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Porter Ranch CEO got a $3 million bonus after a massive natural gas leak

by RebeccaQ50 Posted on March 31, 2016

Porter Ranch CEO got a $3 million bonus after a massive natural gas leak

By on 31 Mar 2016commentsShare

Most of us aren’t rewarded for causing major health, environmental, and public relations disasters on the job. But most of us aren’t the CEOs of fossil fuel companies.

The Los Angles Times reports that Debra L. Reed, chairman and CEO of Sempra Energy, the parent company of the natural gas producer responsible for the enormous natural gas leak at Porter Ranch received a $3.17 million bonus in 2015, bringing her total compensation for the year to $16.1 million. But before you start moaning about the 1 percent and executive compensation, take heart: Before Reed received her bonus, her salary was cut by a whooping $130,000, or less than 1 percent of her total pay, because of the disaster. Poor thing.

At its peak, the Porter Ranch leak released 60 tons of natural gas per hour, and residents of the Los Angeles neighborhood reported headaches, nausea, and severe nosebleeds, as well as eye, ear and throat infections. More than 10,000 Porter Ranch residents (and two schools) were forced to temporarily relocate, which cost the company about $2 million a day. The leak lasted from October 2015 until February 2016.

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The environmental impact was massive as well. The leak was particularly damaging because of the amount of methane — a greenhouse gas more potent that carbon dioxide — released. Porter Ranch’s greenhouse-gas impact was even larger than the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and every day of the leak was equivalent to building six coal-fired power plants or putting an extra 4.5 million cars on the road.

And for this, Debra Reed received an extra $3 million.

So how is it possible that Reed would receive anything other than a boot out the door? LA Times columnist Michael Hiltzik put it well: “It’s the result of a daisy-chain culture among corporate executives who sit on each others’ boards and judge each others’ performance in a near-vacuum.”

In other words, it’s friends voting on friend’s compensation.

Porter Ranch residents, naturally, were not pleased at the revelation of Reed’s bonus. “This sends out a signal that as long as the dollars are there, the impact on people, homes and the environment doesn’t matter,” Paula Cracium, president of the Porter Ranch Neighborhood Council, told Hiltzik. “That’s not the signal we need to send to executives who have so much power.” But for every under-performing CEO who gets handsomely rewarded for his or her mistakes, that’s exactly the message we’re sending.

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5 Ingredients to Avoid in Your Hair Products

by DaciaMcGaw Posted on March 30, 2016

Many Americans are working to reduce their exposure to harmful chemicals and toxic ingredients. Few industries have faced more criticism for their ingredients than the cosmetics industry, and lately, it seems that more and more brands arereleasing organic or all-natural personal care lines.

Shampoos and conditioners, in particular, contain a lot of toxic ingredients. Some health-conscious consumers have taken to making their own haircare products, but others still prefer to use ready-made, expert-developed shampoos and conditioners. If this is you, rest assured that you have plenty of options. You dont necessarily have to spend a fortune, either! A quick glance at a products ingredient list can tell you a lot about its safety. Here are five toxic ingredients youll want to be sure to avoid when picking out a shampoo or conditioner:

Sulfates

Youve probably heard of sulfates by now; pretty much every natural hair care brand states proudly on itspackaging thataproduct is sulfate-free. But what are sulfates, and why should you avoid them?

The main thing to keep in mind when thinking about sulfates is that they are chemical detergents. That in itself isnt necessarily a bad thing, but it means that sulfates are extremely effective at removing dirt and oil … in fact, theyre a little too effective. Sulfates are harsh on the hair and scalp, so they can strip away that natural moisture that keeps your hair shiny and soft.

On a deeper level, they may carry some hormone-disrupting agents along with them. According to Natural Society, many sulfates contain traces of dioxane, a known carcinogen. Dioxane is also thought to disrupt kidney function.

Parabens

Parabens are another widely hated group of chemicals that youve probably been told to avoid in your beauty and personal care products. Parabens are xenoestrogens, which means that they have a similar composition to hormones found in the human body. Xenoestrogens are thought to disrupt hormones and could even post a cancer risk.

Real Simple even noted that British scientistsfound evidence of parabens in samples of breast cancer tissue. Though this doesnt necessarily mean the parabens caused the cancer,most natural-minded folks try to avoid parabens completely.

Fragrance

Fragrances are bad, bad, bad. If the fragrance in your product comes from a natural essential oil, it will say so on the packaging. If all the manufacturers have chosen to tell you about the ingredient is that its a fragrance, thats generally bad news.

