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Small Amount of Radioactivity Found in Sample of Green Tea from Japan
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 16th, 2015
EcoWatch: Four years after the multiple explosions and melt-downs at Fukushima, it seems the scary stories have only just begun to surface.
Given that Japan’s authoritarian regime of Shinzo Abe has cracked down on the information flow from Fukushima with a repressive state secrets act, we cannot know for certain what’s happening at the site.
We do know that 300 tons of radioactive water have been pouring into the Pacific every day. And that spent fuel rods are littered around the site. Tokyo Electric...
Posted in Water Conservation 
Comments Off on Small Amount of Radioactivity Found in Sample of Green Tea from JapanLegendary Coal Miner Says We Must Stop the Insane Practice of Mountaintop Removal
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 16th, 2015
EcoWatch: With mountaintop removal mining on the ropes, as the last bank financiers ditch lending support amid new scientific research that demonstrates “solid evidence that dust collected from residential areas near mountaintop removal sites causes cancerous changes to human lung cells,” residents from across central Appalachia’s coal country are converging today on the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection headquarters in Charleston to demand an end to new permits.
A day of reckoning is...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Legendary Coal Miner Says We Must Stop the Insane Practice of Mountaintop Removal1,000 People Needed to End Mountaintop Removal
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 14th, 2015
EcoWatch: A reinvigorated “People’s Foot” movement to end mountaintop removal is ramping up its efforts next week, as the last vestiges of outside support begin to abandon the nation’s most egregious strip mining operations in central Appalachia.
“Mountaintop removal is on the ropes,” said Bob Kincaid, with the Appalachian Community Health Emergency campaign and board president of Coal River Mountain Watch in West Virginia, “but we need 1,000 people to join us in the streets and in our campaign as subscribing...
Can Climate Action Plans Combat Megadrought and Save Colorado River?
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 9th, 2015
EcoWatch: If a city’s water supply is threatened by climate change, should that city enact a strong climate action plan? I believe the answer is yes, but few cities throughout the Colorado River basin are moving forward aggressively to address climate change even though the threat is increasing every year. Two of the largest reservoirs in the U.S.—Lakes Mead and Powell along the Colorado River—continue to lose water and are now less than half full with no prediction that the trend will change direction. The...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Can Climate Action Plans Combat Megadrought and Save Colorado River?Are There More Oil and Gas Wells in LA Than Movie Stars?
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 6th, 2015
EcoWatch: The story of the rise and fall of Edward Doheny, the first oil baron of Southern California, would seem the archetype of a LA noir tale: A man rises from rags to riches and presents a veneer of respectability to the outside world, but behind closed doors lurks corruption, even violence. Elaborate stagecraft—Hollywood’s specialty—hides the machinery and political machinations that fuel what boosters like to call “progress.” A kind of prosperity veils danger. Here’s how the story goes:
In 1892 Doheny,...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Are There More Oil and Gas Wells in LA Than Movie Stars?Keystone XL Veto Override Fails in Senate
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on March 4th, 2015
EcoWatch: The U.S. Senate today attempted to override President Obama’s veto of legislation that would force approval of the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, but fell short with a vote of 62-37. To override the President’s veto it would have required 67 votes in the Senate. Next step is for the National Interest Determination process to complete its assessment and then the State Department will make its final recommendations to President Obama, most likely in the coming months.
“The definition of insanity...
Plastic Smog: Microplastics Invade Our Oceans
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on February 27th, 2015
EcoWatch: The idea that there are “patches” of trash in the oceans is a myth created 15 years ago that should be abandoned in favor of “plastic smog,” like massive clouds of microplastics that emanate out of the five subtropical gyres. My recent publication in the journal Plos One, estimates 269,000 tons of plastic from 5.25 trillion particles, but more alarming than that is it’s mostly microplastic (>92 percent in our study) and most of the plastic in the ocean is likely not on the sea surface.
Recent...
Keystone XL Bill Heads Obama Desk Today, Pipeline Opponents Urge Veto
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on February 24th, 2015
EcoWatch: Congress plans to send the Keystone XL pipeline bill to President Obama’s desk today. The president is “poised to reject” the GOP-backed legislation “with a swift veto,” according to The Hill.
“I would anticipate, as we’ve been saying for years, that the president will veto that legislation, and he will, so I would not anticipate a lot of drama or fanfare around it,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest told The Hill.
Republicans say a veto will not be the end. “The allure of appeasing environmental...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Keystone XL Bill Heads Obama Desk Today, Pipeline Opponents Urge VetoLeaked Document Shows Mounties View Anti-Oil Activists as Security Threat
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on February 19th, 2015
EcoWatch: Fascism is alive and well in Canada. What else would you expect from a government that sanctions the seal slaughter? Canada likes to think of itself as "good", but it is just as "good" as the US. Both nations place money above all else because their citizens don`t give a damn about anything but themselves.
Yet representatives from Canada’s broad environmental movement say the document is another example of the Harper government’s efforts to criminalize legitimate civil dissent such as peaceful...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Leaked Document Shows Mounties View Anti-Oil Activists as Security ThreatCan the Planet Sustain 7 Billion People Eating a Paleo Diet?
Posted by EcoWatch: None Given on February 18th, 2015
EcoWatch: After decades of obscurity, Paleo is now one of the fastest-growing diet trends. A 2013 survey found that one percent of Americans eat Paleo, which is based on the premise that our diets should be based on animals and plants, the way we ate when we were hunter-gatherers. Bestselling books like Grain Brain have redeemed meat’s nutritional profile and convinced many people that their high-carb diets promote unhealthy levels of brain and gut inflammation. I count myself among the throngs of Paleolistas...
Posted in Water Conservation Comments Off on Can the Planet Sustain 7 Billion People Eating a Paleo Diet?