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Showing posts with label pollution. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pollution. Show all posts

Friday, September 2, 2011

President Obama concedes the wrong point in pollution regulation

© 2011 Joshua Stark

President Obama has pulled back from his earlier proposal to put stricter limits on ground-level ozone, a major pollutant and cause of asthma attacks and deaths, reports the Associated Press.

By this act, the President has conceded to opponents the very idea that pollution regulations are job killers, and opened the door to a flood of rollbacks, and the subsequent pollution increases that will come with them.

Hard choices have to be made, and the President has ducked a big one right here.  Sadly, he has done it by buying into the notion that pollution control is a net loss to our economy, thus legitimizing the idea, even though, under our current circumstances, it almost never has merit. 

In our dirtiest places, Americans live like 3rd World countries.  California's Central Valley has thousands of Americans who can't even drink their own tap water, and one-fifth of their children have asthma (for a thorough look at the impacts of asthma and ozone on the Valley, click here).

The regulation that the President has backed off would have direct impacts on asthma rates in places like the Central Valley, improving the quality of life for millions of Americans, particularly the poor.  But, what would be the economic impact?

Well, in 1997 the EPA estimated that asthma cost the U.S. between $9 and $11 billion (today, that would be $12.5 to %15 billion).  And these rates don't calculate lost productivity due to parents' worries over a hospitalized child, stress from losing a child, young people's inability to perform work throughout their life due to their impaired physiques and oxygen loss during growth.

Additionally, these calculations don't take into account the value of individual dollars - a gaping intellectual hole when calculating economic impacts.  Simply put, one dollar is worth more in a poor person's hands than it is in a rich person's hands, especially now.  A poor person, when getting a dollar, will spend that dollar, because it is more valuable turned into food than it is sitting in a bank.  A rich person may spend that dollar, or they may save it, because its value as a saved dollar may be bigger than its value as one more hamburger.

Right now, our economic problem is in large part due to our low total demand for goods and services because we can't afford them, because there isn't enough circulating money.  Money isn't circulating because we have too many people out of work, unable to afford things.

We are in the beginning stages of a vicious cycle, economically-speaking, and this cycle has nothing to do with our pollution.  But, regulating our pollution can go a long way toward ending this cycle and getting us out of our current slump.  Robust pollution regulation can lead to direct job growth in the testing and regulating industries (often public-private partnerships), and it will lead to increased productivity among those who would see improved health.  The additional demand from this growth of more valuable dollars would lead to increased supply to meet that demand, pushing up employment.

Make no mistake, companies who fight these regulations want to pollute.  If they didn't want to pollute, they would not care about the regulation.  They do not care about total demand, they do not care about social health improvements.  The individuals who work in these companies might care, but officially and professionally, they don't make their decisions based on what is good for the nation; they cannot, because the pressures of their fiduciary duties and their pressures to see quarterly profits are too great.


Economic reasons aren't the only reasons for robust pollution controls, and they shouldn't even be the first reasons.  But, there are real economic benefits to robust pollution control, and the President, by ignoring these, has lost sight of the good of the nation and has given over to ideas that will further stunt our growth, economically and otherwise.

Monday, March 28, 2011

Black Swans, the Precautionary Principle, and Power


© 2011 Joshua Stark

A quick note:  I'd like to read what you all think about nuclear power in light of the events in Japan.  It is a horrible, sad, tragic series of calamities befalling the country right now, and I won't tolerate any unkind comments.  For us, however, the debate should begin.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of "black swan" thinking, in general.  However, outliers should be examined in the context of the level of catastrophe that may one day occur.  For nuclear and large hydropower, the potential for catastrophe is large at generation.  For petroleum and coal-based generation, the potential for catastrophe is large at extraction (see the Gulf).  Really, the only generation types that would appear to limit the potential for catastrophe is very small hydropower, wind, and solar power.  

What do you all think?

