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Bad news for the Amazon as Brazil backs out of hosting UN climate talks

by Gabriele0723 Posted on November 28, 2018

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Brazil was set to be the host country for COP25, next year’s crucial United Nation talks to address climate change, but just two months after offering to do so, the country’s officials have reversed their stance.

Brazilian leaders communicated the decision on Monday to Patrícia Espinosa, executive secretary of the UN Convention on Climate Change, just days before the start of COP24, this year’s annual climate conference being held in Katowice, Poland. The Brazilian government blames the change on budget constraints and the ongoing presidential transition process. But others are interpreting the move as yet another sign of President-elect Jair Bolsonaro’s impending war on the environment.

“This decision is not surprising considering it comes from a leader with proven skepticism towards the reality of climate change, and open animosity towards those working to preserve our climate,” Christian Poirier, program director at Amazon Watch, told Grist. Poirier also says he doesn’t buy Brazil’s budget excuse for reversing on hosting the conference. “It is clear that Mr. Bolsonaro’s reactionary political agenda was the decisive factor in this decision.”

Bolsonaro confirmed that he participated in the decision, saying “I recommended to our future minister that we avoid the realization of this event here in Brazil.”

(The United Nations did not immediately reply to Grist’s request for comment.)

Before Bolsonaro’s election, the country seemed eager to host the next round of international climate talks. According to Brazilian news site O Globo, the foreign ministry had said Brazil’s offer reflected “the consensus of Brazilian society on the importance and the urgency of actions that contribute to the fight against climate change.”

But in some ways, the current reversal comes as no surprise. During his campaign, Bolsonaro (a.k.a. The Trump of the Tropics) vowed to jettison from the Paris Climate Agreement — though he’s since backtracked from that promise. Still, he’s been steadfast in his desire to open up the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, to mining, farming and dam building. He’s said he wants to open up the country’s existing indigenous reserves to commercial exploitation. And earlier this month, he chose a new foreign minister that has said he believes climate change is a Marxist plot to help China.

A recent report issued by the Brazilian government found the Amazon has reached its highest levels of deforestation in a decade, thanks to illegal logging and the expansion of agriculture in the area. And there are major concerns that Bolsonaro’s lax environmental policies could push the Amazon past its tipping point as one of the world’s most important carbon sinks.

Brazil withdrawing its offer to host COP25 also carries symbolic weight when you consider the country is the birthplace of global climate talks. The milestone Rio Earth Summit of 1992 set the green agenda for decades to come.

“The image of Brazil is at risk,” said Carlos Rittl, executive secretary of the Brazilian Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental non-governmental organizations, in an interview with the New York Times. “Climate and the environment are the only issues where Brazil is a leader in global terms. We are not leaders in world trade, we are not leaders in a geopolitical sense on security issues. But on climate and environment we are leaders, and we are giving that up.”

The South American country’s decision has left the United Nations scrambling to find a new site for the summit. A new venue for the summit has not yet been determined.

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Bad news for the Amazon as Brazil backs out of hosting UN climate talks

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Bad news for the Amazon as Brazil backs out of hosting U.N. climate talks

by RaquelBeauregar Posted on November 28, 2018

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Brazil was set to be the host country for COP 25, next year’s crucial United Nation talks to address climate change, but just two months after offering to do so, the country’s officials have reversed their stance.

Brazilian leaders communicated the decision on Monday to Patrícia Espinosa, executive secretary of the U.N. Convention on Climate Change, just days before the start of COP 24, this year’s annual climate conference being held in Katowice, Poland. The Brazilian government blames the change on budget constraints and the ongoing presidential transition process. But others are interpreting the move as yet another sign of President-elect Jair Bolsonaro’s impending war on the environment.

“This decision is not surprising considering it comes from a leader with proven skepticism towards the reality of climate change, and open animosity towards those working to preserve our climate,” Christian Poirier, program director at Amazon Watch, told Grist. Poirier also says he doesn’t buy Brazil’s budget excuse for reversing on hosting the conference. “It is clear that Mr. Bolsonaro’s reactionary political agenda was the decisive factor in this decision.”

Bolsonaro confirmed that he participated in the decision, saying “I recommended to our future minister that we avoid the realization of this event here in Brazil.”

(The United Nations did not immediately reply to Grist’s request for comment.)

