KC GlobeNews

Free Music to Download: Over 60,000 Concerts by more than 3000 Bands

2008-10-31T16:36:00.000-07:00

Everyone knows you can download a zillion songs on mp3s.

But did you know you can also download more than 60,000 live music shows by over 3000 bands? And on top of it they are completely legally and free? Oh, did I mention that most of them are available in high quality lossless formats as well?

The answer is the LIVE MUSIC ARCHIVE at archive.org, the Internet Archive!

The Live Music Archive is run by etree.org. This is an online community providing high quality live concerts in a lossless, downloadable format. The Internet Archive teamed up with etree.org to preserve as many live concerts as possible for everyone to enjoy.

Uh, wait a minute... what kind of band would allow their live show to be downloaded for free? Well for those who did not know, there are a lot of bands like this. These band allow fans to freely trading some of their music, usually live recordings of their performances.

Some artists formally allow both taping and trading (e.g. most Jam Bands like the Grateful Dead, Allman Brothers, Phish, Widespread Panic, and so on). Some artists formally or tacitly allow trading of tapes even if taping isn't allowed. Regardless of the specific bands' trading policies, this is all for noncommercial use. In other words, it is for fans to enjoy!

If that's enough to convince you then by all means click here now:
http://www.archive.org/details/etree

Annual BAEER Fair in the San Francisco Bay Area

2008-09-02T20:49:00.000-07:00

Here's a plug for the Bay Area Environmental Education Resource Fair!

Every year I stop by this wonderful event to learn about the various government, eduational, business and nonprofit groups in the San Francisco Bay Area that are innovators in environmental education, for example Generation Green and their Dumpster Diversion Project.

The BAEER Fair is one of the best ways to show Bay Area kids of all ages some hands on environmental education.

The 32nd Annual Bay Area Environmental Education Resource Fair (BAEER Fair) happens in just a few months - on January 24th, 2009.

A wide-sweeping collection of resources dedicated to environmental education will be on hand at the Marin Center Exhibit Hall in San Rafael, CA.

This all day event (10 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.) draws teachers, students, parents, and community educators to see the many exhibits, events, and demonstrations from organizations across the spectrum of environmental education.

The Lawrence Hall of Science is proud to be a major sponsor of the 2009 BAEER Fair.

For more information, please visit www.baeerfair.org

And mark your calendars for January 24, 2009.

Happy Winter Solstice to all Earthlings!

2007-12-21T13:20:00.000-08:00

The year is 2007 AD. My calendar reads December 21, the special date called Winter Solstice. Or Summer Solstice south of the equator.

What is Winter Solstice?

The day on which Winter season starts in the northern hemisphere.

And the shortest dayof the year north of the equator.

And a special moment of the year since Neolithic times (confirmed by Stonehenge).

And holidays around the world are linked to the winter solstice.

Get many more details about Winter Solstice from KC AstroNews

And happy Winter Solstice!

Letter from Kiev: Latest Facts About Chernobyl And Nuclear Power

2006-05-10T08:41:00.000-07:00

This letter is from my friends Enid Schreibman and Fran Macy at the Center For Safe Energy.

Kiev, April 27, 2006

Dear Friends,

We are writing to you from Kiev where spring is breaking out, golden cupolas shine in the sun, and well-dressed people hurry alone wide sidewalks. We are here for a conference timed for the 20th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster and find that the media and many Ukrainian people are thinking and talking about Chernobyl and the medical, economic and psychological impacts that are still felt and will be for generations.

Top specialists from Ukraine, Europe and US threw information at us for two and one half intense days at the conference. While we have been at previous anniversary events in Kiev and have read about Chernobyl impacts for many years, we were still surprised and shocked by many things we heard and saw. "There are lessons from Chernobyl that concern everyone however far they may live from a nuclear reactor." We want to share some of these with you.

1. Over half the radioactive fallout from the Chernobyl power plant fell on European countries beyond the borders of the USSR. Some 40% of Western Europe is still contaminated. The health effects are “still emerging”.