The term fragrance allows manufacturers to opt out of including a list of the ingredients used to create that fragrance, as the term is not regulated by the FDA. So really, if fragrance is listed on an ingredient list, theres no telling whats in there. Natural Society even notes that there are more than 3,100 chemicals used by the fragrance industry to concoct these suspicious-sounding additions to your shampoos and conditioners.

Triclosan

Triclosan is an antibacterial agent thats often added to personal care products as a preservative. Dr. Ben Kim notes that we still dont have enough conclusive evidence to say for sure whether or not triclosan is safe for use, but there have certainly been some warning signs to the contrary.

Triclosan is thought to be an endocrine disruptor, which means it can be harmful in the same fashion as xenoestrogens. Its also been linked to immune system problems, weight loss and uncontrolled cellular reproduction, according to Dr. Kim.

Polyethylene Glycol

Polyethylene glycol, or PEG, is also thought to interfere with the body. According to Natural Society, the state of California has classified the chemical as a developmental toxicant, which means that it may interfere with human development. Its also known to be contaminated by the aforementioned cancer-causer dioxane.

If youre looking for shampoos and conditioners that are made with safe, reliable, natural ingredients, you have lots of options at your fingertips. And if youre feeling more adventurous, of course, you could always try making your own homemade hair care products!

Related
How to Choose Natural Ingredients for Beautiful Skin8 Natural Mosquito Repellents

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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8 Of The Best Spring Flowering Shrubs

by EsmeraldaSym Posted on March 21, 2016

Whether youre renovating your garden or just looking for a bit more color, spring is an excellent time to consider adding some new plant material. Spring-flowering shrubs are a great way to liven up a yard. If you choose the right shrub to fit your needs, youll be rewarded with a gorgeous spring display year after year.

1. Forsythia spp.

This may be one of the most flexible options for spring blooming shrubs. Forsythias can grow ten to fifteen feet tall and wide. They naturally have a beautiful, arching form when fully mature.

If you dont have space for a mature specimen, they can be pruned into a smaller, compact shrub, or even used as hedging. Make sure to prune your forsythia after it has bloomed in the spring because it will start to set next years blooms soon after the new growth appears.

They prefer full sun and may benefit from supplemental irrigation in dry areas. Lots of mulch is helpful to provide water retention and nutrients.

Hardy to zone 5.

2. Lilac (Syringa spp.)

Lilacs are very durable shrubs that prefer drier locations, such as on slopes and in well-drained soils. They also require very little feeding. A high phosphorus fertilizer in early spring will promote blooms, whereas too much nitrogen in the soil will actually reduce flowering.

Cutting off the old blossoms once theyre done will promote more flowers the next year. You can also prune lilacs as needed to either control their size or shape. They have a tendency to spread by runner shoots, which you can cut off at ground level.

The most common bloom colors for lilacs are purple and white, with yellow and bicolor varieties also available. The strength of their scent varies with each variety, but all blooms will have the classic heady lilac aroma that can drift throughout your entire yard.

Hardy to zone 3.

3. Daphne spp.

The fragrance of daphnes is what makes these plants stand out. There are many different types, and all of them smell amazing.

The rock daphnes are a group of spreading groundcovers. They grow up to ten inches tall and make attractive mounds similar to heathers. Cultivars of Daphne cneorum are commonly available in garden centers. There are also a few shrub daphnes. Most of these tend to be smaller shrubs, only getting two to four feet tall, like Daphne x burkwoodii. The occasional variety, like Daphne bhoula, can grow up to eight feet tall.

All types of daphne are quite low-maintenance. They rarely need any pruning or shaping. They appreciate moist soils with good organic matter. Daphnes are considered poisonous plants, so take care if you have pets in your yard that like to forage.

The hardiness zone varies depending on which type you choose, anywhere from zone 4 for Daphne burkwoodii, to zone 8 for Daphne bhoula.

Daphne x burkwoodii ‘Carol Mackie’

4. Witch Hazel (Hamamelis spp.)

Witch hazels may be the earliest blooming shrub of all. In many parts of the Northern Hemisphere, witch hazels may start to bloom in January or February.

They have a distinct, hairy-looking blossom that is often fragrant, depending on the variety. The species witch hazels, such as Hamamelis virginiana, tend to smell stronger than modern hybrids, like Hamamelis x intermedia Arnold Promise.

Witch hazels are understory plants in their natural habitats and tend to do better in partial, but not full, shade, and moist soil. Theyre a slow-growing shrub, with an open vase-like form that will not become too dense. They can grow up to twelve feet, although they blend easily into the background once theyre done blooming for the year.

The hardiness zone can range from zone 3 to zone 5.

5. Viburnum spp.

Most viburnums have attractive blossoms, but not all viburnums smell. Whereas the early varieties Viburnum carlesii and Viburnum x bodantense are worth planting for their spring fragrance.

