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Looney Tuna

Feds, pressured by industry, lax in warning public about mercury in tuna The Wall Street Journal today continues its series on toxic chemicals and human health by taking a hard look at some fishy dealings concerning tuna and mercury. For years, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has known that canned tuna contains mercury. A […]

Comment on EPA’s Plan

EPA says race, income shouldn’t be environmental-justice factors

It may surprise some people to hear that the Bush administration’s EPA just drafted a strategic plan on environmental justice. Insidiously, and perhaps less surprisingly, advocates say, the move threatens to redefine that term into irrelevance. The agency’s new plan defines environmental justice as “the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of […]

The human and the sublime

While we're on the topic of wild spaces, there's a great article in the New York Times this morning. Even though the author, Edward Rothstein, did some of his exploring in a car, he captures the awe-inspiring beauty of nature in way that will wake you up faster than that cup of coffee.

Preserving wild spaces

There's been some discussion over at The Commons about the lesson that we should take from the Dr. Suess classic The Lorax. Full text of the book (no pictures, though) can be found here. The free-marketeer interpretation is that the demise of the Truffula trees results not from the greed of the Onceler nor the materialism of the society that gobbles up thneeds just as fast as they please. The reason the Truffula trees are all destroyed is that no one has property rights to them. They are part of the commons, and if the Onceler doesn't chop them, someone else will.

Stuff to read

Two interesting pieces up tonight from people who should be in bed.

Makower's got a long and pleasingly wonky post up on Environmental Strategies for Industrial Development, a new report from Alliance to Save Energy that discusses ways industry and government can work together to lower the cost of regulatory compliance. It's partly by simplifying regs and party through benchmarking " common air, water, and waste management functions" and sharing ways to improve them, thereby cutting waste and reducing the need for regs. Hott!

Meanwhile, Cascio hopes peak oil will be like the Y2K bug -- nope, not the way you're thinking. He says Y2K was a real problem that, thanks to shrill and apocalyptic warnings, got solved before it wreaked destruction. So here's to shrill and apocalyptic warnings!

Oh, and one more, from yesterday: An interview with Cory Doctorow (co-proprietor of BoingBoing and advocate for the Electronic Frontier Foundation), also on WC, about "copyfight" and the international struggle for reasonable intellectual property laws. Too many people think of copyright law as a niche concern -- something that only concerns filesharing teenagers -- but it is in fact enormously important. If we want poor countries to develop in a more humane and green way than we did, it's vital they be able to share what Doctorow calls "knowledge goods" -- science, practical techniques, information. Lots of good stuff in here.

Update [2005-8-1 23:21:33 by Dave Roberts]: Here's a layman's intro to copyfight.

Wolcott and me

There is no greater stylist of the English language writing on the World Wide Interwebs today than Vanity Fair's James Wolcott. So to be quoted by him is akin to having Thom Yorke stroll past you on the sidewalk, humming one of your tunes (or, for our older readers, the equivalent of Bruce Springsteen pulling you from the audience to dance awkwardly for a few moments in his video). I don't really go in for the fanboy thing (ok, not much), but if there's one thing I appreciate it is a good turn of phrase, and Wolcott cranks out three or four every time he sets fingers to keyboard, so consider this me screaming and throwing my bra onstage. Um, as it were.

Sadly, he quotes me as "Energy Bulletin," referring to this post, which was reprinted at EB. It all comes in the context of a post about Boy Scouts collapsing in the heat. Check it out.

No one knows much about Bush’s Asia-Pacific treaty, but some folks think it’s genius

I haven't commented yet on the "Asia-Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate" (APPCDC?), the new climate-focused tech-sharing agreement Bush signed with Australia, China, India, and South Korea. The details are still under wraps, so nobody knows very much about it. (Of course, that's not stopping people from weighing in; Jeff's got a nice wrap-up of reaction so far.) Frankly, I fear the details will just reinforce the cynicism that's encrusted itself like bitter eye boogers around my once starry, hopeful eyes ever since 9/11 Changed Everything©. Our own Amanda Griscom Little will be writing on the treaty this week; until then I choose to remain ignorant and preserve what remains of my faith in the human spirit.

One thing I can say: I'm fairly suspicious of any analysis that starts like this:

It must be very strange to be President Bush. A man of extraordinary vision and brilliance approaching to genius, he can't get anyone to notice. He is like a great painter or musician who is ahead of his time, and who unveils one masterpiece after another to a reception that, when not bored, is hostile.

Niger is experience famine because it’s people ‘buy (only) local’

According to an article on BBC News, huge flocks of red-beaked quelas have destroyed up to 70% of the crops in northern Nigeria. They have been driven there in a search for food from neighboring Niger, which has just experienced a drought and a plague of locusts. The poor people of Niger have been thrown into yet another famine and children are once again starving.

Highway bill passes the House

Both Gristmill and the nation's editorial boards have been abuzz about the recently passed energy bill, and rightly so. However, another piece of legislation found its way through the House today: the highway bill. Typically described as "pork-laden," the bill passed the House by a wide margin and contains $286.5 billion in pork spending. It's expected to pass the Senate as well.