Monday, August 9, 2010

Watch out for radioactive pigs from space! (and truffles)

© 2010 Joshua Stark

Except for the space part, the title is true if you live or plan to visit East Germany (and probably huge parts of Eastern Europe and Russia), and you also plan to eat wild boar or certain mushrooms, then you might be interested in this article in the Spiegel (via the Hog Blog).

25 years after Chernobyl, German hunters are still killing contaminated hogs, and the German Government is required to reimburse them for it, last year to the tune of over a half-million dollars.

The article points out, among other things, that the pigs are probably still being contaminated because they feed on certain mushrooms, including truffles, that still concentrate the contaminants.  And, they are finding some pigs contaminated at rates over 11 times the allowed about of radioactivity.

I also thought this might be interesting for people who are on the fence about subsidizing nuclear as an energy option.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Lead bans in California

© Joshua Stark 2010

Phillip at the Hog Blog beat me to it, but I wanted to note here that the proposed lead ammunition ban in California wildlife areas was killed in committee.  I don't expect this decision to be paraded around by opponents as another example of wise leadership on the part of our legislature, but it should.
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That's right, I said that the folks who were opposed to this ban need to acknowledge, vocally and in public, that this decision was a good, wise decision.  Then, they need to take it a step further, and offer a bill that would provide for research on these properties, research that looks for any and all impacts from potential pollutants, including lead, but also other pollutants.  It's time to judo-flip this puppy, lock arms with other members of the environmental and EJ communities, and say, "hey, there is a concern for pollutants on our lands.  We worry, because we love the wild, and we also eat the wild.  We want healthy places for our land and for our children."

Now is the time to step up with some solid language.  I propose the bill language include general research into airborne, soil, and water pollutants with a focus on identifying the toxins and determining their vectors into the habitat.  I also propose that findings be reported by five years' time.  Last, I propose that the research consider each wildlife area individually, that it not be lumped into some general statements.

We are a huge state with many climates, dozens of microclimates, many different watersheds, and a huge diversity of industries.  We also have a gigantic population that is highly urbanized.  All of these factors weigh in on the various pollutants with which we live.

Seriously, this could be the impetus for bringing together those who care about our environment, whether for hunting, for its own sake, or for the pollutants that harm our own neighborhoods.

Editorial note:  I did support the lead ban in condor country, but opposed the proposed lead ban in all wildlife areas.  I also no longer shoot lead at all when hunting, because I have a pregnant wife and a three-year-old daughter.  We need solid science to show that a lead ammunition ban would, indeed, positively impact my wild places, and where this comes to light, I do support lead bans.  But, where it is determined that it is not causing a problem, I do not support a ban.

The sorrowful pessimist in me says that other politics (namely, the grip of huge industries on our political sphere) will keep our groups from organizing on this issue.  But, I try to remain hopeful, and if anyone is interesting in helping out, please let me know.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Utilitarian Environmentalism?

© 2010 Joshua Stark

Should environmentalists embrace utilitarianism as an ethos, or are they barking up the wrong tree?

In my recent conversations on pollution, and population growth, I've noticed that many environmentalists claim utilitarianism as their ethical lodestone. Usually, I bite, and try to argue from within the confines of utilitarianism, but occasionally I question the premise.  (For a good definition of utilitarianism, read this.)
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Utilitarianism is a 'consequentialist' ethic:  The rightness or wrongness of an action depends only upon the consequences of the action.  In utilitarianism, therefore, the only good thing is some form of happiness, or pain aversion, and actions are deemed ethical or unethical by how effectively they can maximize happiness and avoid pain.  There are no inherently 'good' or 'bad' things, people or actions.  Also, therefore, the only equality among people is coincidental to the level of happiness or aversion to pain that particular actions may have upon them.