Both with grow up to eight feet tall and wide over time, but can be easily pruned to shape. They prefer full sun and well-drained soil with good organic matter. Both make effective hedging plants or can stand alone as specimens.

Viburnum carlesii is a hardiness zone 4 and Viburnum x bodantense is hardy to zone 5.

Viburnum carlesii

6. Rhododendron spp.

A celebrity of spring-flowering shrubs, rhododendrons can be absolute show-stoppers for a few weeks every year. They are available in countless colors and shades to suit any taste or garden plan.

They have leathery, evergreen leaves and can grow up to twenty feet tall and wide when mature. They can be pruned back to fit into your space as well.

Rhododendrons prefer partial or full shade and a protected location that doesnt get a lot of wind. They do best in moist, acidic soil high in organic matter. A fall application of fertilizer suitable for acid-loving plants will give them an extra boost.

Most varieties of rhododendrons are not very cold tolerant, and will only be hardy to a zone 7 or 8. Although this is slowly changing as plant breeders develop cultivars that are more hardy. If you live in a colder climate, keep an eye out for hardy selections in your local garden center.

7. Flowering Quince (Chaenomeles speciosa)

These shrubs may be overlooked due to the fact they have thorns. But their show of bright white, pink or red flowers early in the spring makes them worthy of a second look. In addition, they will produce quinces in the fall. These are two-inch, round, nutritious fruit that are traditionally used in jams, jellies and baking.

If you have a place in your garden where the thorns wont be an issue, or youre looking for a good natural deer fence, flowering quince could be a great option.

They grow up to eight feet tall and wide. They can handle many different types of growing conditions, are not particular about what type of soil they grow in, and are drought tolerant once established.

Hardy to zone 4.

8. Azalea (Rhododendron spp.)

These are the smaller cousins of rhododendrons. They are often deciduous and lose their leaves in winter, unlike their evergreen relatives.

Azaleas typically grow from two to eight feet tall. If you need to prune them to shape, make sure to do this soon after the blooms have finished for the year. They will start to set flower buds for next year in the spring.

They prefer partially shady locations and can handle a bit more sun than rhododendrons. The soil should be acidic. Mulching with pine or other conifer needles can be a great way to reduce the pH if your soil is too alkaline.

The hardiness zone for azalea varieties can range from 5 to 8.

Related
A Guide to the Worlds Best Botanical Gardens
Selecting the Right Tree For Your Garden
5 Simple Ways To Get Your Garden Ready for Spring

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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Clinton backtracks on coal comments after coal lovers throw a fit

by Shauna4037 Posted on March 15, 2016

Clinton backtracks on coal comments after coal lovers throw a fit

By on 15 Mar 2016commentsShare

On Sunday, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton told the world that the coal industry would be in trouble when she’s president. On Monday, she tried to take it all back.

At a town hall event broadcast on CNN Sunday evening, Clinton was asked, “Make the case to poor whites who live in Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, who vote Republican, why they should vote for you based upon economic policies versus voting for a Republican.” She tried to argue that she stands with working people, but it didn’t come out exactly right:

I’m the only candidate which has a policy about how to bring economic opportunity using clean renewable energy as the key into coal country, because we’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business … and we’re going to make it clear that we don’t want to forget those people. Those people labored in those mines for generations, losing their health, often losing their lives, to turn on our lights and power our factories. Now we’ve got to move away from coal, and all the other fossil fuels. But I don’t want to move away from the people who did the best they could to produce the energy that we relied on.

It’s true that Clinton is the only candidate who has laid out a comprehensive plan to help coal country transition to a cleaner economy. Her $30 billion plan would rebuild infrastructure and invest in public health, education, and entrepreneurial initiatives in order to help coal-reliant communities transition to a cleaner economy.

But of course that’s not the part of her statement that everyone glommed onto. Conservative politicians and commentators — and Democrats running for office in coal country — immediately attacked her for allegedly wanting to put the coal industry “out of business.”

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“Hillary’s vow to kill coal miners’ jobs finishes a vast Democratic betrayal,” read the headline the in New York Post. Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority leader from Kentucky, called Clinton’s comments “callous” and “wrong” on the Senate floor. Breitbart wrote that Clinton’s statement is “a clear sign she intends to accelerate the destruction of one of the country’s leading energy sector industries.”

Two of the three Democratic candidates for governor of West Virginia also attacked: Booth Goodwin said he “absolutely disagreed” with Clinton, and Jim Justice, who made his fortune in coal, said he would “not support anyone who does not support coal,” according to the AP.