Before Bolsonaro’s election, the country seemed eager to host the next round of international climate talks. According to Brazilian news site O Globo, the foreign ministry had said Brazil’s offer reflected “the consensus of Brazilian society on the importance and the urgency of actions that contribute to the fight against climate change.”

But in some ways, the current reversal comes as no surprise. During his campaign, Bolsonaro (a.k.a. The Trump of the Tropics) vowed to jettison from the Paris Climate Agreement — though he’s since backtracked from that promise. Still, he’s been steadfast in his desire to open up the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, to mining, farming, and dam building. He’s said he wants to open up the country’s existing indigenous reserves to commercial exploitation. And earlier this month, he chose a new foreign minister that has said he believes climate change is a Marxist plot to help China.

A recent report issued by the Brazilian government found the Amazon has reached its highest levels of deforestation in a decade, thanks to illegal logging and the expansion of agriculture in the area. And there are major concerns that Bolsonaro’s lax environmental policies could push the Amazon past its tipping point as one of the world’s most important carbon sinks.

Brazil withdrawing its offer to host COP 25 also carries symbolic weight when you consider the country is the birthplace of global climate talks. The milestone Rio Earth Summit of 1992 set the green agenda for decades to come.

“The image of Brazil is at risk,” said Carlos Rittl, executive secretary of the Brazilian Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental non-governmental organizations, in an interview with the New York Times. “Climate and the environment are the only issues where Brazil is a leader in global terms. We are not leaders in world trade, we are not leaders in a geopolitical sense on security issues. But on climate and environment we are leaders, and we are giving that up.”

The South American country’s decision has left the United Nations scrambling to find a new site for the summit. A new venue for the summit has not yet been determined.

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Bad news for the Amazon as Brazil backs out of hosting U.N. climate talks

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The future of food: droughts, wrecked crops, and empty plates

by CarinaAslatt Posted on November 28, 2018

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More droughts. More punishingly hot days killing farm workers and livestock. More allergen-spewing weeds. More crop-wrecking storms. And ultimately, more hunger.

According to the recently released National Climate Assessment, global warming is already making farming in the United States more difficult, and it’s likely to get worse. A steep decline in U.S. harvests would spur a worldwide crisis, because grains, oils, and meat from the United States ship to every continent. It would increase pressure to clear rainforests around the equator and the boreal forests of Canada and Russia to grow food. Falling yields would also drive up food prices, making it harder for the poor to afford meals.

“Food security, which is already a challenge across the globe, is likely to become an even greater challenge,” the report’s authors wrote.

The short-term outlook doesn’t look so scary. Climate change means a longer growing season, and conditions might actually improve in places like the Dakotas, where cold weather currently limits farming. Warming should also boost wheat and barley harvests. But rising temperatures and CO2 concentrations will also “enable ragweed and other plants to produce allergenic pollen in larger quantities,” for more months out of the year. And in the long term, harvests of all food crops, including wheat, are expected to decline unless farmers take unprecedented steps to adapt.

Radical adaptation could improve harvests and help solve the larger climate problem. Crops can suck carbon dioxide out of the air and store it in the soil. The report notes that “agriculture is one of the few sectors with the potential for significant increases in carbon sequestration.”

What would radical adaptation look like? The corn belt might move north from Kansas to Saskatchewan with the weather. Farmers could synch planting times and fertilizer application with precise weather forecasts. Governments might pay farmers for locking up carbon in their fields instead of maximizing profits. They could also provide the funding necessary for scientists to breed climate-adapted crops and animals.

In short, there are plenty of ways that agriculture can provide hope in place of worry. But without action, there’s going to be misery in farm country, according to the report. By 2050, climate change could shrink Midwestern harvests all the way down to the size they were during the farm crisis of the 1980s, when a surge of foreclosures led many farmers to take their lives. And with our global food market, misery in farm country would mean misery around the world.

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The future of food: droughts, wrecked crops, and empty plates

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Micro-Organisms and Biotechnology – Birchfield Interactive

by Myrna Posted on November 28, 2018

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Micro-Organisms and Biotechnology

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This textbook uses stunning 3D animation with voice-over, video, imagery and interactive activities to ensure effective learning for this topic. Superb for independent learning, covering the following topics areas: Classes of Microbes; Microbes and Disease; Defense Against Microbes; Microbes and Food Production; Other Applications of Biotechnology, and Famous Microbial Discoveries.

