Uncategorized

Organophos-fate

To the dismay of pesticide-makers, a federal judge on Wednesday approved a settlement between enviros and the U.S. EPA that will speed up a review of the safety of pesticides in the food supply. The agency now has until next August to assess the risks of 39 commonly used organophosphates, a class of highly toxic […]

Hello, Newmont!

Hundreds of demonstrators blocked a major highway in northern Peru this week, demanding that the largest gold mine in Latin America be shut down because it was contaminating local water supplies with mercury. Peru’s energy and mines minister, Jaime Quijandria, said it was “simply and totally impossible” for the water to have been contaminated by […]

Chilly Con Carnage

As an alternative to traditional funerals, Swedish ecologist Susanne Wiigh-Masak is recommending a greener way to go — freeze-dried cadavers that work well as fertilizer. She recommends plunging dead bodies into liquid nitrogen, blasting them with ultrasound waves, and then turning them into dust with the tap of a hammer. The remains would then be […]

Catch a Poacher By the Toe

f tigers at the Panna Tiger Reserve in India has more than doubled, and enviros are calling on the government to expand the reserve’s successful conservation practices to other areas. The Panna population has grown from two to three tigers per 40 square miles to seven to eight tigers — a number high enough for […]

Ma-hog-any

Loggers are illegally cutting the mahogany forests of the Kayapo Indians in the Amazon, according to evidence presented yesterday to the Brazilian government by Greenpeace. Most mahogany logging was banned in Brazil in 1996, and logging of any kind is not permitted on Indian lands. Of the 13 companies that hold permits for sustainable mahogany […]

Truck Start

The U.S. Energy Department this week lifted a moratorium on the shipment of low-level nuclear waste that was imposed on the day of the terrorist attacks. The waste is usually transported along highways by truck to storage sites like the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico. A spokesperson for the department, Joe Davis, wouldn’t […]

NMFS-o-maniacs

The U.S. National Marine Fisheries Service has been hurting salmon recovery more than it has been helping it, according to a scathing draft report completed in August 2000 but not made public until Monday. Officials from Okanogan County, Wash., released copies of the document after it had been leaked to them. The report by the […]

Life in the Fast Lane

After more than a week of fasting to protest the giant Sardar Sarovar hydroelectric dam being built by the Indian government, environmental activist Medha Patkar has been told by a doctor that she is weak and should go to the hospital. Patkar and six others began their hunger strikes on 17 Sep., demanding that the […]

Dry, the Beloved Country

Global warming could cause big changes in South Africa in the next 50 years, including the loss of many plant species, less rainfall, and an increase in wildfires, according to a report released by the South African branch of the World Wildlife Fund. One of the report’s authors, William Bond of the University of Cape […]

Zinc About What You're Trying to Do to Me

A proposed zinc and copper mine in northern Wisconsin may have run into trouble last Friday when the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Sokaogon Chippewa have the right to regulate water quality on their reservation downstream from the mine site. The court rejected arguments by Wisconsin that it alone had the […]