Clinton, in a head-spinning reversal, quickly backed up on Monday. After first pointing out that Republicans were spinning her words (which is true), the campaign released a statement saying, “Coal will remain a part of the energy mix for years to come, and we have a shared responsibility to ensure that coal communities receive the benefits they have earned and can build the future they deserve.”

But here’s the thing: Clinton may be afraid of losing coal country votes, but Big Coal has been dying for decades. As Alec MacGillis wrote in The New Republic in 2014, “Employment in the coal industry has been in decline for so long in states such as Kentucky and West Virginia that the number of jobs directly at risk from any clampdown on coal is far smaller than the sweeping rhetoric about ‘coal country’ would have one assume.” In Kentucky, the heart of “coal country,” employment in the industry went from 38,000 in 1983 to less 17,000 in 2012, MacGillis reports. And AP notes that production in the top three coal states declined between 5 and 20 percent in 2015 alone. In Ohio, it fell 22 percent.

While it’s true that environmental regulations — and automation — have had an impact on the industry, coal isn’t actually dying because of environmental regulations. It’s dying because of the free market. The decline in coal directly corresponds to the rise in natural gas, a cheaper and more efficient source of energy — and one that the GOP has been pushing in earnest. As Michael Lynch, an energy consultant, told The New York Times in 2014, “It’s not Obama’s war on coal. It’s reality’s war on coal. Natural gas turns out to be better than coal in the marketplace.”

With coal companies going bust and banks decreasing their support for the industry, no one can save Big Coal now. What the government can do is create clean energy jobs and help coal communities adjust to the new reality — which is exactly what Hillary Clinton was talking about doing. At least, until the bad press started rolling in.

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Obama’s offshore drilling plan mostly a win for environmentalists, with a caveat

by DwightMyers Posted on March 15, 2016

Obama’s offshore drilling plan mostly a win for environmentalists, with a caveat

By on 15 Mar 2016commentsShare

President Obama has shown little interest in gambling his environmental legacy in his final year of office. Rather than slow down after the Paris climate change conference in December, he has pushed forward on policies climate activists say are necessary to keep fossil fuels in the ground — first, his administration announced a moratorium on new coal leases, and now, it has taken the Atlantic Coast off the table for drillers.

The administration released a new version of its five-year plan for offshore drilling on Tuesday, and the most significant change is its reversal on its plan from a year ago to open the mid-Atlantic to offshore development. The Arctic, meanwhile, is still open for business: The new proposal solicits comments on whether to drop Arctic leases entirely or whether to limit them in some areas. But it also still has an option that includes leases in the Chuckhi Sea, Beaufort Sea, and Cook Inlet — much criticized by environmentalists who say a spill anywhere in the Arctic will have devastating effects for the rest of the region. The Gulf will be open for 10 leases.

The Interior Department’s plan for offshore drilling essentially sets the course for oil and gas development long after Obama leaves office. Technically it covers a period from 2017 to 2022, but oil and gas exploration offshore can take years to get off the ground, even decades before paying off the cost. Any delay is promising: While presidential candidates could promise to reverse course, in practice, they are unlikely to do so, explained Natural Resources Defense Council’s Beyond Oil Director Franz Matzner. “This administration sets the five-year plan for the next administration,” Matzner said in an email. “The next administration could, in theory, try to undo that, but we have not seen that precedent in the past. Far and away the most secure route for the Obama administration would be to permanently withdraw the Arctic and Atlantic from all future leasing, using his executive authority under [the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act].”

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If the proposed version is finalized after the 90 days of public comment, it will be a significant achievement for environmentalists and local communities that organized against offshore drilling. With one caveat, of course: the Arctic.

“They won’t get it right every time, but it gives us a new hook to hold them and the next president to account,” 350.org spokesperson Jamie Henn said in an email. “The new test of climate leadership is if you’re keeping fossil fuels in the ground.”

“Less than a week after committing to protect the Arctic with Prime Minister Trudeau, President Obama has left the door open for Shell and the rest of the oil industry to drill in the region,” Greenpeace USA Executive Director Annie Leonard said in an email. “This decision doesn’t balance conservation and energy — it fuels climate chaos. President Obama must place the whole Arctic off limits. This program isn’t yet final, the president must use the time he has to take all new offshore drilling out of circulation.”

The Interior didn’t highlight climate change as part of its calculus on Tuesday, only citing “significant potential conflicts with other ocean uses such as the Department of Defense and commercial interests; current market dynamics; limited infrastructure; and opposition from many coastal communities.” But there was intense pressure from cities and businesses that rely on $4 billion in tourism and fishing on the coasts to remove the Atlantic from the plan. In recent weeks, both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have highlighted their opposition against drilling off the East Coast and the Arctic.

