Your Opinion Matters

I would like to invite each of you to post your opinion on whether you regard population as an environmental problem and if so what would be your policy of choice to confront that challenge. (There will be mana from heaven for those that respond :-))

Is you is or is you ain't?

Oh how I wish that I can report on an event that is both ecologically friendly and yet meaningful at the same time. Unfortunately these events are so rare that I have no recollection of when the last such event took place.

We are all aware of how the whole world pretends to be concerned about climate change. It is accepted by everyone that global warming, leads to climate change and potentially catastrophic consequences for all of us all over the globe and it is equally accepted that the major cause for global warming is the increased concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. One would naturally expect that once the potential negative result of an event is clear to all and once practically everyone is in agreement about the major cause for that potential calamity then we would take meaningful action to stop the acts that lead to the inevitable catastrophe. Well let us review the record: The global Meteorological association has just released ( on Friday Nov 23, 2007) its most recent findings regarding carbon dioxide. Not surprisingly, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen again during 2006 to the historical high of over 386 ppm which is over 36 % above what the concentration used to be at the beginning of the industrial revolution. My only question ; with apologies to King Cole; Is you is or is you ain't (CO2 that is) the cause of climate change? If CO2 concentration is the cause then why , in the name of whatever you hold dear, aren't we doing anything about it? Could it be because we are not serious about climate change? You bet.

Our $ Share

"Nations that have grown rich in part by polluting without facing the costs of doing so must now repay their carbon debt to the developing world," said Andrew Pendleton, author of "Truly Inconvenient - tackling poverty and climate change at once."

According to an estimate done by a British economist developed countries need to spend about 1% of their current GDP on efforts to help contain Global warming. Given that the US GDP is estimated to be at over $14 Trillion then our fair annual share would be around $140 billion. Would we ever pay even a tenth of that some? Do pigs fly?

Another Gloomy Environmental Assessment

You are encouraged to take a look at a relatively exaustive analysis of the Global Environmental Outlook by visiting the site of UNEP and then clicking on GEO 4.

Sink, What Sink?

The original estimates about the expected level of Carbon dioxide concentration have been too high. Upon further investigations the anomaly was resolved. It turns out that the oceans and the forests do sequester about 50% of all the carbon dioxide that is emitted by human activity. That was the good news otherwise the anticipated rise in temperature would have been far greater that what it has been.
Now for the not so good news. Scientists at the University of Anglia have outfitted some ships with instruments that can measure the level of carbon dioxide that has been absorbed by the waters that they ply. The data supplied by these ships that have traveled the North Atlantic is totally unexpected. Actually if this preliminary finding proves to be accurate then it does not bode well for climate change.
The newly collected observations show that the North Atlantic is absorbing only half of the carbon dioxide that it used to absorb.That is a huge drop by any measure. If this proves to be accurate and if it turns out to be true for the other oceans then we have to revisit most of the projections that had assummed a carbon sink that is much larger than what the current data suggest that it is.

Nobel Peace Prize ups pressure for climate action

It is not clear whether Al Gore would have been as influential in spreading the case for the need to take action to control Global Warming had he been elected as a President of the United States. Actually, it would be safe to assume that he would not have had the time to work on "Inconvenient Truth" neither would his message been regarded as an objective assessment . In an ironic twist, it sure was good for Environmentalism and for humanity that the Supreme Court stopped the recounting of votes in Florida. The wonderful unforseen consequence of that act by the supremes is the awawarding of the Nobel peace prize to Mr. Gore and the IPCC .

This award has in effect broadened the definition of peacekeeping operations and it is hoped that the resulting awarness that it brings to the effort to contain Global Warming will play a major role in shaping an effective global policy in a few months from now in Bali.

Not everyone is rejoicing though. As it is to be expected the dissenters, such as Vaclav Klaus, the Czech President, were skeptical of the relationship between global warming and world peace. Obviously the Nobel Committee does not agree with the skeptics . They emphasized that rising sea levels, more floods, droughts and desertification will only lead to " increased danger of violent conflicts and wars".