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Micro-Organisms and Biotechnology – Birchfield Interactive

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Here’s what everyone gets wrong about the climate report

by KashaDljvkevnt Posted on November 27, 2018

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When reporters combed through the recently released National Climate Assessment, searching for news, they flagged the potential damage to the U.S. economy. Climate change could “knock as much as 10 percent off the size of the American economy by century’s end,” said a headline in the New York Times, and other outlets picked up the claim. When a reporter asked President Donald Trump about climate change devastating the economy, he responded, “I don’t believe it.”

The thing is, Trump’s statement is worth a second look. (Crazy, I know). That 10 percent projection comes from an outlier data point on a graph in the report. It’s what happens if we fail to reduce emissions at all, everything else also goes wrong, and temperatures rise 15 degrees Fahrenheit. It’s the worst-case scenario. A more reasonable person might be excused for saying he doesn’t believe the worst-case scenario will come to pass.

That said, even if you don’t focus on the 10 percent blow to gross domestic product — the rightmost point below — the rest of the graph suggests that climate change will almost certainly make the country poorer by 2100, especially if we fail to reduce emissions.

And it could be worse. Marshall Burke, a Stanford scientist, has published estimates where climate change shrinks the U.S. by more than 20 percent by 2100. Unmitigated climate change could squeeze the economy down between 1 and 20 percent by 2100, compared to what it would have been without warming. It’s all within the realm of possibility.

Why the huge range in these projections? Because there are huge unknowns, said Burke. “If you are looking at the historical record about how temperature affects agricultural production, for instance, there’s noise in the data, there’s sampling error, there’s a lot of uncertainty. And then there’s also a lot of uncertainty in how much warming we are going to see.”

These projections also mask the likely pain of economic contraction by lumping it all together into one number, said Gary Yohe, an economist at Wesleyan who reviewed the report for the National Academy of Science. In fact, people living in the Southeast are likely to get poorer while people in the North may actually benefit.

Solomon Hsian et al.

The point is to avoid fixating on any particular number, like 10 percent, Yohe said. “I’m afraid that the report will be dismissed, not because it’s 2 percent, or 10 percent but because 2100 seems really far away. Who cares? How do we refocus back to something people will understand? People are looking out their windows and seeing climate change. People look at their TVs and see California burning. These aren’t projections or estimates, they are observable facts.”

So what should we focus on? Let’s look at what the report actually says: Unless we really get our act together “climate change is projected to impose substantial damages to the U.S. economy, human, health, and the environment.”

And you don’t need to wait for the projections to come true. The report, and Grist, have documented dozens of ways in which climate change is already causing financial distress, right now. In the Southeast residents in 60 percent of cities are already paying for more air conditioning as heat waves increase, and “high tide flooding already poses daily risks to businesses, neighborhoods, infrastructure, transportation, and ecosystems in the region.” In the West, a 2006 heat wave caused some “600 deaths, 16,000 emergency room visits, 1,100 hospitalizations in California, and economic costs of $5.4 billion.” In Oklahoma and Texas, flooding “caused an estimated $2.6 billion in damage in 2015.” Last year, climate-related disasters cost the United States over $300 billion. The report predicts the bill will keep rising.

We can argue about whether climate change will someday “devastate the economy,” but there’s no arguing with the fact that we are already spending heaps of money on crap that we might have avoided.

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Here’s what everyone gets wrong about the climate report

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1,656 pages too long? Climate report coauthor Katharine Hayhoe has 3 takeaways.

by ReynaMarie942 Posted on November 27, 2018

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The 1,656-page National Climate Assessment can feel overwhelming if not broken up into actionable-sized pieces — not unlike climate change itself. Thankfully, report coauthor Katharine Hayhoe offered up some key takeaways in a webinar with the nonprofit news organization Climate Central on Monday. Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist and political science professor at Texas Tech University, focused her presentation on a core message: Climate change is impacting everyone now.

“The myth that the science isn’t real, or that it’s something up for debate, is not the most dangerous myth that the largest number of people have bought into,” Hayhoe said. “There’s a belief that is just as pernicious: that global warming does not matter to me.”

To change this mindset, Hayhoe recommended shifting the narrative away from polar bears in the melting Arctic to how climate change is shaping people’s lives today, from wildfires in California to severe flooding in New York.

The new report offers the most up-to-date assessment of how climate change is affecting the United States. As Hayhoe said, it tackles “the myth that climate change is happening to people far away.” Three of her takeaways:

1. “There are already climate refugees in the United States.”

