills in Ontario, ravaged West Virginia mountaintops, the oil-slicked Gulf of Mexico and a string of factories along the lower Mississippi River known as “Cancer Alley.” He is currently photographing coal ash disposal sites, many considered highly hazardous by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Fair, who lives in New York State, consults scientists to better understand the images in his viewfinder: vast cranberry red ponds of hazardous bauxite waste spewed by aluminum smelters; kelly green pits filled with byproducts, some radioactive, from the manufacture of fertilizer. But pollution never looked so good. “To make an image that stops people it has to be something that tickles that beauty perception and makes people appreciate the aesthetics,” says Fair, who specialized in portraiture before taking to the skies.

Read more: Smithsonian

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How South America’s Rainforests Are Being Sacrificed on the Altar of Energy

Published on 12/30/2010 in dams, greenwashing, hydropower, policy, privatization, products and wastewater. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Amazon Rainforest. Photo retrieved from: www.svbchemicals.com

“That estimate takes into account a 10-km strip that would be deforested along each of the roads that have to be built in order to install the transmission towers and power lines.

It does not consider further deforestation in areas already degraded by the construction of the Southern Interoceanic Highway, which will link the Amazon jungle state of Acre in Brazil with several Pacific port cities in Peru.

The study mentions a number of impacts for the Inambari and Araza river basins, such as the dams’ interruption of the migration of many species of fish upriver to their breeding grounds, which will in turn affect riverbank populations that depend on fish as a staple food.

Peru ranks fifth in the world in terms of diversity of fish species, with more than 1,000 species, around 600 of which can be found in the Madre de Dios river alone, the report says.”

Read more: AlterNet

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Jordan’s Disi Water Conveyance is On Track – but to Where?

Published on 12/28/2010 in climate change, drought, groundwater, policy, privatization, tap water, water diversions and water technology. 0 Comments

Photo retrieved from: www.greenprophet.com

“The pipeline will bring water from water from the ancient aquifer to the capital Amman was first begun in 2009 and has experienced construction delays, which were later denied , and also considering other projects including building a desalination plant near Aqaba . Jordan is also planning its own version of the Red – Dead Sea water conveyance project, in which Jordan plans to “go it alone” without waiting for neighboring Israel to take part.

The al-Disi aquifer, most of which lies under Saudi Arabia, is estimated to be 325 km long, and is said to be “locked” within non-porous sandstone rock and not subject to recharging by rainfall. It is largely unknown how much water the aquifer contains or its archeological history.

What is known is that the water in the al-Disi is not rechargeable and is quite old (ie. 20,000-30,000 years old). This means it was created during a period when water resources were more plentiful in the region; possibly as a result of last Great Ice Age.”

Read more: Green Prophet

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Environmentalists Deplore Schwarzenegger’s Corporate Turn

Published on 12/25/2010 in agriculture, groundwater and policy. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Photo retrieved from: www.latimes.com

“The Schwarzenegger administration also fast-tracked regulations to permit agribusiness’ use of the controversial chemical methyl iodide to treat soil in fields where strawberries and other crops grow.

The push came despite a finding from the Department of Pesticide Regulation that the chemical “could result in significant health risks for [farm] workers and the general population.” An independent panel of scientists confirmed that assessment, warning that methyl iodide could poison the air and water.

The administration defended the move by noting that companies using the chemical must establish strict buffer zones and ground water protections.

“This is the most evaluated pesticide in the department’s history,” said Lea Brooks, a spokeswoman for the Department of Pesticide Regulation. “These are the nation’s toughest restrictions.” She denied charges by several groups, including the Natural Resources Defense Council, that the public comment period was improperly shortened so the changes could be pushed through before Schwarzenegger leaves office.”

Read more: LA Times

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The Lost Lands of Takalar

Published on 12/25/2010 in climate change, erosion and oceans. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Under threat: A child walks on a beach of Laikang Bay, Mangara Bombang district, Takalar regency, South Sulawesi. Coastal erosion has become an alarming issue in the region. Photo retrieved from: www.thejakartapost.com

“The environment and investment office of Takalar regency recorded seven kilometers of its coast as seriously eroded, five kilometers as moderately damaged, and the remainder as slightly affected with a small part unaffected.

“Erosion in Takalar is getting worse,” said Alwy Rahman, the head of the environment and investment office of Takalar recently.

Apart from the coastal zone, settlements, roads and bridges as well as cemeteries have also been adversely affected.

The varying degrees of erosion have forced 400 families to relocate.

According to Alwy, unless promptly dealt with, the erosion is likely to have a worse impact.

“We need to build concrete embankments and breakwaters quickly. But sadly, we don’t have enough funds to do this,” he said.

Soil in Takalar is said to be eroding mainly because of human activity removing the area’s natural protection against waves.

People are removing mangroves on a large scale, fishing using explosives therefore destroying coral reefs which normally function as barriers to waves.”

Read more: The Jakarta Post

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How River Pollution is Robbing Kavadi of Birds

Published on 12/24/2010 in contaminated water and rivers. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Photo retrieved from: www.alokbhave.com

“During the late 1970s, Kavadi, a village off the Pune-Solapur highway, 3 km from Loni, with its pollution free river was just right for migratory birds. Ornithologists say it had the makings of a bird sanctuary. However, rising pollution in the Mula-Mutha that flows through the village has led to a fall in the number of birds coming to Kavadiwith each passing year.

Ornithologist Kiran Purandare said the effluents in the river was keeping birds away now. “Kavadi is visited by painted storks, black-headed ibis, ducks including the ruddy shelduck, which migrates from Ladakh, common teal, garganey teal and northern shoveller. Other birds like woolly necked storks, egrets and Indian river tern can also be spotted here,” he said.