Affluence

The common mainstream environmental wisdom seems to connect poverty with environmental scarcity and degradation. As you might have noticed our text book never tires of making this point.
Does it really make sense to make such assertions in a world where we sell production cars for a $1,500,000.00 a copy, luxury cell phones fetch $17,000.00, swiss made watches go for over $25,000.00 a piece, a designer sofa retails for $30,000.00, an Atlantic City suit costs $10,000.00 a night and to top it all the NYC trend of buying an apartment for $6,000,000.00 only to turn around and spend a few millions on gutting it and redecorating it. Are such activities eco friendly ? Is this the world that we aspire to create? In my book, affluence is the problem and so it cannot be the solution. But hey, the remodeled apartment has triple glazed windows.

Why Climate Change Can't be Stoped?

A short article that appeared as a web exclusive by Foreign Policy argues that we have done too little and that we are too late to stop climate change. Food for thought.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3980

Global Warming Revisited

The UN held a mini summit on Global warming early last week in an effort to galvanize interest in the new Kyoto agreement. The next major meeting to discuss the shape of the new Kyoto; the old one expires in 2012; will take place in Bali, Indonesia next December.
Meanwhile Washington invited the leaders and representatives of the major 16 Carbo emmitters to a meeting at the State Department last Thursday. The current US administration has changed its tone. It no longer denies Global Warming and is trying to portray itself as a leader on the issue. None of the countries; the 16 represent 80% of the global economy and 80% of carbon emissions; welcomed the US conversion because it did not go far enough and seemed to be less genuine that what it was portrayed to be. The US is still adamantly opposed to any mandates and wants to champion technology transfer provided others set up a fund to pay for it. Mr. Bush made it clear that he thinks that Global Warming must be taken seriously but apparently only if the voluntary targets do not interfer with economic growth.
One more time we want to have our cake and eat it too. But this time we were not able to influence anyone. All the countries voiced their dismay at the proposals and have promised to look past the current administration. But what if the new administration does not turn out to be that different? Do we have the right to put the welfare of the future generations in jeopardy?

The Pot Calling the Kettle Black !!

The Pot Calling the Kettle Black !!

Many of the most connected political operatives in the United States have reported on the topics that were discussed by President Bush and his Chinese counterpart President Hu during their summit early last year.

A consensus has emerged among these well connected journalists and opinion shapers that athe main topic that occupied these two leaders was that of energy. President Bush, the political leader of a nation that consumes over 20 million barrels of crude oil a day has expressed concern about the rising level of consumption of a nation that has over five times the US population and yet consumes less than one third the US total. Can anyone pull that with a straight face? Are we truly telling others that we see nothing wrong in consuming fifteen times what they do on a per capita basis and that it is their relatively smaller consumption that needs to be constrained so that we can go on building our large homes, driving our huge SUVs and maintaining our highly energy intensive life style? It does take lots of chutzpah to do that, doesn’t it?

The Green Monster

Whoever was it that said you cannot teach old dogs new tricks must have never known about the big bad WalMart that is trying to change its image into that of a Friendly Green Machine.
We all know about WalMart's efforts in selling organic produce but its latest effort is even more impressive. It has at least earned my personal stamp of approval :-)
A number of countries have embraced the CFL light bulbs much more widely than the US. Actually a few countries have even banned the sale of the old fashioned incandescent lightbulb. "Giving" the latest book by Bill Clinton estimates that if we were to replace every regular light bulb in the US by a new CFL then we would in effect eliminate the need of the electricity output from around eighty electric power plants. That is a lot of coal that will not have to be used.

So what is WalMart up to? They plan to sell 100's of millions of the CFL's in at least 3000 stores and they plan to do that by selling their own brand, produced by GE and by Phillips, at a 25% discount. I will be visiting my local WalMart today in order to pick up a dozen CFL's, what about you?

TANSTAAFL

"There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch" is one of the most fundamental and most enduring ideas in Economics. Interestingly enough the above expression expresses the same principle that ecologists consider to be paramount; everything is connected to everything else.

When would the "shallow" environmentalist, the world over, start applying the lessons of their discipline ?Don't we have the right to expect a policy designed to be environmentally friendly to live up to its billings or have we gotten soused to sloppy thinking that we have become enamored of faddish behaviour, superficial thinking and yes, even the willingness to deceive.