Louisiana’s Isle de Jean Charles, home to members of the Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw tribe, has been swallowed by rising tides. In 1955 the island was 22,000 acres; today it’s only 320. Last year, state officials announced that the tribal nation would be evacuated to higher grounds.

However, many other indigenous communities face significant barriers to receiving relocation funding, as the report details. Slow-onset disasters like coastal erosion and melting permafrost deeply effect communities over time, but they often don’t qualify for relocation funding. The report highlights the need for more community-driven relocation plans.

2. “Hurricanes are getting stronger, bigger, and slower, meaning they can sit over us for longer.”

If you’ve noticed hurricanes getting worse in recent years, it’s not your imagination. Climate change is bringing wetter and more intense hurricanes to the United States. For example, one recent study showed that climate change made Hurricane Florence 50 percent worse. The storm dumped enough water to fill the Chesapeake Bay.

3. “Climate change hits us in the Achilles’ heel.”

Peering into a climate-changed future is a bit like looking into a fun-house mirror where all of your worst features are accentuated. Texas, for example, is susceptible to a host of climate hazards, from heatwaves to hurricanes. It’s experienced more costly weather disasters than any other state. Climate change will only boost these extremes, bringing even more drought, flooding, and high temperatures.

You may have heard that everything’s bigger in Texas. That’s certainly true of climate change.

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1,656 pages too long? Climate report coauthor Katharine Hayhoe has 3 takeaways.

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It’s not the economy, stupid. Here’s why focusing on money misses the big climate picture.

by LemuelVargas25 Posted on November 27, 2018

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If you’ve heard anything about last week’s huge White House climate report, it might be that climate change could dent the economy up to 10 percent by 2100 — more than twice the impact of the Great Recession.

However, that number is a strange one to highlight. Yes, climate change hurts the economy — the hurricanes of the past two years alone have caused nearly half a trillion dollars of damages — but projecting that forward 80 years into the future is awash with unnecessary uncertainty. It’s a number gleaned from a graph buried deep in the assessment. The real takeaway is that climate change is already hurting people, today.

And as the years roll by, those impacts will get exponentially worse. In an era where the U.N.’s climate body says we only have 12 years left to complete the process of transitioning to a society that’s rapidly cutting carbon emissions, all the attention on far-off economic risks drastically understates the urgency of the climate fight.

Money just isn’t the appropriate frame when we’re talking about the planet. Climate change is a special problem that traditional economic analyses aren’t built to handle. The idea of eternal economic growth is fundamentally flawed on a finite planet, and there is substantial evidence that these economic costs will be borne disproportionately by lower-income countries. There’s no dollar figure that anyone can attach to a civilization’s collapse.

In addition to the widely covered economic risks, there were scads of human-centered impacts listed in Friday’s report: Unchecked climate change will displace hundreds of millions of people in the next 30 years, swamping coastal cities, drying up farmland around the world, burning cities to the ground, and kickstarting a public health crisis inflicting everything from infectious disease outbreaks to suffocating air pollution to worsening mental health.

This process is already in motion. Those of us who talk about climate change for a living should be focusing our dialogue on the immediate danger of climate change in human terms, not making it even more abstract and distant than it already seemingly is.

If an asteroid was going to hit the Earth in 2030, we wouldn’t be justifying the cost of the space mission to blast it out of the sky. We’d be repurposing factories, inventing entire new industries, and steering the global economy toward solving the problem as quickly and as effectively as we can — no matter the cost. Climate change is that looming asteroid, except what we’re doing right now is basically ignoring it, and in the process actually making the problem much, much worse and much harder to solve.

Understandably, Americans’ views on climate change are sharply polarized and have become even more so during the Trump era. In that polarized environment, dry economic analysis doesn’t seem like enough to matter. It’s the human stories that give people visceral moral clarity and firmly establish contentious issues as important enough for a shift in society.

There’s proof of this: In the aftermath of every recent climate disaster Google searches for climate change spike, heartbreaking images of survivors lead national news coverage, and my own Twitter account is flooded with messages from readers asking what they can do to help.

If we are going to take heroic action on climate change in the next decade, it will be because of an overwhelming outrage that our fellow citizens are literally being burned alive by record-breaking fires — not a potential decline in GDP in 2100. In order for people to feel the true urgency of climate change, we’re going to have to talk a lot more about the people it’s already hurting.