2. An estimated 22,000 West European have died prematurely because of Chernobyl, according to a report by respected independent British scientists.

3. The UN investigation of Chernobyl consequences in 2004-5 did not study impacts outside the old Soviet borders. Western governments “are in denial” to protect their own nuclear industries.

4. The “catastrophe continues” in Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, the latter having received 70% of the fallout that fell on Soviet territory. (94% of Belarus lands are still contaminated with radioactivity.) In these countries the excess cancers, beyond normal rates, are projected to affect 30-60,000 people in the foreseeable future and 18-28,000 of these are expected to emerge in Belarus. The cases of thyroid cancers continue to rise rapidly above pre-Chernobyl rates, especially in children who were 1-5 years old at the time of the accident.

5. The non-cancer health effects are growing as people are exposed for many years to relatively low doses of radioactivity. General health levels are markedly lower in contaminated areas compared to those not receiving fallout. “Radiation causes instability in the nucleus of cells and they lose their ability to receive information from neighboring cells.”

6. The scope of the fallout was so large because the extraordinary force of the explosion in reactor four blasted radioactive materials as high as two kilometers where the winds are stronger than at the surface. Nevertheless, those living closest to the power station have been at greatest health risk for twenty years and will be for untold years.

7. While the government of Germany has negotiated a phase out of nuclear power by 2020, the governments of UK, US, Russia and even Ukraine are supporting both the extension of operations of existing reactors whose thirty-year licenses are expiring and the construction of new ones. Twenty-four reactors are under construction in 13 countries but only the first since 1991 is being built with an untested design in West Europe (Finland) and none in UK and US. (Polls of West Europeans show 55% against further reliance on nuclear and 37% for.) Asia is the main area of growth. Yet the nuclear industry is the slowest growing source of electricity generation in the world and the proportion of total electricity from nuclear fuel is dropping annually.

8. It is a false myth that Western reactors are safer by design than old Soviet reactors. Despite claims to the contrary, many of the former do not have stronger containment structures. Most Western reactors date from the 1980s before the Chernobyl accident and no new reactor has been started in the US since the Three Mile Island partial meltdown in 1979. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission published a report after the Chernobyl disaster saying that US reactors could release to the biosphere as much or more radioactivity as Chernobyl. In fact, most of the radioactivity of reactor four in the Chernobyl station is still in the ruined reactor. Speakers at the conference agreed that “Chernobyl is not the worst case disaster” because accidents at Western reactors could release even more harmful radioactivity. The father of the Russian nuclear technology, Dr. Kurchatov, once said, “Every reactor is a time bomb”.

9. Reliance on nuclear energy to counter global warming and replace fossil fuel is based on the false assumption of unlimited uranium fuel. In fact, uranium reserves are estimated to last no longer than fifty years.

10. The nuclear industry would go bankrupt in any true market economy because it cannot operate without massive government subsidies.

We hope you might want to pass these powerful facts on to friends since the Bush administration and the Congress are raising to $12 billion the annual subsidy for expanding the nuclear industry in the United States.

With our strongest personal wishes for a sane world,

Fran and Enid

Visit the CSE website

California quake could cause Katrina II

2006-02-24T10:21:00.000-08:00

Many densely populated regions in the US face the threat of flooding as disastrous as after Hurricane Katrina. The culprit is urban spread into river floodplains.

In California an earthquake or even a moderate flood could destroy the levee system protecting towns and cities along the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers.

Most of the Sacramento-San Joaquin delta land is below sea level and protected by 1,000 miles of levees.

Developers want to build 130,000 new homes near the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in the Central Valley. Among large US metropolitan areas Sacramento is one of the most at-risk for flooding.

Read the whole article here:
Scientists say California quake could cause Katrina II

Earthquake!

2006-02-11T11:29:00.000-08:00

2006 marks the 100th anniversary of the earthquake that almost wiped San Francisco off the map.