To understand that ethanol is not a solution to the energy crisis and that it should not be encouraged is a no-brainer. Studies have demonstrated clearly that the production of ethanol from corn in the US uses more energy than the energy that is produced as an output in the process. Add to that the evidence that a strong mixture of ethanol in the fuel appears to be corrosive and the obvious fact that there is no infrastructure to transport ethanol and distribute it across the land and it becomes rather clear that this so called solution is actually one way to aggravate the problem. But if we are to gloss over all of the above glaring shortcomings of ethanol production there is no excuse for not having seen that the rush to grow more subsidized corn by the farmers can only create a shortage of other crops whose production is replaced by corn. And sadly this is exactly what has happened. The projected wheat crop in the US is going to be smaller than expected and that, combined with an Australian draught , has resulted in a major increase in the price of wheat. The future contract hit today an all time high of over $9 per bushel. The price has more than doubled since April.
Ironically the poor nations will suffer the most as a result of our misguided "environmental" policies. The poor will have to deal with a greater incidence of malnutrition, we will have higher food prices, rich ethanol producers , corroded internal combustion engines and no relief from the energy shortage. Oh what tangled webs we weave when first we practice to deceive.

When Will We Act?

Signs of severe environmental degradation abound on both a local, regional and global scale. Air too dirty to breath, contaminated water sources, aquifers running dry, melting ice caps, increased frequency of flooding, more intense hurricanes... If the above signs of the times are not enough to make us aware of the severity of the environmental crisis all what we have to do is read the dire reports issued by the scientific community all over the world that warn us that business as usual is not an option. The latest such report was released only two days ago in Britain where scientists do not think that we will be able to contain the global warming to the targeted 2 degrees centigrade. Any increase above that is considered to be dangerous.

Yet we do not seem to be overly concerned. Why is that?

Human- Chimps speciation

New evidence released by the journal NATURE suggests a new theory to explain the gaps in the fossil records regarding the split between the humans and Chimps. According to this new hypothesis the final speciation; split between humans and Chimpanzees; is much more recent than what used to be commonly believed. It is now estimated that the split into two different species occurred less than 6.3 million years ago and might have been as recent as 5.4 million years ago.

It is commonly believed that the split from an original ancestor, into humans and Chimpanzees, took place 9 million years ago. This is still the belief. The fossil record, however, contained a large gap that went unexplained until this recent study of genomes.
What the scientists have concluded sounds bizarre but it is as of today the only possible explanation of the developments that can be seen in the genetic codes.

The Harvard and MIT study reiterated the belief that the split from a common ancestor started 9 million years ago and was completed 6.3 million years ago. But this is where the new revelations become interesting. Early humans must have been attracted to the Chimps and must have mated with them, which created new hybrid specie. Finally the two animals split totally around 5.3 million years ago because they just did not find each other to be physically appealing.

Scientific evidence does not only claim that humans and chimpanzees have common ancestors but that both have even mated with each other. Does such a trial and error process require an intelligent designer?

Can$$$$ buy you good Health?

A study conducted by a group of British and US researchers concluded that the typical white American is not as healthy as the white British in any of the seven areas investigated.

The study was done on a group of 55-64 years old and in order to isolate the race factor only whites were used. The Americans were almost twice as likely to have diabetes or cancer as their British counterparts and 50% more likely to develop a stroke or heart disease. Hypertension, heart attacks and lung disease were 25-30% more likely to occur in Americans rather than the British. What is astonishing is the fact that the Americans did not beat the British in any category despite the fact that the US outspends the UK on health care. What was even more astounding was the revelation that in most categories the British poor were healthier than the US rich; the poor Brits had fewer incidences of cancer, diabetes and hypertension than the wealthy Americans.

The explanation for the above unexpected results will require more detailed studies. The leading hypothesis by the researchers, however, centers on a lifestyle phenomenon called social isolation.