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It’s not the economy, stupid. Here’s why focusing on money misses the big climate picture.

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Trump doesn’t ‘believe’ his own administration’s climate report

by Sheree9799 Posted on November 27, 2018

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President Trump has read “some” of the Fourth National Climate Assessment — a comprehensive report released by his own administration that looks at the effects of climate change on the U.S. — and he says he doesn’t “believe it.” As in he can’t believe how bad the impacts are going to be? No, he simply doesn’t believe it.

Putting our differences aside for a second, this is actually kind of a baller move. Not only did Trump move up the date of the report’s release from December to the day after Thanksgiving (climate change vs. Black Friday mall sale stupor, anyone?) he made zero apologies about choosing to live in his own version of reality. Life’s a beach when you choose not to believe in inconvenient things! Check it out: You tell me I have to go into work the Monday after Thanksgiving? I don’t believe it. They did surgery on a grape? I don’t believe it.

The Commander in Chief didn’t give us many more details (like, you know, why), but the gist of the situation is that he thinks the climate assessment is a bunch of baloney. (Let the record again show that the report was composed by his own administration.) And it wasn’t even the only climate report his administration released on November 23. Another report, this one from the U.S. Geological Survey, found that nearly a quarter of the country’s carbon emissions come from fossil fuels produced on federal lands.

Here’s what Trump did say:

Did he … did he literally shrug? Regardless of how blasé Trump was about a report that basically portends widespread chaos, destruction, and economic distress for the country, his reaction is pretty damn believable. The man has spent a good portion of his tenure as president dismantling what’s left of United States climate policy:

He wants to replace Obama’s landmark Clean Power Plan with a “Dirty Power Plan” that seeks to prop up the dying coal industry.
His administration announced plans in August to freeze fuel-efficiency standards for cars and trucks for the next eight years, despite findings that those regulations would have reduced emissions and saved lives.
He rolled back an Obama-era rule that curtailed methane leaks on public lands, calling it “unnecessarily burdensome on the private sector.” Methane, by the way, is in the short term many times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.

Those are just three examples of the Trump administration’s climate policies! There are many more. And as much as I would hope that this climate report or this one or this one might change his mind, at this point, it looks unlikely.

If President Trump believed some of his other rhetoric, then he might see that making America great requires protecting the regions now facing imminent and catastrophic climate change. But alas, the America Trump wants isn’t “America the Beautiful,” it’s America with the most beautiful, “clean” coal. Those spacious skies and amber waves of grain might not look so pretty after 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming.

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How Can You Protect Yourself from Electromagnetic Radiation?

by Emelia6737 Posted on November 26, 2018

Research has shown that electromagnetic radiation can pose various health risks, such as an increased risk of cancer, miscarriage?and depression. And we?re surrounded by electromagnetic radiation on a daily basis.

Electromagnetic radiation refers to energy produced from a source, such as light from the sun, microwaves from an oven, or your cell phone?s signal.

You?re likely exposed to some form of electromagnetic radiation almost constantly, but you can still do a lot to protect yourself from any potentially negative effects. Let?s take a closer look at this issue.

WHAT IS ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION?

Electromagnetic radiation is a type of energy that travels and spreads out as it moves. It?s composed of a stream of particles called photons that move in wave-like patterns at the speed of light. Each photon has a certain amount of energy, but no physical mass.

The photons of radio waves are fairly low-energy and move in long wavelengths, which puts them at the low end of the electromagnetic spectrum. As you move up the spectrum, microwaves have more energy, then visible and ultraviolet light from the sun, and x-rays and gamma rays have the highest amounts of energy.

Electromagnetic radiation is classified into two different types:

Ionizing radiation ? includes mid- to high-frequency types of radiation, such as ultraviolet radiation, x-rays and gamma rays. Ionizing radiation has enough energy that it can remove electrons from atoms and molecules of air, water and living tissue as it passes through them.
Non-ionizing radiation ? includes low- to mid-frequency types of radiation, such as radio waves, microwaves and cell phone signals. These are not able to remove electrons from atoms or molecules, but they are strong enough to heat up substances and are proven to have a biological effect on human cells.

HOW CAN ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION HARM YOUR HEALTH?

It?s well-established that prolonged exposure to ionizing electromagnetic radiation can cause cellular changes that can lead to health risks such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, radiation sickness and genetic damage.

Because non-ionizing radiation is weaker than ionizing radiation, its effects tend to take place over longer periods. But it can still be just as damaging after many years of exposure.