Personally, I have trouble reconciling an environmentalist worldview with utilitarianism both in theory and in practice.  For example, utilitarianism very easily supports the type of elitism that many people find unethical by requiring that smaller communities bear the burden of the pollution of larger communities, so long as the total good feelings win out.  Also, a person has to really go through contortions to use utilitarianism for arguing against over-consumption, or to even think about waste as a problem.

But where utilitarianism makes its biggest flub in environmentalism is the fact that it gives no inherent value to the environment.  To me, it seems reasonable that an "environmental" ethos values the environment as more than what it can provide to people.

Of course, it is up to today's philosophers to adhere to such strict codes as utilitarianism.  This is ironic, because philosophy literally means "love of wisdom", and usually wisdom teaches that such strict mathematical dogmas don't make it very far in this world.  But for environmentalists, it may be a better idea to acknowledge belief in the environment as valuable in and of itself, in addition to what it provides for us.  Utilitarianism can be a great decision-making tool at times and in particular ethical dilemmas.  But, it is not an environmental ethos.

Thursday, June 3, 2010

Internalizing externalities, cancer-causing pesticide edition

© 2010 Joshua Stark

The San José Mercury News reports on the probable use of methyl iodide in California.

"The California Department of Pesticide Regulation has proposed registering methyl iodide as a pesticide in California to the dismay of scientists and environmental groups, who say it is so toxic that even chemists are reluctant to handle it."

Methyl Iodide was proposed and accepted by the US EPA as an alternative to methyl bromide in 2007. Methyl Bromide was phased out because of its damage to the ozone layer.

So, instead of using a pesticide that causes an externality to the atmosphere, we as people are about to switch to an agent that 'internalizes' that damage, so to speak.

This is also another example of a false choice.  Where's the "none of the above" box to check?

If you are interested in weighing in on this issue, please make your voice heard at the Dept. of Pesticide Regulation's public comment section.  The article above has the address and email, or you can email:
mei_comments@cdpr.ca.gov

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

The Secret of NIMBY

© 2010 Joshua Stark

Okay, so I have a 'problem' with silly, obscure titles.  Sue me.  But there is a secret of NIMBY (Not-In-My-Back-Yard'ism)... that secret is... we all use it, and it ain't all that bad.

I'm sure you've heard NIMBY excoriated as a concept at one time or another.  Usually, hateful language is aimed at the concept when tied to limousine-liberal-elite-hippie-tree-hugger hypocrisy, like when a wealthy, left-leaning neighborhood turns down a waste facility in their county, and it gets located in a poor backwater.  You can also hear it when people argue about the future of greenhouse gases, as in the case of David Zetland's post here. (if you read the comments section, that's me defending NIMBY.)
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However, there are many logical, ethical reasons for the value of NIMBY, the value of protecting your own back yard.  And I'll start this defense, as many ethical philosophers do, with a claim, and then use a thought experiment (a pretend set-up used to illustrate a particular idea) to support it.

My claim:  People prioritize their values, and people who do not value the safety and well-being of their own physical places are stupid.

Yes, I'm blunt - this is a blog, not Harvard.  (And although I didn't include a "should" or "ought" claim in the sentence, it's inferred.)

Now, to support this claim with a thought experiment couched in a series of questions:

First, would a reasonable person allow a threatening murderer to live in their actual back yard?  No, a reasonable person would not.  Then, would a reasonable person allow a threatening murderer to live in the back yard of someone living 10,000 miles away?  Yes, a reasonable person would allow that.  That second claim sounds silly, but it is true.  Many bad people live in other countries, other states, even other towns.  Where we are able, people move those bad actors out of their own back yards, and others do not begrudge them this, (with one nuanced exception which I will address later).  But the reality of the world is that we must prioritize our values, and our limited resources demand that we prioritize the safety and well-being of our location.  That is NIMBY in a nutshell.  Now, let's see this concept in environmental ethics, with another thought experiment/claim.