This is the second time the administration has tried to open the East Coast for drilling, only to reverse course. Just before the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster by BP, the administration proposed auctioning up to 104 million acres of the mid- and south-Atlantic and 10 leases in the Arctic. Then last January, Interior again put the Atlantic on the table, which set off protests from environmental groups and local businesses and residents.

The oil and gas industry, which eyed the Atlantic for its 3.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil and 31.3 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, will be furious. But public opinion on oil drilling is more complicated than political divides. Public support for offshore drilling plummets when there are spills, as it did after the BP disaster in 2010, but tends to rise again with passing time.

In his final year of office, Obama faces limits in what more he can do for the environment and climate. He’s already pushed his executive power on climate change more than any other president; the offshore drilling plan is one of the few opportunities he has left. Protecting the coasts by limiting oil and gas development offshore would be a fitting ending for a president who once called the BP spill the “worst environmental disaster America has ever faced.”

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Why the EPA’s recent pesticide battle could be a big deal

by Aisha69O9866892 Posted on March 4, 2016

Why the EPA’s recent pesticide battle could be a big deal

By on 4 Mar 2016commentsShare

A battle between the U.S. government and a chemical giant revealed a fundamental flaw in the way we control pesticides — one that could be allowing thousands of unsafe chemicals to go undetected.

In a rare show of regulatory muscle, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a Notice of Intent on Tuesday, announcing that it planned to cancel the sale of products that included a pesticide called flubendiamide as an active ingredient. The EPA has been monitoring these products, manufactured mainly by the company Bayer CropScience LP (and also by the smaller Japanese company Nichino America, Inc.), over the past few years. Studies have shown the pesticide was breaking down into a different, more deadly compound that was killing mussels and other invertebrates that fish rely on for food — a problem that the agency deemed serious enough to warrant the banning of all products of its kind.

The EPA’s move to ban the products is a novel one, and could signal a change in the way it regulates pesticides, particularly with issuing “conditional registrations,” a loophole that allows pesticides that have not undergone otherwise required safety testing to enter the market. Conditional registrations aren’t uncommon at all — according to a 2013 report released by the Natural Resources Defense Council, as much as 65 percent of more than 16,000 pesticides were first approved by the EPA for the market by way of conditional registrations.

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David Epstein, a senior entomologist at the USDA’s Office of Pest Management Policy, says that these conditional registrations exist to aid growers of crops like vegetables, fruits, and nuts keep away pests. And in theory, they can be a beneficial aid to help smaller growers — but the process isn’t perfect.

“It’s a risk-benefit analysis,” Epstein told Grist, explaining that registrants are evaluated for risk in terms of things like human health, environmental safety, and non-target effects, and then they weigh the pesticide’s potential benefits to farmers. Epstein said that flubendiamide, a pesticide he’s used himself on crops, is an important tool for farmers to keep away harmful pests. The conditional registration process, he said, is a way to help growers get pesticides like these more quickly.

“It’s an evolving process,” he said. “Mistakes are made and corrected, and then we and move on.”

But there’s a big problem, according to Nathan Donley, a staff scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity and an expert on pesticide regulations.

“The EPA has no way of tracking these conditional registrations,” he told Grist. “During the normal regulatory process, the public can review docs and comment. But in conditional registration, it all happens backdoor; the public doesn’t get to see.”

Donley argues that the fundamental concept of conditional registration is flawed, and should be shut down until the EPA can better regulate pesticides.

“There’s more than enough pesticides on the market,” said Donley. “If a chemical company can’t demonstrate that its pesticide is safe, then that pesticide shouldn’t be on the market.”

The latest flubendiamide news is only the most recent skirmish in a battle that’s been brewing for months between Bayer, a German chemical giant worth $42 billion that produces the pesticide under the trade name Belt, and the EPA. It all began back in 2008,  when the EPA issued a conditional registration for flubendiamide — the chemical was legal to manufacture, but only under the condition that the companies must produce toxicity data on the impact of its use over the next few years, to fill in gaps in the original risk assessment. The EPA gave Bayer a generous five years to conduct scientific studies to prove that flubendiamide is safe for aquatic invertebrates, or the pesticide would have to go. Bayer agreed that it would voluntarily cancel the products if these stipulations weren’t met.

Seven years later — two years longer than expected — studies conducted by the EPA found that flubendiamide was having adverse effects on aquatic invertebrates. In January, the EPA gave Bayer the sign: a notice that, as they had agreed, Bayer must withdraw its flubendiamide pesticides. But last month, Bayer flat-out refused. In a statement, the company said that it “instead will seek a review of the product’s registration in an administrative law hearing,” asserting that the product was safe. It was a bold move, one that triggered outrage among environmentalists, many of whom demanded that Bayer play by the rules.