A large volume of research over the past three decades has linked non-ionizing radiation to an increased risk of developing certain cancers, Alzheimer?s disease, immune system dysfunction and free radical damage to DNA.

Even the World Health Organization has stated that technology that emits low-level electromagnetic fields (EMFs), such as cell phones, ?is too recent to rule out possible long-term effects?.

In their publication Establishing a Dialogue on Risks from Electromagnetic Fields, the WHO goes on to say that, ?Given the widespread use of technology, the degree of scientific uncertainly, and the levels of public apprehension, rigorous scientific studies [of EMFs] and clear communication with the public are needed.?

WAYS TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION

1. Keep Your Distance

Electromagnetic radiation is strongest at its source. For example, cell phones, microwave ovens, baby monitors, smart meters and Wi-Fi modems all actively create and emit electromagnetic radiation. So, the farther away you are from these active sources, the less radiation you?ll receive.

Try some of these suggestions for keeping your electronic devices at a distance:

Hold your cell phone or cordless phone away from your head when talking. Most cell phone manuals state that you should keep your phone at least 15 millimeters (5/8 inch) away from your head when using it. Also, use speakerphone or text when you can.
Avoid putting your laptop on your lap. Try to use a secondary keyboard and mouse to give yourself some distance.
Keep your modem away from your living spaces. When possible, have your modem installed in the least-travelled corner of your home.
Stand back from your microwave when it?s operating. Some microwaves can leak a small amount of radiation when they?re on, so it?s best to give them some space until your food is done.

2. Get Wired

Wireless signals provide a constant source of electromagnetic radiation, so try using wired devices as much as possible. Yes, using wires is annoying. But if you?re on your devices for many hours a day, it will significantly cut down your exposure to electromagnetic fields.

Try using a wired headset when talking on your cell phone, using an ethernet cable for your computer, or wired headphones for your MP3 player.

3. Watch Your Time

More time spent around electronic equipment will mean more exposure to electromagnetic radiation. Working around electronics is hard to avoid, but consider some unplugged activities in your free time.

Instead of watching a video on your computer or television, try going for a walk or getting together with friends instead. Chances are you?ll have more fun than watching that video anyway.

4. Unplug

Even when you?re not using many electronic devices, they?re still producing electromagnetic radiation. Wi-Fi modems emit signals continuously, and even computers will still have a weak electromagnetic field around them when they?re in ?sleep? mode.

Get in the habit of turning your modem off at night when possible. Also try having as many of your electronic devices on power bars that you can switch off when they?re not in use. This will also help you conserve energy and save money on your power bills.

5. Remove Electronics from Your Bedroom

You spend a lot of time in your bedroom, so keeping it as clear as possible from electronics will greatly reduce your exposure. Electromagnetic radiation is also shown to disrupt melatonin and sleep, which makes it especially important to keep it out of your sleeping space.

Remove any unnecessary wireless devices, unplug any screens for the night and above all, don?t take your cell phone to bed with you.

6. Stay Healthy

It?s known that electromagnetic radiation causes oxidative stress on your cells and increases free radical concentrations in your body. Under normal circumstances, your body should be able to repair this damage.

But, if your health is compromised, your body won?t be able to deal with the effects of prolonged electromagnetic radiation exposure. Over time, this oxidative stress can take a toll on your health.

Maintaining your health and eating a diet rich in antioxidants and nutrients will support your body and naturally protect against any potential damage from electromagnetic radiation. Try including these antioxidant rich foods in your diet or spending more time in nature to naturally boost your health.

Related on Care2

What Is Dirty Electricity and Is It Harmful?
Study Links Cell Phones to Brain Cancer
What Is Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity?

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

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How Can You Protect Yourself from Electromagnetic Radiation?

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Their water became undrinkable. Then they were ordered to pay more for it.

by lizzycjoelson1956 Posted on November 24, 2018

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This story was originally published by Mother Jones and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

In Martin County, Kentucky, residents are paying steep prices for water that sometimes comes out of the tap brown and foul-smelling—that is, when it comes out at all. The impoverished rural county is confronting an unprecedented water crisis: Its water system is on the brink of collapse and the Kentucky Public Service Commission has ordered the ailing water district to raise rates and seek outside management.