Are we ready for it when it happens again? Trust us, you don't want to find out.

WELCOME TO YOUR NIGHTMARE

The minute the next big earthquake hits—whether on the Hayward Fault or the San Andreas Fault or one of the other six major faults running like striations of cracking ice beneath the Bay Area, from Mendocino to Monterey and San Francisco to Walnut Creek—life as we know it will change forever.

Terrorism is an if. Earthquake is a when.

What if it happened today, shortly after you read this article—99 years after the famous 1906 earthquake and fire?

In Marin County, where a single winding path once led through the bucolic countryside, thousands of cars begin to wobble and dance along Highway 101 as the waves build in intensity. Some panicked drivers spin out of control and over the highway's small bridges.

Out past the eastern end of San Rafael, the old piers and shrimping cabins along China Camp start tumbling into San Pablo Bay; nearby houses in Santa Venetia, built on landfill, begin to wallow in the liquefied soil, as do the apartments in the largely Hispanic Canal district a few miles south.

Near Sausalito, rocks and soil from the steep hills above the southbound lanes of 101 begin to slide, burying cars and blocking the roadway.

Read the full article in San Francisco Magazine

Growing Risk Of Water Shortages And Flooding In California

2006-02-11T00:14:00.000-08:00

Thanks to greenhouse gases, California risks more winter floods and summer droughts.

Global warming will affect river flows. We'll have more rain and less snow. Snow remains will melt earlier in the year.

California’s major rivers will flow higher during winter and lower during spring and summer.

This is all assuming CO2 doubles (likely) and El Niño will remain the same (probably).

Read about the new research by Lawrence Livermore:

Growing Risk Of Water Shortages And Flooding In California

New Climate Research Reveals Growing Risk of
Water Shortages and Flooding in California

Large-scale Ecosystem Restoration Initiatives
Protecting and Restoring the San Francisco Bay-Delta

CDEC - California Data Exchange Center
Installs, maintains, operates hydrologic data collection network.
Snow gages, precipitation and river stage sensors.
Lots of forecasts reports, charts, satellite images.

CA State Water Board
Protects and enforces many water uses:
industry, agriculture, municipal, environmental

Nature lovers get dirty on World Wetlands Day

2006-02-07T17:25:00.000-08:00

What a great way to spend a sunny Saturday morning!

With my dog in tow I joined my neighbors and local volunteers in planting some native plant seedlings to help protect our local open space.

In my case "local open space" is a protected wetland sandwiched between my home and the San Pablo bay. It is called the Santa Venetia Marsh Open Space Preserve.

The Marin County Open Space District and local nonprofit organization "Save the Bay" and many volunteers are building a "biological fence" of native plants on both sides of the levy. Once these plants are established they will keep the endangered animals in the wetland (such as the California Clapper Rail, a rather elusive bird) from being disturbed by humans and their dogs.

Read the article in the Marin IJ. There is even a quote of mine at the end of the article!

Nature lovers get dirty
(Marin Independent Journal)

Related subjects:

World Wetlands Day

Save The Bay

Santa Venetia Marsh

California Clapper Rail

Untangled Humpback Whale Nuzzled Her Saviors

2006-01-25T09:36:00.000-08:00

A humpback whale freed by divers from a tangle of crab trap lines near the Farallon Islands nudged its rescuers and flapped around in what marine experts said was a rare and remarkable encounter.

Read the whole beautiful story:

Daring rescue of whale off Farallones
Humpback nuzzled her saviors in thanks after they untangled her from crab lines, diver says

The Green Banking Revolution

2006-01-23T14:49:00.000-08:00

The Green Revolution

Are banks sacrificing profits for activists' principles?

Adopting environmentally and socially responsible banking practices is the PC thing to do these days.

Banks say doing the right thing is a delicate balance.

Activists' aggressive tactics are forcing banks to adopt policies.

