GreenWatch

B. McPherson Update:  The Canadian Coast Guard is reporting that all the recoverable oil  has been removed from the water. What does that really mean? You know that means that besides that oil that is now polluting Vancouver beaches is also in the water. While our Coast Guard personnel do the best job possible in the circumstances, you and I know that taking six hours to contain what is a tiny spill is not good enough. Let's remember that the Feds closed the Vancouver Harbour Coast Guard station and plan to remove even more disaster protection from one of the country's biggest ports. __ An oil spill Wednesday in Vancouver, BC, showed the residents how an oil spill would likely play out. The oil was spotted in that part of the harbour known as English Bay and reported by a sailor. At 5pm the oil slick was reported. Three hours later a crew showed up to try to contain the spill of heavy bunker oil. It took until 2 am Thursday morning for crews to put a containme...

B. McPherson Dow Chemical, third largest company in the world, should be able to spare a few million to clean up this mess. The people in Bhopal India are still suffering from the chemical release that has killed 25 000 to date. It has left many with respiratory problems, blindness and birth defects. Union Carbide, now wholly owned by Dow Chemicals(head offices in Michigan) had a pesticide manufacturing plant in the town. A release of methyl isocyanate gas spread over the town 30 years ago dropping small children where they stood, adults took a few minutes to die. Residents of Bhopal marked the terrible anniversary by marching in the streets and demanding that the corporations involved and the Indian government treat them fairly. Compensation was meagre and spotty. A widow was awarded the equivalent of $3.20/month. Eventually this was increased to $12/month. Death payments were $1000 but only if deaths could have been proved to be a direct result of the gas leak. Some In...

B. McPherson The cosmetic industry is taking a quick turn in their product offerings. The recent phenomenon in the beauty world of offering microbeads in everything from tooth paste to body scrubs is being phased out. By 2018 in the USA most states will have banned their use and the cosmetic companies are listening. Perhaps in the past you have purchased Crest toothpaste with neat little glitter bits in it. It’s supposed to encourage children to brush their teeth, but adults can use it too. I’ve used it. It’s kind of fun. Turns out the glitter bits are small pieces of coloured plastic. They are not poisonous, but polypropylene is not high of children’s meal menus. Many cosmetics contain tiny plastic beads as well. They have been touted as a way to achieve smooth skin. The organization Beat the Microbead has an extensive list of products that contain these tiny pieces of plastic. Those tiny pieces of plastic make their way down the drains of the cities and from there to...

B. McPherson Dirty coal is killing people in China China’s great push to establish itself as the leading industrial nation has come at a heavy price. Currently there are 2 300 operating coal fired electrical plants in the country. Noxious emissions are calculated to kill about 275 000 people each year. The figures are staggering. A  WHO's Global Burden of Disease report   estimated that 1.2 million people died prematurely in China in 2010 due to air pollution. Research published in the  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences  (PNAS) in July found that air pollution has caused the loss of more than 2.5 billion years of life expectancy in China – shaving   5.5 years off the average life expectancy . Greenpeace Pollution and In particular, air pollution has become a flash point in the PRC. The expanding middle class in China has been objecting to the rampant pollution which sickens their children and shortens their lives. Coal f...

Click to view this email in a browser Dear Barbara, When the federal review panel gave the New Prosperity mine proposal a 2nd thumbs-down, it looked like the “dead mine walking” would finally be laid to rest. Except the project keeps popping up again and again like the villain in a bad horror movie. Take action . The scathing federal review found that the proposed gold/copper mine at pristine Fish Lake in the heart of Tsilhqot’in traditional territory would cause significant adverse effects on water quality, fish and wetland ecosystems. It also warned of impacts on the South Chilcotin grizzly bear population. It should have been a slam dunk for the federal minister in charge, Leona Aglukkaq, to reject the mine. But now the proponent, Taseko Mines Ltd, is putting pressure on the federal government with disingenuous claims of technical mistakes in the review process, and threats of lawsuits – bullying tactics unprecedented in the history of the Canadia...

Metro Vancouver is looking to locate a garbage burner away from the city. Will your town fall for the promises? A new study published in this month’s Lancet Oncology confirms what many of us have suspected – dirty air causes lung cancer. Our lungs are the interface where oxygen passes into our bodies and carbon dioxide passes out. Other substances can move across the lungs’ membranes as well. Many things are suspended in the air besides oxygen and some of them can harm you. Lancet’s study specifically looked at particulate matter in nine European countries. Particle sizes ranged from large – soot to the very tiny – less than 10 microns(less than 10/1000 of a metre). We have many sources of particulate matter in our air. Wood, coal smoke, pollen, dirt, bacteria, viruses. Our bodies are very good at dealing with these unwanted bits. We usually simply breathe them out again or our immune cells destroy them. We cope less well with ultrafine particles. It makes good sense to keep...