“We have many people working an enormous number of hours," says Lisa Berkman, a social epidemiologist with Harvard University. "But they also have no time to take care of themselves or their families, as well as maintain a certain kind of community or neighborhood or set of ties." If we would only remember the admonition that we do not live by bread alone!!!!!

The Pot Calling the Kettle Black !!

Many of the most connected political operatives in the United States have reported on many of the potential topics that were discussed by President Bush and his Chinese counterpart President Hu.

A consensus has emerged among these well connected journalists and opinion shapers that a major topic was that of energy. President Bush, the political leader of a nation that consumes over 20 million barrels of crude oil a day has expressed concern about the rising level of consumption of a nation that has over five times the US population and yet consumes less than one third the US total. Can anyone pull that with a straight face? Are we truly telling others that we see nothing wrong in consuming fifteen times what they do on a per capita basis and that it is their relatively smaller consumption that needs to be constrained so that we can go on building our large homes, driving our huge SUVs and maintaining our highly energy intensive life style? It does take lots of chutzpah to do that, doesn’t it?

Is It Too Late to Stop Global Warming?

A post regarding the issue of Global Warming has been added to Environmental Ramblings. You can get there by using the Environmental Ramblings link found on the right hand side area of this blog.

Oh The Webs We Weave...

“Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive”

The US government establishes a safety limit to the amount of mercury that children can be subjected to. That measure in itself is a good public health policy. These standards formed the basis of placing limits on the amounts of fish that are to be consumed when caught in polluted rivers and lakes. Unfortunately when pharmaceutical companies decided that they need to add a preservative, thimerosal, to children vaccines that are mercury based the government looked the other way.

No one has shown conclusively that the thimerosal causes Autism, yet. There is, however, a preponderance of evidence that Autism in the US has exploded with the beginning of the use of the mercury based preservative in vaccines. The amounts injected in each child are above the safety standards set by the US government.

Autism is currently occurring in one out of each 166 births in the US. It is a developmental disability that makes it difficult for autistic to communicate verbally or to interact socially. The cost is huge in human and dollar terms. The CDC has refused to ban the use of thimerosal on the grounds that there is “no evidence” of a causal link between the preservative and autism but they immediately add that no evidence of harm does not mean that it is safe!!!!

Sure let us use the children as guinea pigs because we are not sure that there is an evidence of harm and let us not remove heavy metal from flu vaccines because that might open big pharma to liability suits. What ever happened to the precautionary principal?

Homo Sapiens Sapiens vs Chimps

It’s official. Many have speculated that the DNA of humans and that of Chimpanzees are very similar. Now that both DNA sequences have been completed the factual evidence proves that all these theories were absolutely on the money. The DNA sequencing of humans and that of Chimps are 98% the same. What accounts for the major difference in our cognitive abilities is explained by the 2% difference.

The comparative studies have already started. A surprising preliminary conclusion is that the difference in the structure of the brain is minimal and cannot explain the rather substantial difference between the two primates. Further studies will reveal the area where we differ the most and whether any “genetic” engineering could benefit either of the two species.
The promise that has accompanied DNA sequencing as an answer to many of the questions about treatments of various diseases and even evolution has diminished .One reason for the current pessimism is what the courts have wrought. They have awarded patents on 20% of the human genes to various commercial enterprises. A product of nature, a gene, is now the private property of a corporate entity which can demand a huge payment for the use of a gene that it had nothing to do with its creation in the first place. But that is the law of the land until now. The Supreme Court is being asked to review the intellectual property rights tomorrow in a case that will have far reaching implications on
patenting genes and ideas. Will we ever stop this process of commodification?

Inflation

Big Bang has not been definitively confirmed yet but we have moved one step closer towards that confirmation. A NASA satellite, Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe, has sent new data to suggest that the universe, 13.7 billion years old, did experience a rapid inflation in the first one trillionth of a second. It was during these first few moments that the universe ”underwent a violent growth spurt, ballooning from submicroscopic to astronomical size in the blink of an eye”.

This should help to dispel the literalist interpreters of the story of biblical creation. Maybe, after all, this world was not created for us but that we are off this world, we evolved from. Lynn White was right all along, it is the Judeo-Christian story that lies at the root cause of ecological deprivations.