In 2005 PMorgan Chase became the third U.S. bank to adopt the benchmark Equator Principles (EP) for project finance; it also promised to create policies to promote sustainable forestry and protect indigenous people's rights and to cut its own-and its clients'-carbon-dioxide emissions.

Moreover, the bank extended the EP to include all loans, debt and equity underwriting, financial advisories and project-linked derivative transactions.

This makes JPMorgan Chase one of the most environmentally progressive banks on the planet.

Read the entire article here:
U. S. Banker | The Green Revolution

Bertrand Piccard's Solar-Powered Circumnavigation

2006-01-20T10:48:00.000-08:00

In 1997 Bertrand Piccard and his partner Brian Jones achieved the last great aviation feat of the 20th century: the first non-stop round the world balloon flight.

Piccard and his team are now taking on a spectacular human and technological challenge with a new team:

Around the world with a solar airplane.

Read all about it:

Solar Impulse - the official website

Popular Mechanics: Bertrand Piccard's Solar-Powered Circumnavigation - Sept. 2005 Cover Story

California Grapples with Execution

2005-12-09T19:32:00.000-08:00

Found this in the local Marin Independent Journal today:

Local lawmaker urges clemency
Joe Nation seeks clemency, moratorium on death penalty
Richard Halstead

Stanley Tookie Williams, founder of the notorious Crips street gang, is scheduled to be executed at San Quentin State Prison at 12:01 a.m. Tuesday for murdering a 7-Eleven clerk and a family of three during the commission of separate robberies in 1979.

Assemblyman Joe Nation, D-San Rafael, has asked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to grant clemency to Stanley Tookie Williams and commute his death sentence to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

In his letter, Nation urged Schwarzenegger to, at the very least, impose a moratorium on executions until the commission presents its findings. The commission expects to complete its work by the end of 2007.

Nation also appealed to Schwarzenegger's stated desire to cut wasteful government spending. According to estimates by Attorney General Bill Lockyer, it costs the state $12.5 million to execute a murderer and just $1.5 million to imprison them for life.

Read the entire article here

Jimmy Carter Speaks Out - Eloquently

2005-11-21T10:36:00.000-08:00

This isn't the real America

By Jimmy Carter

JIMMY CARTER was the 39th president of the United States. His newest book is "Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis," published this month by Simon & Schuster.

November 14, 2005

IN RECENT YEARS, I have become increasingly concerned by a host of radical government policies that now threaten many basic principles espoused by all previous administrations, Democratic and Republican.

These include the rudimentary American commitment to peace, economic and social justice, civil liberties, our environment and human rights.

Also endangered are our historic commitments to providing citizens with truthful information, treating dissenting voices and beliefs with respect, state and local autonomy and fiscal responsibility.

At the same time, our political leaders have declared independence from the restraints of international organizations and have disavowed long-standing global agreements — including agreements on nuclear arms, control of biological weapons and the international system of justice.

Instead of our tradition of espousing peace as a national priority unless our security is directly threatened, we have proclaimed a policy of "preemptive war," an unabridged right to attack other nations unilaterally to change an unsavory regime or for other purposes. When there are serious differences with other nations, we brand them as international pariahs and refuse to permit direct discussions to resolve disputes.

Regardless of the costs, there are determined efforts by top U.S. leaders to exert American imperial dominance throughout the world.

These revolutionary policies have been orchestrated by those who believe that our nation's tremendous power and influence should not be internationally constrained. Even with our troops involved in combat and America facing the threat of additional terrorist attacks, our declaration of "You are either with us or against us!" has replaced the forming of alliances based on a clear comprehension of mutual interests, including the threat of terrorism.

Another disturbing realization is that, unlike during other times of national crisis, the burden of conflict is now concentrated exclusively on the few heroic men and women sent back repeatedly to fight in the quagmire of Iraq. The rest of our nation has not been asked to make any sacrifice, and every effort has been made to conceal or minimize public awareness of casualties.

Instead of cherishing our role as the great champion of human rights, we now find civil liberties and personal privacy grossly violated under some extreme provisions of the Patriot Act.

