eco-friendly Archives - Environmental ADR

When It Comes to Environmental Protection is New York Lagging Behind?

May 16, 2016 by Lester Levy Leave a Comment

New York State and City take pride in being leaders and trendsetters when it comes to legislative and regulatory action to protect consumers in a number of areas, including banking and insurance and commercial transactions. But when it comes to environmental protection, there are ways in which New York seems to be seriously lagging compared to the extent of efforts in many other jurisdictions.

The latest account of a serious lapse in environmental protection in New York is the subject of a recent article published in Crain’s New York about long-known, but largely unaddressed, concerns about Perchloroethylene, or “Perc,” a solvent used in the dry cleaning of clothes for many decades. There is a lot of literature on this subject that was developed over many years of scientific study. The inquiry focused on concerns of potential health risks to those who work at dry cleaning establishments, inhale perc’s fumes and drink water that contains it high concentrations of perc from its release into drinking water aquifers and such.

According to the article and other sources, USEPA deems perc a “likely carcinogen” that can harm the liver, kidneys and blood, and the immune, reproductive and central nervous systems. In response to this and its independent scientific findings the State of California banned the use of perc in 2007. Ironically, the article reports that Jack Nicholson turned into the Joker when he fell into a vat of it in the first Batman movie. I, myself, have mediated hundreds of perc cases, both large and small, involving releases of this contaminant into the environment in other states throughout the country. [Read more…]

Water Is Broken. Data Can Fix It.

March 28, 2016 by Environmental ADR Editor Leave a Comment

Water Is Broken Data Can Fix It

AS a nation, we have become disciples of data. We interview 60,000 families a month to determine the unemployment rate, we monitor how much energy we use every seven days, Amazon ranks sales of every book it sells every hour.

Then there is water.

Water may be the most important item in our lives, our economy and our landscape about which we know the least. We not only don’t tabulate our water use every hour or every day, we don’t do it every month, or even every year.

The official analysis of water use in the United States is done every five years. It takes a tiny team of people four years to collect, tabulate and release the data. In November 2014, the United States Geological Survey issued its most current comprehensive analysis of United States water use — for the year 2010.

The 2010 report runs 64 pages of small type, reporting water use in each state by quality and quantity, by source, and by whether it’s used on farms, in factories or in homes.

It doesn’t take four years to get five years of data. All we get every five years is one year of data.

The data system is ridiculously primitive. It was an embarrassment even two decades ago. The vast gaps — we start out missing 80 percent of the picture — mean that from one side of the continent to the other, we’re making decisions blindly.

n just the past 27 months, there have been a string of high-profile water crises — poisoned water in Flint, Mich.; polluted water in Toledo, Ohio, andCharleston, W. Va.; the continued drying of the Colorado River basin — that have undermined confidence in our ability to manage water.

In the time it took to compile the 2010 report, Texas endured a four-year drought. California settled into what has become a five-year drought. The most authoritative water-use data from across the West couldn’t be less helpful: It’s from the year before the droughts began.

Read the entire article at the New York Times.

This article was originally published in the New York Times written by Charles Fishman.

Apple ‘Renews’ its environmental push

March 28, 2016 by Environmental ADR Editor Leave a Comment

Apple ‘Renews’ its environmental push

Apple is ramping up its environmental push, including the creation of a robot that disassembles your old iPhone for easier reuse.

Two years ago, the tech giant said it wanted to be 100 percent energy-renewable in its worldwide operations. Currently, 93 percent of its facilities run on renewable energy, said Lisa Jackson, Apple’s vice president of environment, policy and social initiatives. Jackson, who headed up the Environmental Protection Agency from 2009 to 2013, spoke Monday at the start of a product event at the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, California.

To get to this point, Jackson said the company built a 40-megawatt solar farm in China and built solar arrays in Singapore.

“Just like everything we do at Apple, when we think about the environment, we think about innovation,” Jackson said, ultimately plugging Apple Renew, a program where you can recycle devices for free in store or via the mail. “We want to change the world for the better. We think there’s no better challenge in the world than our changing climate.”

“We put an incredible amount of money into designing the best products in the world,” she added. We “put that same amount of energy into thinking about what to do when they can no longer be used.”

Jackson also introduced a robot named “Liam” who deconstructs old iPhones so parts can be repurposed. The company showed a short video of Liam taking apart an iPhone, from its display to the camera. The robot helps Apple separate silver, gold and platinum materials to either be recycled or discarded. Apple touts that Liam “can take apart 1.2 million iPhones a year.”

“There’s no other machine in the world that can do what Liam can do,” Jackson said. It “will help us make even bigger strides in the area of reuse and recycling.”

Read this entire article at cnet.

This was originally published on cnet written by Terry Colllins.

How protecting the environment changes human nature

March 11, 2016 by Environmental ADR Editor Leave a Comment

Establishing nature preserves and other types of protected areas is one of the most common conservation strategies — and its benefit to the environment is clear. What’s less obvious, though, is how these protected areas affect the human communities nearby.

It’s an important question to consider, not only from a social standpoint, but from a conservation perspective as well: If a local community reacts negatively to the establishment of a preserve — which changes the ways in which they’re permitted to interact with the environment — it may be less likely that the protections will last or be successful in the long run.

Until now, it’s an issue that’s been poorly investigated. But a new study, published Friday in the journal Science Advances, may open the door to a new vein of research aimed at fostering greater understanding of the potential of protected areas for both environmental and human well-being. The study finds that protected areas may actually change the social structure of their associated human communities, inciting both higher degrees of cooperation and competition among community members — but with a net outcome that, in the right circumstances, can give a boost to overall social cohesion.

“This creative study provides some of the first experimental evidence showing that both negative and positive interactions can intensify after a cooperatively based human network is formed,” said Brian Silliman, a professor of marine conservation biology at Duke University (who was not involved with the new study) by email.

The new study, led by researcher Xavier Basurto, focuses on the social effects of marine protected areas off the coast of Baja California, Mexico.

“A lot of work has been done on the biological effects of marine protected areas, and much less work has been done trying to understand the effects that they have in fishing communities, or in the communities on the coastline that are influenced by marine protected areas,” said Basurto, an assistant professor of sustainability science at Duke University. Read More

Read the entire article at The Washington Post.

This was originally published in The Washington Post written by Chelsea Harvey.

Which State Cares Most About the Environment?

January 20, 2016 by Environmental ADR Editor Leave a Comment

Seriously, what did we do before Google? Not only do we have information on virtually everything under, on and above the sun, but we also now have data and trends.

The folks at SaveOnEnergy have collected and mined this Google Trends Search Volume data – putting together this awesome infographic below titled ‘Which States Care Most About The Environment?‘ which they’ve graciously shared with our readers. Sharing is caring!

Ever wonder which U.S. state searches ‘how to recycle‘ most often? How about searching ‘how to reuse‘ most often?Well, now you have those answers! Using Google Trends, SaveOnEnergy collected 12 months worth of commonly searched environmentally friendly phrases and terms. With that information, they were then able to gauge state-level interest in green activities such as; [Read more…]

When It Comes to Environmental Protection is New York Lagging Behind?

Water Is Broken. Data Can Fix It.

Apple ‘Renews’ its environmental push

How protecting the environment changes human nature

Which State Cares Most About the Environment?

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