Now, it’s a stalemate, with EPA demanding flubendiamide products be banned, and Bayer resisting. But the damage, unfortunately, is already done. In California alone, 42,495 pounds of flubendiamide were sprayed onto 521,140 acres in 2013. In some places, it was applied six times in one year, misted over crops like soybeans, alfalfa, watermelon, almonds, peppers, and tobacco. In many cases, the EPA asserts, it was also being sprayed over wildlife.

The EPA’s notice to Bayer is out in the open, but flubendiamide isn’t leaving yet. According to NPR, Bayer is demanding a hearing before an administrative law judge before it makes any moves. The case has provoked renewed questions about what role the EPA should — and shouldn’t — play in pesticide regulations, and how to prevent unsafe chemicals from being unleashed on the planet.

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This Bee-Killing Pesticide Is Terrible at Protecting Crops

by RFDPenny790770 Posted on January 15, 2016

Mother Jones

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/loose.dtd”>

In 2011, agrichemical giants Monsanto and Bayer CropScience joined forces to sell soybean seeds coated with (among other things) an insecticide of the neonicotinoid family. Neonics are so-called systematic pesticides—when the coated seeds sprout and grow, the resulting plants take up the bug-killing chemical, making them poisonous to crop-chomping pests like aphids. Monsanto rivals Syngenta and DuPont also market neonic-treated soybean seeds.

These products—buoyed by claims that the chemical protects soybean crops from early-season insect pests—have enjoyed great success in the marketplace. Soybeans are the second-most-planted US crop, covering about a quarter of US farmland—and at least a third of US soybean acres are grown with neonic-treated seeds. But two problems haunt this highly lucrative market: 1) The neonic soybean seeds might not do much at all to fight off pests, and 2) they appear to be harming bees and may also hurt other pollinators, birds, butterflies, and water-borne invertebrates.

Doubts about neonic-treated soybean seeds’ effectiveness aren’t new. In 2014, the Environmental Protection Agency released a blunt preliminary report finding that “neonicotinoid seed treatments likely provide $0 in benefits” to soybean growers. But the agrichemical industry likes to portray the EPA as an overzealous regulator that relies on questionable data, and it quickly issued a report vigorously disagreeing with the EPA’s assessment.

Now the seed/agrichemical giants will have to open a new front in their battle to convince farmers to continue paying up for neonic-treated soybean seeds. In a recent publication directed to farmers, a coalition of the nation’s most important Midwestern ag-research universities—Iowa State, Kansas State, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, North Dakota State, Michigan State, the University of Minnesota, the University of Missouri, Ohio State, Penn State, Purdue, South Dakota State, and the University of Wisconsin—argued plainly that “for typical field situations, independent research demonstrates that neonicotinoid seed treatments for soybeans do not provide a consistent return on investment.”

The reason is that neonic-treated soybeans wield the great bulk of their bug-killing power for the first three weeks after the seeds sprout; the major pest that attacks soybean plants, the aphid, doesn’t arrive until much later, when the soybean plants are full-grown. “In other words,” the report states, aphid populations “increase to threshold levels weeks after the short window that neonicotinoid seed treatments protect plants.”

And not only are neonics useless against soybeans’ major field pest, aphids; they may actually boost the fortunes of another important one, the slug, which is “emerging as a key pest” in the soybean belt, according to the report. Pointing to a 2015 study from Penn State researchers, the report notes that slugs aren’t affected by neonics, so they can gobble neonic-treated soy sprouts at will, accumulating the chemical. But when insects called the ground beetle—which has a taste for slugs but not soybean plants—eat the neonic-containing slugs, they tend to die. So slugs transfer the poison from the crops to their natural predator, the ground beetle, and throw the predator balance out of whack, allowing slugs to proliferate. As a result, the Penn State researchers found, neonic seed treatments actually reduce yields in slug-infested fields.

Of course, the most celebrated “non-target” insect potentially affected by neonics is the honeybee. As I reported last week, the EPA recently released an assessment finding that one particular neonic that’s widely used on soybean seeds, imidacloprid, likely harms individual bees and whole bee colonies at levels commonly found in farm fields. That’s because plants from neonic-treated seeds don’t just carry the poison in their leaves and stalks; they also deliver it in bee-attracting nectar and pollen.

While cotton is the imidacloprid-treated crop most likely to hit bees hard, soybeans, too, may pose a threat, the EPA found. The agency couldn’t say for sure, because data on how much of the pesticide shows up in soybeans’ pollen and nectar are “unavailable,” both from Bayer and from independent researchers.