Of even greater concern is that the U.S. has repudiated the Geneva accords and espoused the use of torture in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, and secretly through proxy regimes elsewhere with the so-called extraordinary rendition program. It is embarrassing to see the president and vice president insisting that the CIA should be free to perpetrate "cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment" on people in U.S. custody.

Instead of reducing America's reliance on nuclear weapons and their further proliferation, we have insisted on our right (and that of others) to retain our arsenals, expand them, and therefore abrogate or derogate almost all nuclear arms control agreements negotiated during the last 50 years. We have now become a prime culprit in global nuclear proliferation. America also has abandoned the prohibition of "first use" of nuclear weapons against nonnuclear nations, and is contemplating the previously condemned deployment of weapons in space.

Protection of the environment has fallen by the wayside because of government subservience to political pressure from the oil industry and other powerful lobbying groups. The last five years have brought continued lowering of pollution standards at home and almost universal condemnation of our nation's global environmental policies.

Our government has abandoned fiscal responsibility by unprecedented favors to the rich, while neglecting America's working families. Members of Congress have increased their own pay by $30,000 per year since freezing the minimum wage at $5.15 per hour (the lowest among industrialized nations).

I am extremely concerned by a fundamentalist shift in many houses of worship and in government, as church and state have become increasingly intertwined in ways previously thought unimaginable.

As the world's only superpower, America should be seen as the unswerving champion of peace, freedom and human rights. Our country should be the focal point around which other nations can gather to combat threats to international security and to enhance the quality of our common environment. We should be in the forefront of providing human assistance to people in need.

It is time for the deep and disturbing political divisions within our country to be substantially healed, with Americans united in a common commitment to revive and nourish the historic political and moral values that we have espoused during the last 230 years.

Source: LA Times, November 14, 2005

Marin County Untold Stories

2005-10-05T12:23:00.000-07:00

Here's a fun site to check out if you're interested in Marin County trivia! You'll find lots of fun Marin facts and photos.

Marin County Untold Stories:
http://www.bryndle.com/marin/

Most of the "Untold Stories" are about famous people (esp. from the entertainment industry) that lived in Marin and/or did something famous in this scenic region just north of San Francisco.

Kahl Consultants certified as a Green Business

2005-08-10T10:17:00.000-07:00

Great News from Kahl Consultants!

We've passed the test, Kahl Consultants is officially certified as a Marin Green Business.

The Green Business Program is a partnership among business leaders, government agencies and nonprofits.

It recognizes businesses that:

Demonstrate compliance with environmental regulations
Conserve energy, water, and other materials
Implement environmental practices that prevent pollution
Share environmentally responsible practices with other businesses in our community

The Marin County Green Business Program is part of the Bay Area Green Business Program.

The awards ceremony is in the Marin Civic Center on August 16 at 10 AM in Room 330.

Kahl Consultants invites you to be there.

And we invite your business to join a similar program in your community.

ICE - for future emergencies

2005-07-29T11:57:00.000-07:00

30 seconds that could save your life!

The "ICE" (In Case of Emergency) campaign suggests that you store the word "ICE" in your cell phone address book, and enter the
number of the person you would want to be contacted "In Case of Emergency".

For more than one contact name ICE1, ICE2, ICE3 etc.

In an emergency situation ambulance and hospital staff may then be able to find out who your next of kin are and be able to contact them.

Assuming of course that:
1) they know how to use your phone.
2) you keep you phone on your body
3) the phone is not damaged
4) you don't use a PIN number to secure access to your phone

This is a legitimate idea.

For further detail look here:
http://www.snopes.com/crime/prevent/icephone.asp

Whatever the drawbacks, carrying ICE information is a worthwhile effort.

