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Create a Greater Yellowstone National Park
George Wuerthner: The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem is the largest intact temperate ecosystem in the world. ,,, Across the globe, large, protected areas have been shown repeatedly to be the best way to preserve evolutionary processes and biodiversity. … Depending on how you define the borders, Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) is anywhere from 20-23 million acres. … National Park management seeks to preserve evolutionary and ecological processes, not just species. … Read here …
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Japan to dump Fukushima radioactive water into Pacific Ocean
Peter Symonds: The decision has provoked opposition and protests in Japan itself, as well as in neighbouring countries including China and South Korea, over the potential impact on the environment and human health … the plan, the radioactive water would be diluted using sea water to levels of tritium within international standards then discharged over several decades through a kilometre-long pipe into the sea … it was “choosing the easiest, cheapest, status quo way of simply dumping the contaminated water into the sea.” … Read here …
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Smart investors’ worst enemy is Big Oil
David Suzuki: Fossil fuel money is behind campaigns to ban the consideration of environmental and social risks in investment decisions. In fact, these considerations are necessary to make investments that are sustainable in the long run. … But companies with business models based on activities that create greater inequalities and cause harm to the air, water, and soil, are threatened by ESG (environmental, social and governance) investor policies. … It’s time to get fossil fuel money out of politics and leave the oil in the ground. … Read here …
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Rights Of Nature, Self-Owning Land, And Other Hacks On Western Law
David Bollier: Legislatures or courts in twelve countries have recognized the “rights of nature” at the state, local, and/or national levels in a dozen nations. … western jurisprudence generally privileges private property rights over nature, humanity over plants and wildlife, and individual rights over collective rights … “We’re talking about widening the portal of lawmaking to allow for an expansion of rights towards sustainability.” … instead of federal or state law acting as a ceiling of permissible lawmaking, it is merely a floor – a minimum legal requirement … Read here…
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A Step Toward Justice for the Community of Watts
: L.A.’s district attorney just charged a polluting plant with 22 felonies. … against Atlas Metals, alleging the plant illegally disposed of hazardous waste, some of which was deposited on the grounds of the high school. … The school has been around since 1923, and the plant since 1949. … testing commissioned by the district found lead concentrations in dust samples collected from campus were 75 times higher than what the Environmental Protection Agency defines as a hazardous threshold. … Read here …
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Orcas and Orcus
Why are the orcas attacking the ships? The orca, Descended from Orcus — God of the underworld And death — Who punishes Breakers of pledges and oaths Has orcas sic and seek out those Of course, the orcas are eager to help After all that they’ve suffered And witnessed As well Their habitats poisoned Who […]
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Why Tree-Planting Schemes Aren’t a Silver Bullet
Tara Lohan: There are a lot of ways that tree planting can go awry — especially as people aim to hit arbitrary metrics. This includes planting trees in the wrong places, like in native grasslands or wetlands. Or planting nonnative trees that take up too much water or create other dangerous conditions. … Getting trees in the soil is only part of forest restoration. Caring for those trees is also crucial. … The proximity of newly planted trees to those already growing can be beneficial. … Read here …
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Cities Are Becoming More Like Sponges
Peter Yeun: Water management that prizes lakes and greenery over concrete makes for less flood-prone cities — and prettier ones, too. … Trying to protect cities with hard, gray infrastructure made of concrete is doomed to fail.” … The idea is … to create cities filled with natural spaces such as parks, lakes and wetlands — which are capable of absorbing, storing and cleaning rain and floods — as well as smaller tools like bioswales, rain gardens, permeable pavements and green roofs. … This emerging approach to urban water management also soaks up all kinds of other benefits: green, nature-based spaces provide habitat for wildlife … Read more …
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The Ancient ‘Wonder Material’ Sucking CO2 Out of the Atmosphere
Peter Yeung: … Though public awareness is low, some scientists believe “biochar” is quietly becoming the world’s first major carbon removal success story … A kind of black powder, it is made by heating up organic matter such as wood chips, manure, leaves, or indeed coffee husks, in the absence of oxygen (to prevent its combustion, which would emit CO2) in a process known as pyrolysis. The creation of biochar removes CO2 from the atmosphere, and in doing so, turns the natural decay of organic matter into a carbon-negative process Read here …
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Study: A third of the West’s burned forests can be traced to fossil fuel companies
Kate Yoder: The research could advance court cases seeking to hold polluters accountable for climate-fueled disasters. … The study, published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Research Letters on Tuesday, is the first to quantify how corporate emissions have made wildfires worse. … The new study relies on a key risk factor called the “vapor pressure deficit, … Hotter temperatures cause moisture to be pulled out of vegetation, turning forests into tinderboxes just waiting for a spark. …Read here …
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Can You Fight for Climate Justice Without Being Antiwar?
Teddy Ogborn: No! … We cannot end climate change without ending war. … The United States military is the planet’s largest single emitter of greenhouse gasses and consumer of oil. … Ending war means ending the war economy–the colonial system of extraction and exploitation that got us into this mess in the first place. … That a more peaceful world could be a result of the broad system change climate activists are calling for is no coincidence. … Read more…
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Want to Protect Your Health? Start by Protecting Indigenous Land
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Teapot Dome Redivivus: How Clinton and Gore Opened the Alaskan Arctic to Oil Drilling
: By far the biggest scandal in town, entirely unreported, is the new Alaskan oil rush. … Following the standard script for the Clinton Administration, it is a story of special access and special rights, greased by well-placed lobbyists, secured by corporate campaign disbursements and involving the transference-on an almost unfathomable scale–of public wealth into private hands. … Read more
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Kelp Farming Is Reviving an Ancient Practice — and a Modern Economy
Iris Crawford: The Shinnecock community no longer lives off the water as it once did — rapid development, pollution and warming waters have led to losses in fish, shellfish and plants that were once central to the Shinnecock diet and culture. … That’s why Tela Troge, an attorney and member of the federally recognized tribe, started planting […]
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Why the Ambler Road is One of the Biggest Threats to Alaskan Wildlands
George Wuerthner: The proposed 211-mile Ambler Road would connect the Dalton Highway (pipeline haul road) with the Ambler Mining District in the western Brooks Range. The ore belt that stretches for 200 miles contains copper, cobalt, lead, and zinc and could be one of the most valuable deposits in the world, especially as people turn to […]
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