Environment
Hank |
During the George W. Bush administration, American furniture makers had a crippling disadvantage. While American timber was tightly regulated, foreign supplies had no limitations on where their wood originated from, and could engage in destructive practices and undercut U.S. companies.
President Bush solved that by modernizing the Lacey Act, which was the conservation brainchild of Republicans a century earlier and had been modified a few times since. Under the new law, if a supplier could not show a legitimate trail of legal acquisition, it simply could not come into the U.S. …
Hank |
A team of sociologists say they know of a sure way to hurt environmental protection: Elect a Democratic president.
An analysis of over 20,000 people from the General Social Survey between 1973 and 2014 found that support for environmental spending consistently plummeted during the administrations of Presidents Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. There are other known factors in regulatory support; the older people get the less they support more regulations, but it is a surprise to find that relative support for environmental regulation changes depending on which party is in the…
Hank |
House plants can help clean a home's air, but unless you live in a greenhouse a mechanical high-efficiency particulate (HEPA) air filter is the way to go, because it forces pet dander, pollen (even cigarette smoke if you still do that) or pollen through a mesh that traps those.
Plants may not be out of it in the future, though. A new genetically modified common houseplant, pothos ivy (Epipremnum aureum), can even remove small molecules HEPA filters miss, like chloroform and benzene. You probably don't need to worry about those, though they have been linked to cancer, unless you live in…
The United States, and other countries with modern science and technology regulations, have enjoyed terrific boosts in yields, so great that food has become a cheap commodity, which has allowed for alternative processes (organic, shade tree, natural, etc.) to flourish by charging a premium.
Science is not done yet. Most most crops are afflicted by a photosynthetic glitch, and evolved an energy-expensive process called photorespiration to deal with it. But photorespiration is anti-photosynthesis, so it drastically suppresses the yield potential of those crops. In a new study, crops…
Hank |
European scientific decision-making is often overtly political and that can lead to decisions which defy common sense.
Case in point; disposing of food waste.
In some countries they want food waste separated into its own garbage can but people can't use plastic bags, even if modern science has created a plastic that is just as compostable as the food.
In some countries they can.
There is no way for science to Brexit so companies, researchers and even pro-science politicians remain stymied in parliament-style governments, which must cater to numerous constituencies, often in conflict with…
This year, I served on the judging panel for The Royal Statistical Society’s International Statistic of the Year.
On Dec. 18, we announced the winner: 90.5 percent, the amount of plastic that has never been recycled. Okay – but why is that such a big deal?
Much like Oxford English Dictionary’s “Word of the Year” competition, the international statistic is meant to capture the zeitgeist of this year. The judging panel accepted nominations from the statistical community and the public at large for a statistic they feel shines a light on today’s most pressing issues.
Last year’s winner was 69…
This may be a welcome change from the climate change discussion which got a bit heated over the weekend. The Talanoa climate change story telling dialogs. They have been going on all day, in seven simultaneous sessions, today, 11th December 2018. The stories have been archived and you can rewatch them via Skype
Talanoa is a traditional word used in Fiji and across the Pacific to reflect a process of inclusive, participatory and transparent dialogue. The purpose of Talanoa is to share stories, build empathy and to make wise decisions for the collective good. The process of Talanoa involves the…
Hank |
If you are reading media claims about President Trump and the Waters of the United States, they are using terms like "unprecedented" and "sabotage" regarding rollback of some 2015 Obama restrictions that environmentalists had lobbied for and won.
Yet these new regulations never took effect, so how can it be sabotaging us?
Were we really in danger and only a set of regulations never enacted would save us? Are close-ups of frogs in pea-soup-looking water (obviously to evoke images of chemical sludge for readers who may have never seen a frog in a pond) real or fake news?
Non-profit, non-…
This is running as a scary story in the news today. I’m asked if it means we are all going to die. No, it does not. That was a 10 °C rise and we are headed towards 3.6 °C at maximum with the Paris pledges already. With the Paris agreement if they continue to ramp up the pledges they should get within 2 °C, many countries have already got to that point in their pledges and a fair number to within 1.5 °C. Others, especially China and Russia, face huge challenges but are rising to them especially China. We aren’t currently headed for anything like 10 °C.
For projections about the present we need…
This is an article from Head to Head, a series in which academics from different disciplines chew over current debates. Let us know what else you’d like covered – all questions are welcome..
Sharon George: Plastics are ingrained in our everyday lives. Since 1950, it’s estimated that we have produced billions of tons of plastic, and most of this is not recycled.
Plastics have spread around the world through oceans, rivers and the air to every part of the planet. In rivers and oceans, plastic moves vast distances and is now found right through the water column of the oceans, from the surface to…