And for further Emergency Action tips, visit our KC Emergency Action website:

http://kahl.net/action/

Poo Poo Power

2005-07-18T09:15:00.000-07:00

No joke folks, at a Prison in Rwanda feces is converted into combustible "biogas," or methane gas. It has reduced by 60 percent the annual wood-fuel costs which would otherwise reach near $1 million. The biogas technology was developed at the Kigali Institute of Science, Technology and Management.

The Rwandan prison biogas facilities recently received an Ashden Award for sustainable energy. The award comes with a $50,000 prize. It is given by the Ashden Trust, a British charity organization that promotes green technologies.

Read the whole article at Wired News:

Wired News: Human Feces Powers Rwandan Prison

US forces used Napalm-like bombs on Iraqis

2005-07-14T10:48:00.000-07:00

Another story that the mainstream media has hardly covered: the good old USA has admitted to using gruesome napalm-like bombs in Iraq.

Sure, they call them "Mark 77 firebombs" but they are incendiary devices that look and function "remarkably similar" to napalm weapons.

In case you've forgotten, in 1980 the UN banned the use of napalm against civilians - after those pictures of a naked girl victim fleeing in Vietnam shocked the world.

America, which didn't ratify the treaty, is the only country in the world still using the weapon.

So first we find out that the US forces in Iraq used depleted uranium (DU) and now the son of napalm.

Does this come to a shock to you? It should. Do you find it hard to believe?

Don't take our word for it. Here are some links to news articles from :

SignOnSanDiego.com > Officials confirm dropping firebombs on Iraqi troops

US defends use of napalm-like firebombs - Iraq - theage.com.au

SundayMirror.co.uk - FALLUJAH NAPALMED

Incinerating Iraqis; the napalm cover up

The New Napalm in Iraq (News) Barb Jacobs

Daily Kos: Fallujah: Napalm By Any Other Name

US Lied to Britain Over Use of Napalm in Iraq War

Bird deaths at Altamont wind farm

2005-07-06T12:27:00.000-07:00

Activists seek to curb bird deaths at wind farm

ALTAMONT, California: When it comes to wind power, few places are more productive -- or more deadly to birds -- than this gusty stretch of rolling hills between the San Francisco Bay area and the San Joaquin Valley.

At a time when demand is rising for greener energy sources, the Altamont Pass is a leading producers of wind power in the US, generating enough electricity annually to power 120,000 homes.

Over 5,000 windmills line the hilltops, so migrating birds get chopped up in fast-rotating turbine blades as they fly through or hunt for prey.

1,700 to 4,700 birds are killed each year in the Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area. Between 880 and 1,300 are federally protected raptors such as burrowing owls, red-tailed hawks and golden eagles, according to the California Energy Commission.

Environmentalists were once reluctant to take on an industry that provides an eco-friendly alternative to fossil fuels.

Bird deaths have prompted wildlife advocates to sue wind farm operators and appeal Alameda County's decisions to renew their operating permits without requiring measures to reduce bird collisions.

Read the entire article at CNN.com:

Activists seek to curb bird deaths at wind farm

US Christian fundamentalists are driving Bush's Middle East policy

2005-07-05T16:28:00.000-07:00

Their beliefs are bonkers, but they are at the heart of power in the USA.

To understand what is happening in the Middle East, you must understand what is happening in Texas. Read the resolutions passed at the state's Republican party conventions, such as:

* homosexuality is contrary to the truths ordained by God
* "any mechanism to process, license, record, register or monitor the ownership of guns" should be repealed
* income tax, inheritance tax, capital gains tax and corporation tax should be abolished
* immigrants should be deterred by electric fences
* Israel has an undivided claim to Jerusalem and the West Bank
* Arab states should be "pressured" to absorb refugees from Palestine
* Israel should do whatever it wishes in seeking to eliminate terrorism

Why is the Middle East of such pressing interest to people of a state seldom celebrated for its fascination with foreign affairs? Because several million people Americans have succumbed to an extraordinary delusion.

Two 19th century immigrant preachers cobbled together a series of unrelated passages from the Bible to create what appears to be a consistent narrative: Jesus will return to Earth when certain preconditions have been met.