Nestled deep in Appalachia, home to just under 13,000 people, Martin County was once a booming coal region. Today, the median household income is $29,052, the unemployment rate is 7.3 percent, and 32 percent of the population lives below the poverty line. The demands from the Public Service Commission may not be realistic, given that a county in such dire financial straits may not be able to handle the one-two punch of rate increases and privatization. The problem “has been decades in the making,” says Mary Grant, the director of the Public Water for All campaign at Food and Water Watch, a national advocacy group.

Originally built to serve Inez, the county seat, in the 1960s, the water system was later expanded to include other communities, some of which are in the mountains. Mary Cromer, a lawyer for the Martin County Concerned Citizens group tells Mother Jones,“It was done on the cheap, and it was done very poorly.”

And then disaster struck the already struggling water system. On October 11, 2000, a coal waste lagoon in Martin County broke, spilling more than 300 million gallons of toxic sludge into 100 of miles of waterways. The pollution, which contained toxic metals such as arsenic, mercury, and lead, killed the fish and wildlife in the water. The sludge seeped into the water treatment plant, clogging intake pipes, and poisoning the water supply in Martin County and surrounding area.

The federal investigation into the spill ended when George W. Bush took office in January 2001. The Mine Safety and Health Administration’s team of investigators were sidelined when their investigation was cut short by the new administration. Don Blankenship, the chair and CEO of Massey Energy, the now-defunct company responsible for the spill, had donated money to the Republican Party, and halting the investigation was seen as a way to thank him for his support. (Blankenship eventually spent a year in a federal prison for conspiring to commit mine-safety violations in West Virginia, prior to the deadliest mining disaster in decades.) Instead of the eight violations that the MSHA team were pursuing, Massey was charged with only two. The clean-up was superficial; the company scraped up the black sludge and planted grass and hayseed on the land that was affected, but they weren’t responsible for fixing the water system.

The effects of the crisis 18 years ago still haunt the community today. “The pipes are in such bad shape, they can’t get the pressure to reach all of the houses,” Cromer says. The system also suffers from extreme water loss, with 64 percent of their water leaking out before it can be used. Low pressure combined with leaky, aging pipes means that if the water makes it to the taps at all, it often comes out discolored or with a foul odor.

In January 2018, citing financial troubles and the need to let depleted storage tanks refill, the Martin County Water District began shutting off water in the evening and through the night. Some customers complained that these shut-offs had made bathing and cooking difficult, while others said their water was shut off for days at a time. The water board then requested a 50 percent water rate increase to help fix the rapidly deteriorating system.

Two months later, customers reported that their water frequently smelled like diesel fuel and was the same shade of blue as Gatorade. Local officials told residents that the alarming color of the water didn’t necessarily mean it was unsafe, but by then the low-income community often ignored official statements and spent a large portion of their funds on bottled water. One resident told the Los Angeles Times that he spent about $25 a week on water.

Before raising the rates in March, the average water bill was $39.90 for a customer using 4,000 gallons each month. But then, the PSC allowed the water district to issue an emergency rate increase, bringing the average monthly bill to $51.07. “It’s just so unjust that they’re paying for whatever they can’t cook or drink with,” Cromer says. Last week, the PSC granted a permanent rate increase that will add another $3.30 to the average water bill, bringing the total to $54.37. The order also allowed for a temporary surcharge of $4.19 that will pay off the utility’s debt of $1.1 million.

Such an increase in rates will be profoundly difficult for such a poverty-stricken area, where many residents are on fixed incomes. For those on social security, their checks can be less than $800 a month.

On top of rate increases, the PSC also ordered the Martin County Water District to obtain outside management. Water privatization can be alluring because for-profit companies can provide updates to an aging infrastructure, but it does come with some expensive downsides. In 2012, for instance, in order to replace its aging pipes, the city of Bayonne, New Jersey, contracted with a private equity firm to manage its water system. The company replaced the old pipes with new ones, but customers began complaining about water rate increases. According to the New York Times, rates increased by almost 28 percent. “I personally can’t imagine how privatization could work in the county,” Cromer says. “The people there cannot afford to pay a company to come in and make a profit.”

In fact, Martin County has unsuccessfully tried privatization once before. In 2002, the water district hired American Water Services to run its system for nearly $71,000 a month, not counting other expenses. The company left after two years because of nonpayment. “When communities can’t pay [these companies,]” Grant says, “they just cut and run. They’re businesses, not charities.”

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Their water became undrinkable. Then they were ordered to pay more for it.

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