From You Tube: Some of the reasons to oppose garbage incineration Press Release: Nanaimo Sierra Club FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Monday, July 29, 2013 No time to waste for formal opposition to Metro Vancouver’s incinerator NANAIMO, B.C. – Nanaimo City Council failed to directly oppose the siting of Metro Vancouver’s planned waste-to-energy (WTE) incinerator within Nanaimo city limits at the special open council meeting of July 22 after hearing appeals from Sierra Club Nanaimo and others to take strong measures to protect our local environment and Nanaimo residents from the toxic devastation such a facility would disperse. “We were dismayed that no direct action was taken despite the fact that seven councillors from Nanaimo sit on the Regional District of Nanaimo board, who had previously passed two resolutions expressing a negative stance toward waste-to-energy incineration within the region,” says Carla Stein, core member of Sierra Club Nanaimo. Instead, city council directed staff to...

B. McPherson  No water no life China’s great leap forward that started in the 1990s has exacted a heavy price on the environment and small farmers. Slack environmental protection laws have allowed the factory owners to dump toxic waste directly into waterways, polluting them in some cases to the point where it is dangerous to touch the water. In addition to widespread pollution of waterways and ground water, industry sucks up vast amounts of water in the manufacturing process. Much of China runs on coal power, a resource in abundance particularly in the north part of the country which also is amongst the driest of the territory. Coal uses about 17% of China’s available water, but much comes from already dry areas. Some of these areas are as dry as the Middle East. Water used for industry becomes unavailable for growing food. While the central government is aware of the looming crisis, many urban dwellers are going about their daily business in blissful ignorance of t...

B. McPherson Fukushima the gift that keeps on giving Tokyo Electric Power Company(TEPCO) executives have finally admitted that radioactive water is leaking into the Pacific Ocean and has likely been doing so since the ill fated Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power station failed so spectacularly in March 2011. TEPCO’s behavior since the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami which hit Japan in 2011 has been of incompetence. It has appeared that the executives of the company were more concerned with profits and saving face than saving the people who were affected by the disaster. The clean up and shut down of the Fukushima complex has been so fraught with bungling that it would be laughable except for the fact that people’s lives have been ruined and many will die as a result of their floundering. Incidents where the cooling system is knocked off line by gnawing rats in the electrical system beggars belief.  That’s just one of the incidents that threatened the world with an...

Burning garbage to get energy is a scam. B. Mcpherson The Regional District of Nanaimo Board of Directors firmly rejected the idea of establishing a garbage burner in the area, adding that they did not wish to see one anywhere on Vancouver Island. Last night, June 25 th , RDN bureaucrats floated the idea that they should liaise with Metro Vancouver bureaucrats regarding the criteria for establishing a garbage burner at Duke Point. In a split vote, the area directors voted to allow communications but with the proviso that the bureaucrats emphasize that the district is not open to be a dumping ground for MetroVancouver’s garbage. Officials in the Lower Mainland have been looking for a site to establish a “Waste to Energy” incineration plant. The communities in the Fraser Valley voted unanimously to reject such an installation in their area citing air pollution. North Vancouver rejected the idea as did Powell River. The elected officials sitting around the room were only i...

B. McPherson Want a little dioxin with your breakfast? The Metro Vancouver area is a predatory polluter. For years the City of Vancouver has shipped their waste to other places. Whether it is sewage released into the ocean or garbage, it is consistently moved to someone else’s back yard. The Iona Island and Lion’s Gate sewage treatment plants are primary treat plants. Iona the largest of the treatment plants spews over 500 million litres of poopy water a day into Georgia Strait. A standard Canadian wastewater test places ten rainbow trout into a tank of undiluted effluent; if less than half of the fish survive, the plant is said to have failed the test. Primary treatment facilities reduce the oxygen requirements of effluent by approximately 30% – just enough for half of the fish to survive. This is the treatment employed at the Iona facility. - See more at: The Dependent  When the tourists come to town, when the wealthy in their million dollar condos, the old mon...

B. McPherson The biggest petroleum pipeline corporation in Canada, Enbridge, has safety deficiencies in 117 out of 125 pump stations across Canada according to the National Energy Safety Board. It is a requirement that each pump station have emergency power backup to operate shut-down procedures. You may recall that it took Enbridge hours to shut down the pipe spewing bitumen into the Kalamazoo River. Eight stations across the country complied with that safety regulation. Of the 125 stations inspected, 83 lacked an emergency shut-down button. These regulations have been in place for at least 14 years. The regulation requiring an emergency shut-down button has been on the books since 1994. For its part, spokesman for the pipeline company, Graham White, said that it is a matter of interpretation of the rules. Battery power was in place at the stations, but this is deemed insufficient. The corporation has since installed the emergency equipment and is working towards com...

B. McPherson China’s much publicized pig float in their showcase city of Shanghai is just the latest insult to their waterways. Floating, rotting carcasses can be fished out of the river water and barring new swine dumping, if that were all that polluted the river, it could be made safe again. The toxic soup of sewage, garbage and industrial waste fouls many of the great rivers of China and nothing seems effective in stopping it. The fouling of China’s waterways will not be dealt with as long as those responsible for ensuring safe water ignore the problem and lie to the public. The authorities in Shanghai have declared the water with the putrid pigs, garbage, sewage and toxic chemicals safe to drink. The public doesn’t believe them, but is still forced to use the water for washing and cleaning. A river that flows through the industrial area of Shenzen is so polluted that the locals refer to it as the Black Dragon River. It supplies the drinking water for Hong Kong. ...