The first was the establishment of a state of Israel. The next involves Israel's occupation of the rest of its "biblical lands" (most of the Middle East), and the rebuilding of the Third Temple on the site now occupied by the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa mosques.

The legions of the antichrist will then be deployed against Israel, and their war will lead to a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon. The Jews will either burn or convert to Christianity, and the Messiah will return to Earth.

What makes the story so appealing to Christian fundamentalists? Before the big battle begins, all "true believers" (i.e. those who believe what they believe) will be lifted out of their clothes and wafted up to heaven during an event called the Rapture. The worthy get to sit at the right hand of God and watch their political and religious opponents being devoured by boils, sores, locusts and frogs, during the seven years of Tribulation which follow.

The true believers are now seeking to bring all this about. This means staging confrontations at the old temple site (in 2000, three US Christians were deported for trying to blow up the mosques there), sponsoring Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, demanding ever more US support for Israel, and seeking to provoke a final battle with the Muslim world/Axis of Evil/United Nations/ European Union/France or whoever the legions of the antichrist turn out to be.

The believers are convinced that they will soon be rewarded for their efforts.

Read the full article here:
George Monbiot: Their beliefs are bonkers

Fasten your seat belts!

The Rapture Ready website has a Rapture Index, designed to measure the type of activity that could act as a precursor to the rapture.

Discover how close you might be to flying out of your pyjamas by watching the Rapture Index. The higher the number, the faster we're moving towards the occurrence of pre-tribulation rapture.

The Rapture Index:
The Rapture Index

Talking Zero Trash

2005-06-24T18:25:00.000-07:00

From rethinking recycling to reconsidering our relationship to trash, the zero-waste movement challenges conventional wisdom

A guaranteed conversation-stopper, the topic--and indeed, the reality--of garbage is not going to go away any time soon. Moreover, there are a number of widely held public assumptions that impede progress toward that elusive goal which garbologists refer to as "zero waste."

Assumption one: Garbage is one of those facts of life that falls in with other inevitabilities like death and taxes. Human beings are a consumptive lot, and the byproducts of all that consumption have to go somewhere.

Assumption two: Garbage companies do us all a great service by whisking away the nasty byproducts of our lives and hauling them off to those big holes in the ground euphemistically referred to as "landfills."

Assumption three: Recycling is enough.

After all, it's good for the bottle, it's good for the can. Well, not exactly.

Read the full article here:
Trash Talk

Oil: Caveat empty

2005-06-15T22:13:00.000-07:00

Without any press conferences, grand announcements, or hyperbolic advertising campaigns, the Exxon Mobil Corporation, one of the world's largest publicly owned petroleum companies, has quietly joined the ranks of those who are predicting an impending plateau in non-OPEC oil production.

Their report, The Outlook for Energy: A 2030 View, forecasts a peak in just five years.

In the past, many who expressed such concerns were dismissed as eager catastrophists, peddling the latest Malthusian prophecy of the impending collapse of fossil-fueled civilization. Their reliance on private oil-reserve data that is unverifiable by other analysts, and their use of models that ignore political and economic factors, have led to frequent erroneous pronouncements. They were countered by the extreme optimists, who believed that we would never need to think about such problems and that the markets would take care of everything. Up to now, those who worried about limited petroleum supplies have been at best ignored, and at worst openly ridiculed.

Meanwhile, average consumers have taken their cue from the market, where rising prices have always been followed by falling prices, leading to the assumption that this pattern will continue forever.

In truth, the market price of crude oil is completely decoupled from and independent of production costs, which average about $6 per barrel for non-OPEC producers and $1.50 per barrel for OPEC producers. This situation has nothing to do with a free market, and everything to do with what OPEC believes will be accepted or tolerated by the United States. The completely affordable market price--what consumers pay at the gasoline pump--provides magisterial profits to the owners of the resource and gives no warning of impending shortages.