A person has every reason to keep open, seeping toxic waste from being dumped in their physical back yard.  A community of these same persons has every reason to keep open, seeping toxic waste from being dumped in their public places.  In fact, as I claimed above, it would be stupid for a community to allow open, seeping toxic wasted to be dumped in their public places, or, to put it more broadly, and kindly, it is perfectly reasonable, even expected, for a community to prioritize its own physical safety and well-being.  If you agree with this, then you agree with some form of NIMBY'ism, and your problem isn't with the concept, it's with the application in particular circumstances. (If you don't agree with it, stop reading here.)

Take another example, more positive this time:  When a California community pays local taxes, should they expect those tax revenues to pay equally for roads built in North Korea?  India?  New York?  Arizona, then?  It is perfectly reasonable, even expected, that a community will prioritize its own infrastructure.  In fact, one may go so far as to make the ethical claim that a community should prioritize its own infrastructure, its own physical safety and well-being, and that to do otherwise (to build an equal amount of roads all over the Earth) would be... well, stupid.

Interestingly, attacks on NIMBY'ism almost always occur in only two circumstances.  One is when arguing about the general notion of externalities (effects upon society from production and consumption).  The other, more common time, is when specific communities pressure a particular enterprise (say, liquor stores or waste facilities) out of their location, or export their own problems, thus putting pressure on neighboring communities.   The latter is actually a form of NIMBY'ism, and it falls under that "nuanced exception" I referred to.  The former, however, is typically an off-hand remark that does little to further an understanding of the real world, and it fails whenever specific examples are provided.

"Opponents" of NIMBY'ism typically make an argument analogous to "an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind".  If you push a bad thing out, they say, then you push it into somewhere else.  "Opponents" also add that if you extend some sort of NIMBY'ism into the universal (that is, treat the whole world like your back yard), then you create an untenable place, because our bad stuff has to go somewhere.  Usually, anti-NIMBY arguments assume both that the selfish nature of NIMBY'ism is wrong, and that the particular problems being exported are inevitable problems with no other solutions. 

Did you notice opponents in quotation marks?  That's because these folks only oppose NIMBY when it involves others' back yards - NIMBY-as-universal - not NIMBY as applied to their own communities.  Nobody says, "yes!  I'll take your open, seeping toxic waste in my physical back yard"; they always have a reason for why their place is no good for it.  This is not unreasonable, but it is hypocritical.

These "opponents" also believe that bad things are inevitable from production and consumption, but they are unwilling to allow those bad things into their own back yards, so they basically become NIMBY-people, with a dose of hypocrisy, topped by an unwillingness to deal directly with the bad things they believe they must create through their own production and consumption.  What they have really done is fall into that nuanced exception.

Really what angers people, the unethical behavior that gets labeled NIMBY, is when individuals or communities export their own messes into other people's back yards.  This is usually made worse by the fact that the wealthy can buy their community's safety (economic NIMBY, and the reason why people want to be rich), while poor folks cannot.  The recent fight between Kern County and L.A. over the latter's dumping their literal crap in the former's back yard offers a prime example.  L.A. residents do not want to deal with their own poop.  Kern counters with a firm, "Not In My Back Yard".  Both represent NIMBY, but only one has breached an ethical line here.  L.A. needs to learn to deal with its own waste.  But, whoever wins this argument, NIMBY is not the bad guy here.

People need to prioritize the safety and well-being of their communities.  Rather than excoriating the notion when arguing over who and where gets to deal with our waste, we should understand the value of NIMBY and instead look for ways to internalize external impacts -say, by pricing or capping pollution levels to a much greater degree.

Friday, May 28, 2010

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

Vileness from the Right and Left over the oil spill

© 2010 Joshua Stark

I won't belabor this point, because the spill is getting enough coverage from folks who can write far better than I.  However, I do want to help provide a context, and do what I can to keep this from becoming merely a political football.
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In that vein, then, I provide the following:  First, there is no socialist/communist conspiracy to create an oil catastrophe in order to end petroleum as we know it, or to try to usher in a socialist regime.  All socialist regimes have loved oil, from the good ol' USSR, to today's Venezuela.  Second, this disaster has not created any kind of political "opportunity".