That information gap may be cold comfort for beekeepers, but the agrichemical industry will no doubt seize upon it to argue that its blockbuster chemical is harmless to bees. The rest of us can savor the bitter irony that this widely used pesticide may be more effective at slaying beneficial pollinators than it is at halting crop-chomping pests.

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This Bee-Killing Pesticide Is Terrible at Protecting Crops

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Media disaster reporting can throw a wrench in the way you process disaster risk

by IsidraThynne52 Posted on October 9, 2015

Media disaster reporting can throw a wrench in the way you process disaster risk

By on 9 Oct 2015 4:59 pmcommentsShare

The last time I read about a BASE-jumping accident, I remember thinking to myself, Huh, BASE jumping. I could use a little more adrenaline in my life. Maybe I should give that a shot. And thanks to science, now I can take solace in the fact that this kind of baseless (sorry), idiotic risk-accounting isn’t that rare: A new study in Nature Climate Change suggests that reporting on natural disasters can actually encourage people to move to more dangerous places. Way to go, brains! (Spoiler alert: I still have yet to BASE jump and likely never will — largely because it’s an objectively dumb thing to do — but I did rent a canoe last weekend, which has to count for something.)

Natural disasters have cropped up in the news a lot lately. And for good reason: There are plenty of them out there. To get at the question of how these reports affect people’s risk perceptions, researchers from Australia, the U.K., and Israel designed a psychological experiment that allowed study participants to make decisions about where to live, given fake reports of disaster frequency and location.

Participants were awarded points for living in one of three different villages, with more points awarded for riskier situations — akin to, say, a beachfront home generally being lovely, except for when those pesky hurricanes start wreaking havoc. Lead author Ben Newell explains the experiment over at The Conversation:

One group only found out if their own dwelling was hit, a second group found out if any of the dwellings in their village was hit, and a third group found out if any dwellings in either risky village were affected.

These three groups were designed to mimic information people could get in real life from personal experience, local sources, or from afar via media or authorities.

The key result was that the third group – people given the most information about recently experienced or avoided disasters – took more risks and were more likely to choose regions prone to disasters.

Getting full information about all the villages, as is possible in real life through media and authorities, appeared to reinforce for people that “most of the time nothing bad happens in the risky areas”.

There’s also a good amount of empirical evidence out there for this kind of effect. Newell cites a study suggesting that new home buyers after the Loma Prieta earthquake “reduced their assessment of risk as information concerning the location and rate of earthquakes” was released. “A similar pattern was found following the Tohoku tsunami of 2011, with unaffected residents exhibiting lowered risk perception about the heights of waves warranting evacuation,” he writes.

Anecdotally, there’s also the fact that here in the Seattle Grist office, we chose to laugh off the news of impending Pacific Northwest earthquake doom, hunker down at our standing desks, and order another round of doughnuts instead. (To be fair, there’s a pretty great doughnut place across the street.)

Part of what’s going on here is that people are generally just kind of awful at estimating risk. Probabilities mean different things for different people, and we rarely take time into account when assessing these probabilities, anyway. The field of behavioral economics is rife with examples of poor risk accounting. Low probabilities, in particular, are usually overestimated. There’s also that tricky gut feeling that says, “Oh, that will never happen to me.”

“Statements often seen in the media such as a ‘one-in-50 or one-in-100-year’ event could lead people to assume, incorrectly, that there won’t be another event for 49 or 99 years,” writes Newell. “This perception is compounded by their typical daily experience of nothing bad happening.”

The solution? “Risk messages need instead to focus on the accumulation of events and the increase in their associated risks across time,” writes Newell. “For example, people should be reminded how many major floods or severe fire days occurred between specific points in time – such as ‘four events between 1900 and 1949,’ or ‘ten events between 1950 and 2000.’”

Of course, we could also just try to develop the common sense not to move to disaster areas. And if that’s too much to ask — which seems likely — the least we could do is invest in real risk management. That means actually implementing tsunami preparation advice, demanding that buildings are up to the latest earthquake codes, and using sound landscaping techniques and maximizing defensible space in the event of wildfires. For many of us, climate change is already here. We ought to be ready for its effects.

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Disaster reporting may encourage people to live in riskier places

, The Conversation.

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Media disaster reporting can throw a wrench in the way you process disaster risk

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A Hawaiian clean energy plant makes electricity from seawater and ammonia

by HansNorthcote Posted on August 25, 2015

A Hawaiian clean energy plant makes electricity from seawater and ammonia

By on 25 Aug 2015commentsShare

The ocean is often considered to be the final frontier for energy, whether we’re talking about Arctic oil reserves or giant floating wind turbines. Now, a 40-foot tall tower on the Big Island of Hawai’i will harvest the oceans’ energy using a method that has renewable energy advocates drooling. It’s part of a new research facility and demo power plant that uses seawater of different temperatures to power a generator via turbine.