All the more reason that the public should heed the silent alarm sounded by the ExxonMobil report, which is more credible than other predictions for several reasons. First and foremost is that the source is ExxonMobil.

No oil company, much less one with so much managerial, scientific, and engineering talent, has ever discussed peak oil production before. Given the profound implications of this forecast, it must have been published only after a thorough review.

Read the entire article:

Oil: Caveat empty

Invasive Species - Can They Be Stopped?

2005-05-27T20:55:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the downside of global trade. Along with cheap goods from China, linens from Europe and seafood from South America, a host of unwanted plants, animals, insects and microbes have been penetrating US borders.

Invasive species are nothing new. The gypsy moth arrived in 1869, imported by a French scientist who hoped to crossbreed the insect with silkworms. Instead, America got a pest that denudes millions of trees a year.

Today, 7000 invasive species are already in the USA, outcompeting or eating their native cousins, killing crops and forests, upsetting nature’s delicate balance. They’re blamed for four in 10 endangered-species listings, and their economic toll is staggering: $137 billion a year, estimates one study. Little wonder that the General Accounting Office has labeled invasive species “one of the most serious yet least-appreciated environmental threats of the 21st century.”

Read the entire article with TIPS on WHAT YOU CAN DO:
Can They Be Stopped?

Resources:
Invasive Species - gateway to Federal and State invasive species activities and programs

Nature Conservancy - Invasive Species Initiative

Healthy Cosmetics

2005-05-17T17:09:00.000-07:00

Lets talk about healthy cosmetics!

Believe it or not, but some cosmetics are being linked to cancer!

I agree, it's hard to believe, but there really are quite a few cosmetics still on the market with ingredients that are carcinogens or cause reproductive harm.

That includes the lotions we rub into chapped skin, the deodorants we swipe under our arms, the lipsticks and blushes we use to brighten our faces.

What happens before these things go on the shelves of the stores? There must be some review process, right? Cosmetic companies must have to send their formulas and safety studies somewhere, right?

Wrong! In the USA the FDA does NOT regulate the cosmetics industry, nor does any other governmental body. In a case of the proverbial fox guarding the henhouse, the job of regulating the thousands of chemicals that are used to preserve, dye, and emulsify most of the personal care products and cosmetics on the market -- the very same chemicals, by the way, that are used in industrial manufacturing to soften plastics, clean equipment, and stabilize pesticides -- falls to the Cosmetic Ingredient Review panel, the industry's voluntary oversight committee.

Not sure what ingredients are good or bad?

The Breast Cancer Fund has a handy checklist:
http://www.breastcancerfund.org/

The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics! is a coalition of public health, educational, religious, labor, women’s, environmental and consumer groups.

They want to protect the health of consumers and workers by requiring the health and beauty industry to phase out the use of chemicals that are known or suspected to cause cancer, genetic mutation or reproductive harm:
http://www.safecosmetics.org/

Also here are just a few companies that sell healthy cosmetics:
http://acquarellapolish.com/
http://www.chooseorganics.com/
http://www.barefoot-botanicals.com/
http://colorganics.net/

Here is a database of the good stuff:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/purelink.html

Stop! What if I want to make my own beauty products?

Sure, check out the recipes here:
http://www.makeyourowncosmetics.com/

Bottom line: play it safe and stick to body products with ingredients similar to those that you would eat!

Hope this helps all your pretty people to look good AND feel good!

TRAVEL AGGREGATOR WEBSITES

2005-05-04T11:30:00.000-07:00

Check out these TRAVEL AGGREGATOR sites the next time you are online looking for travel tickets:

http://qixo.com/
QIXO searches more than 28 popular airfare sites and finds you the best prices and flight times.

http://mobissimo.com/
Mobissimo performs real-time queries of the multiple websites that travelers traditionally check manually (plus dozens of others that are often overlooked).

http://kayak.com/
KAYAK objectively and comprehensively navigates travel information online by searching for travel deals from over 100 online travel sites.