What brings them to Kavadi is its habitat — cultivated fields interspersed with vegetable plantations, scrub lands and human habitation. “These attract diverse species of birds. For instance, the pied buschat or common stone chat (from the Himalayas), red-throated fly catcher (from Kashmir), and pipits and larks frequent the cultivated fields in Kavadi. In winter, one can easily spot as many as 60-70 species of birds here,” said Purandare. ”

Read more: The Times of India

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China’s Ability to Feed its People Questioned by UN Expert

Published on 12/24/2010 in agriculture, climate change, contaminated water, drought, erosion and privatization. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

Photo retrieved from: www.guardian.co.uk

“With memories still fresh of the famines that killed tens of millions of people in the early 1960s, the Chinese government has gone to great lengths to ensure the world’s biggest population has enough to eat, but its long-term self-sufficiency was questioned by UN special rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter.

“The shrinking of arable land and the massive land degradation threatens the ability of the country to maintain current levels of agricultural production, while the widening gap between rural and urban is an important challenge to the right to food of the Chinese population,” said De Schutter at the end of a trip to China.

He told the Guardian his main concern was the decline of soil quality in China because of excessive use of fertilisers, pollution and drought. He noted that 37% of the nation’s territory was degraded and 8.2m hectares (20.7m acres) of arable land has been lost since 1997 to cities, industrial parks, natural disasters and forestry programmes.”

Read more: Guardian

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Syria Launches Its First ‘Water-Scarcity Park’

Published on 12/23/2010 in agriculture, climate change, desertification, drought, hydropower, rainwater harvesting, rivers, solutions and outreach, water diversions, water shortage and water technology. 0 Comments Tags: , , .

Photo retrieved from: www.greenprophet.com

“Following five years of drought which has driven nearly half a million people away from drought-hit areas and put the country at risk of increasing desertification, Syria has inaugurated a water scarcity park to highlight the need to conserve dwindling water supplies.

Using drip irrigation techniques, the 1,000 square metre ‘water scarcity park’ will harvest rainwater and also use solar power to generate electricity to pump water for irrigation. Drip irrigation is a technique used to conserve water as draws water directly from it sources and takes it the plants through a network of pipes with small holes so that water waste is minimal.

The park which was opened by the country’s Vice-President Dr Najah Al-Attar, is located in Dummar, a suburb of Damascus and is planted with various drought-resistant flora. It is hoped that the park will be used as model for public and private parks and help rationalize the consumption of water and energy.

The water scarcity crisis in Syria has been blamed on a combination of poor water management, lack of rainfall and the over-extraction of water. In the past, Syria was comfortably supported by the Euphrates River in the top half of the country but the diversion of large amounts of water into agriculture and industrial sector means that the supplies are not sufficient to support the population. According to reports in The National, scientists reported that between 2002 and 2008, water availability dropped from 1200 cubic meters to 750 cubic meters per person in Syria.”

Read more: Green Prophet

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Predicting the World’s Next Water Pollution Disaster

Published on 12/23/2010 in contaminated water, dams, fracking, greenwashing, groundwater, hydropower, mining, oceans, oil, products, rivers, tap water, wastewater, waterborne diseases and world water supply. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , .

A worker samples water from a well at a coal bed methane drill site. Photo retrieved from: www.nationalgeographic.com

“Only a tiny fraction of the ore miners exhume contains gold, copper, lead, zinc, or the other metals they’re after. The rest is waste, or tailings, full of large quantities of metals and minerals ranging from benign to very toxic. These fine-grained wastes are often held in tailings ponds that can cover many square miles.

Unfortunately the dams holding tailing ponds aren’t always examples of high-level engineering and, in some countries, may be made by simply bulldozing the tailings themselves into an embankment, explains geologist Johnnie Moore, of the University of Montana.

“There is the potential for huge amounts of [toxic waste] to move into a river system whenever any of those things break, and in fact it does happen,” he said.

Last summer a discharge of acidic waste escaped from a Fujan province copper plant run by China’s largest gold producer, Zijin Mining Group Co. The accident poisoned enough Ting River fish to feed 70,000 people for a year and also contaminated their water supply, according to reports from the Reuters news agency. Two years earlier, runoff from a gold mine near Dadong contaminated the water supply for more than 200,000 people. Over the years, similar disasters have occurred in Spain, Peru, the Philippines, and elsewhere, and there are plenty of other sites in China that scientists have their eye on.

Other toxic processes that use mercury and cyanide to extract valuable minerals from rock create the potential for environmental disaster as well.”

Read more: National Geographic

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Why Is the EPA Sitting on Its Ash?

Published on 12/23/2010 in contaminated water, policy and rivers. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

Photo retrieved from: www.motherjones.com

“It has been two years since an earthen dike holding back 1.1 billion gallons of coal slurry ruptured, unleashing a tsunami of dark gray sludge from the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Kingston Fossil Plant in Harriman, Tennessee. The wave destroyed homes, surged into the yards of neighbors, and caused the nearby ponds and streams to overflow. More than 300 acres of land were covered in the stuff, and in the weeks after, the ash would travel as far as 30 miles downstream on the nearby Emory River. Locals refer to the “ash bergs” up to 40 feet tall that landed in their yards and floated down the river.

The environmental disaster for the first time raised the question of why coal-burning power plants are allowed to dump the fly ash waste—the fine, dust-like particles emitted when coal is burned to create power—into vast open pits. The ash, doused with water and left in these containment ponds for years, contains toxic elements like arsenic, mercury, and lead. But for decades, the disposal of the waste was left unregulated. Power plants produce more than 130 million tons of the ash each year, and while 43 percent of it gets recycled into products like cement and wallboard, much of the rest remains on site at coal-fired power plants around the country.”

Read more: Mother Jones

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