What happened in the Gulf of Mexico, and continues to happen, is quite simply a horrible, horrible catastrophe.  Eleven souls were lost on that platform, and the ensuing damage will destroy countless human lives and livelihoods, untold numbers of sea life and habitats, and will change the way we know the region.  We will lose billions of dollars and work-hours, just to get as close to square one as we can.

Yes, we can learn from this horrible event.  Yes, we can and should use this experience to grow as people.  But, to use this catastrophe to fan the flames of dissent among us, or to claim that it has created a political opportunity, shows a callous disregard for human and wild life, and, dare I say it, is anti-environmental.

In particular, I am upset at the editors of Grist magazine for letting this piece, titled, "Wake up, Obama. The Gulf Spill is Our Big Chance" not only get published, but get such a title.  Environmentalists used to be known as being in favor of living things.  The realpolitik expressed in this title and the piece, itself, however, continues to destroy the general public's perception of our community.

The Gulf Spill offers no "chance", no opportunity.  It is a sad disaster that we may learn from, yes, but so long as "environmentalists" claim some political gain from disasters, especially in light of the deaths of workers, our community will relegate itself to the fringes of society and politics.

Monday, May 3, 2010

Beware Brits bearing business contracts

© 2010 Joshua Stark

A quick note for folks on the Southern coast.  al.com has a story about British Petroleum (BP) hiding a waiver to sue to fishermen who may be impacted by the oil spill and who signed up to deploy boom to help corral the spill.  Basically, if offers $5k for the job (I believe), but buried in its fine print was an agreement to waive suing BP over damages in the future.

I'm no lawyer, but I'd recommend nobody sign that thing.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

James Cameron keeps bothering me...

© 2010 Joshua Stark

James Cameron obviously didn't read my last post about some environmental inconsistencies between his talk and his actions

Yesterday, National Public Radio's 'All Things Considered' covered the concept of 'windowing' in the movie industry - where companies try to maximize profits from each medium their movie will hit - and did so by considering how Fox is working Avatar. 

It's the last comment that deserves note on this blog:

"ULABY: In the case of "Avatar," the DVD coming out does not have a single extra - no commentary, no nothing. The studio wants fans to buy both this version and the fully-loaded DVD that comes out in gift-buying season in November."

That's right... Mr. Green, the man parading all over the World trying to save it, will manufacture his DVD in a way to cajole millions upon millions of people to buy the same thing twice.

He just proves my point, you can't sell conservation.  I just wish he'd opted for the 'conservation' part of that equation, rather than the 'sell'.

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Kern county defends its poop ban

© 2010 Joshua Stark

The L.A. Times reports that L.A. and Orange counties are appealing a voter-approved Kern county ban on their biosolids being trucked onto its county.

I think it's time that local governments work out local solutions to their own messes.  Go, Kern county!

Monday, March 1, 2010

Specialization can be bad: A crappy example

© 2010 Joshua Stark

The Washington Post has an interesting article out about manure being the next big pollutant. In response, expect animal rights' groups to argue that this is because we are meat eaters and dairy eaters, and if we'd only wean ourselves from these practices, we'd not pollute so much.
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But the problem isn't our carnivory, nor is it the poop, per se. The problem is our over-compartmentalization in agriculture.

As many farmers know, animals belong on farms. Pest reduction, soil movement, fertilization, and more are provided by animals, and in return, the land feeds and waters the animals. Humans add to the equation by providing protection and shelter for both, and by mimicking processes that most effectively provide, and in return, animals and plants produce more, and humans take the extra.

When we decided to separate the diverse systems into compartments, we temporarily increased our efficiencies. However, we quickly ran up against a problem: The effects of multiple components in a system provided for the needs of each particular component. Plants converted nitrogen, for example, from the manure provided by the local animals. In the new system, however, no nitrogen was being returned to the soil in the barren lands with one type of plant.