Most sources of energy (even the naughty ones!) originate from the sun’s rays, and the technology at the demo plant — a joint project of Makai Ocean Engineering and the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority — is simply experimenting with a different way to capture them. Oceans cover upward of 70 percent of the earth’s surface, which means that 70 percent of Earth-bound sunlight strikes the ocean — and that makes for a lot of unharnessed heat. The Makai project extracts this thermal energy from the warmed ocean water.

Popular Science has the story:

The plant uses a concept called Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC). Inside the system is a liquid that has a very low boiling point (meaning that it requires less energy to evaporate), like ammonia. As ammonia passes through the closed system of pipes, it goes through a section of pipes that have been warmed by seawater taken from the warm (77 degrees Fahrenheit), shallow waters. The ammonia vaporizes into a gas, which pushes a turbine, and generates power. Then, that ammonia gas passes through a section of pipes that are cooled by frigid (41 degrees Fahrenheit) seawater pumped up from depths of around 3,000 feet. The gas condenses in the cold temperatures, turning back into a liquid, and repeats the process all over again. The warm and cold waters are combined, and pumped back into the ocean.

Despite the cool factor, the type of OTEC technology powering the Makai plant isn’t the most efficient out there. It takes a good chunk of electricity to pump in (and out) all that deep seawater. The demo plant currently uses a 55 inch-wide pipeline pumping 270,000 gallons per minute in order to operate. There are also relatively few ocean sites — off the U.S. coast or otherwise — that allow for the depth and temperature gradients necessary for ideal OTEC conditions. But above all else, the Makai plant is a research facility, and teams of engineers are constantly fiddling with the heat exchangers in the name of efficiency gains.

Of course, the thermal plant would also be more efficient if it were actually offshore, closer to the chilly ocean depths. Making the expansionary move could boost the plant’s capacity to powering upwards of 120,000 homes — 1,000 times as many as Makai expects the demo plant to power today. The energy company projects that a single full-scale offshore plant would prevent the burning of 1.3 million barrels of oil annually.

Watch the rather patriotic video above for more info.

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A new energy plant in Hawaii generates power from ocean temperature extremes

, Popular Science.

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A Hawaiian clean energy plant makes electricity from seawater and ammonia

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There Might Be Fracking Wastewater on Your Organic Fruits and Veggies

by ManuelMaurer Posted on August 20, 2015

Mother Jones

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The US Department of Agriculture’s organics standards, written 15 years ago, strictly ban petroleum-derived fertilizers commonly used in conventional agriculture. But the same rules do not prohibit farmers from irrigating their crops with petroleum-laced wastewater obtained from oil and gas wells—a practice that is increasingly common in drought-stricken Southern California.

As I reported last month, oil companies last year supplied half the water that went to the 45,000 acres of farmland in Kern County’s Cawelo Water District, farmland that is owned, in part, by Sunview, a company that sells certified organic raisins and grapes. Food watchdog groups are concerned that the state hasn’t required oil companies to disclose all the chemicals they use in oil drilling and fracking operations, much less set safety limits for all those chemicals in irrigation water.

A spokesman for the USDA’s National Organics Program confirmed that it has little to say on the matter. “The USDA organic regulations do not directly address the use of irrigation water on organic farms,” said the spokesman, who asked to be quoted on background, “but organic operations must generally maintain or improve the natural resources of the operation, including soil and water quality.”

Of course, that’s easier said than done. USDA organic regulations do not require farms to perform water quality tests, and irrigation water is not evaluated as an input by the Organic Materials Review Institute, which vets products used on organic farms. Calls placed to California Certified Organic Farmers, which certifies organic farms in California, were not returned.

Irrigation water appears to be a major loophole in a food safety program that otherwise strictly controls what farmers can apply to their land. Notably, the organics program does prohibit the use of sewage sludge-based fertilizer, a product widely used on nonorganic farms that sometimes contains chemicals such as flame retardants and pharmaceuticals.

On Monday, California Assemblyman Mike Gatto, a Democrat from Glendale, introduced a bill that would require crops irrigated with wastewater from oil and gas operations to be labeled as such. “No one expects their lettuce to contain heavy chemicals from fracking wastewater,” he explained in a press release.

That’s especially true if their lettuce is labeled “organic,” adds Adam Scow, the California director of the environmental group Food and Water Watch: “I think most people’s logic would tell them that’s not a practice consistent with organic standards.”

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There Might Be Fracking Wastewater on Your Organic Fruits and Veggies

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