The solution was to engineer nitrogen from petroleum and subsidize it - the Green Revolution. Satisfied that we'd overcome the problem of compartmentalization, we pumped a tremendous amount of "new" nitrogen into the system.

Now, of course, we understand that nitrogen is a pollutant, too.

At the same time, other insidious consequences came with compartmentalization: Most humans were removed from the food production cycle; inhumane conditions were created for animals in the name of profit and a false economy; and an illusion was created that separated systems were cleaner and healthier than incorporated ones.

The first and second consequences above created the animal-rights movement; the first and third helped to create our obsession with "sterilized" environments, warping it with an unnatural environmental outlook.

Now, we are compartmentalized. By removing anything living from our sight and responsibility, by removing ourselves from working relationships with other living things, we have become hyper-sensitive to the "chaos" inherent in organic systems and we have anthropomorphized other creatures, instead of knowing and appreciating them as they are. We have also become addicted to the prices of our subsidized and unsustainable, compartmentalization of agriculture.

Feeding into this compartmentalized system is Monsanto, hoping to get its RoundUp Ready alfalfa approved for use in the U.S. (This is an alfalfa that has been genetically modified to not die when sprayed with RoundUp). Healthy grasslands don't consist of just one type of plant, and our current alfalfa-growing practices are used to support CAFO's. If you get a chance, head over and comment (by Wednesday!) that you don't want this alfalfa in our system. And, if anybody at the federal government is reading this, the comment system online is a hassle, and needs to be simplified.

Compartmentalizing the land is no way to maintain healthy food systems or ecosystems.

Monday, February 1, 2010

Green tech, off-topic on taxes, rainwater capture, and a new blog

© 2010 Joshua Stark

A couple of links for the day, with a bit of commentary.

Dan Walters at the Sacramento Bee has an interesting story on green tech in California, and whether and how we can keep it growing here. He focuses on bureaucracy and taxes as problems in keeping green businesses here. I'd like to add that we've really put ourselves in a pickle by getting used to exorbitantly low property taxes. Yes, I'll touch California's political third rail in my blog, and from an economics angle:

Do you think the total prices paid by people to purchase homes in California, was honestly lower in the subsequent 30 years after its passage? That's rhetorical - no, they weren't any lower than they otherwise would have been. The extra profit that would otherwise have gone into schools, roads, and social programs in the state instead went directly into sellers' pockets, and into inflating a housing bubble. This is because California's greatest, most valuable asset is its location. Property taxes are higher in Ohio, they are higher in Texas. In Texas. Yet, Texas government is considered the new way to do things right. Maybe it is, and we should follow suit by raising our property taxes.

Now, California has to make up for lost revenue because it gave up its share of land prices. In the meantime, our schools are worse, our air quality is worse, our job prospects are worse, and we rely too heavily on regressive (sales) taxes and taxes that the wealthiest among us can more easily opt out of (income taxes don't work at the state level to any great degree). Also, our property values yo-yo terribly, but were still out of the range of the fixed-income folks we pretended to protect when we passed Prop. 13.

On to better news: The L.A. Times reports that the city of Los Angeles will soon (hopefully) require rainwater recapture in new, large building projects. This is great, amazing news, both for their local beaches and ocean, but also for, eventually, those of us in the Delta who would like to see L.A. become even more self-sufficient. We need good, mass technology that provides easy cleaning of rainwater for home use, and I see this as just one more step in that direction.

Tangentially, I've done some dabbling in rainwater capture numbers, and I believe, in Sacramento, a typical small home could capture enough rainwater for two months or so of their typical use from their roof.

Last, I wanted to link to the new Planning and Conservation League blog. These are good folks - any group whose annual symposium can get funded by Tejon Ranch and the National Wildlife Federation is doing something right. They are plugged into the state environmental scene to a great deal.