World Watch articles from May 2004

World Watch archives from May 2004

Politics and the English language.(meaning of phrase "sound science")(Editorial)
May 1, 2004... Wending their way through the U.S. Congress now are several Republican-sponsored bills to reform the Endangered Species Act under the guise of "sound science." If you didn't know any better, you might think these laws would ensure the use of...

Did you hear the big news?(Note from a World Watcher)(criticism of media coverage of popular and important topics)
May 1, 2004... Serious newspapers don't often run banner headlines in 96-point type. Only a few events in the past century have warranted such attention: the end of World War II, the Kennedy assassination, the Moon landing. On January 18, 2004, a story...

Concrete facts about dams.(From Readers)(Brief Article)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... "Hubris on the Yangtze" [Matters of Scale, November/December 2003] pointed out an environmental disaster in the making. However, I do think you were a little misleading in comparing the amount of concrete used in the building of the Three...

Key research ignored.(From Readers)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... Your article "The Hidden Shame of the Global Industrial Economy," [January/February] is both gratifying and disturbing. It is good that the critical issues you raise are receiving attention. At the same time, it is hard to distinguish this...

Absorbing carbon.(From Readers)(Brief Article)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... The statement in Matters of Scale [January/February] that 761,000,000 trees contain carbon equal to the amount emitted during a year by a single power plant in Monroe, Michigan, is striking, but true only for small trees (the emissions are...

Totalitarian television.(From Readers)(Brief Article)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... In "The Hidden Shame of the Global Industrial Economy" [January/February], Ed Ayres speaks of the "unspoken disincentive of the worlds' media giants to expose the exploitative nature of the industries... and reluctance to undermine the...

Spring cleaning without the headache.(Green Guidance)
May 1, 2004... It's springtime, when some dream of love and others of cleaning house. In both cases, it can be a challenge to find the real thing. Conventional cleaning products, rather than producing pristine homes as advertisements claim, actually leave...

If it's not politically helpful, it must not be "sound science".(Environmental Intelligence)
May 1, 2004... The term "sound science" is popping up more and more often in media coverage of critical issues affecting the human prospect. In his editorial in this issue, science writer Chris Mooney observes that for the Bush administration, "sound science"...

New treaty fights invasive marine species.(Environmental Intelligence)(The International Convention for the Control and Management of Ships Ballast Water & Sediments)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... The UN's 50-year-old shipping agency, the International Maritime Organization (IMO), has adopted a treaty aimed at combating the spread of invasive species by shipping vessels. The International Convention for the Control and Management of...

Pentagon report suggests global warming could trigger catastrophic freezing.(Environmental Intelligence)
May 1, 2004... In January, the Pentagon shared with Fortune Magazine a report that had gathered the analyses of leading climate scientists to forecast possible political, social, and environmental scenarios if today's releases of greenhouse gases triggered...

World * Watch updates.(meshed briefs)
May 1, 2004... See "Risking Corn, Risking Culture," Nov/Dec 2002, p. 8 GMO Corn in Mexico A report written for the environmental branch of NAFTA emphatically confirms that genetically engineered corn threatens Mexico's ecosystems and traditional corn...

Silent winter? Biopharmed crops are turning wildlife--and us--into lab animals.(genetically modified organisms)
May 1, 2004... WILLOWS, California -- A winter storm is arriving here at the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge. Ducks and geese are circling above the ponds, and as the first rain drops begin to fall, the birds start to drop from the sky by the...

Sacred mountain: not all the news from Africa is bad.
May 1, 2004... There's a place in Africa where ice lies directly on the equator. Twelve glaciers--all of them shrinking--follow striated ridges up the rocky flanks of Mount Kenya, which rises 5,119 meters (17,058 feet) into the East African sky. If you should...

Don't get mad, get elected! A conversation with Kenyan activist Wangari Maathai.(Interview)
May 1, 2004... Jailed, harassed and vilified by the autocratic regime of former President Daniel arap Moi, Wangari Maathai is the founder of the Green Belt Movement (GBM) of Kenya, which has supported the planting by women of over 20 million trees in that...

How serious is BP? Erik Assadourian asks, what does it mean when one of the world's largest oil companies starts using the marketing slogan "Beyond Petroleum"?(Between the Lines)(British Petroleum Company PLC)
May 1, 2004... BP, once known as British Petroleum, is neck-and-neck with ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell in the race to be the world's largest oil company. (In 2002, BP had revenues of $178.7 billion, just under Shell's $179.4 billion and Exxon's $182.5...

Citizen, Heal Thyself.(The Last Refuge: Patriotism, Politics, and the Environment in an Age of Terror)(Ecological Medicine: Healing the Earth, Healing Ourselves)(The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight: The Fate of the World and What We Can Do Before It's Too Late)(Book Review)
May 1, 2004... The Last Refuge: Patriotism, Politics, and the Environment in an Age of Terror by David W. Orr (Island Press, 2004) Ecological Medicine: Healing the Earth, Healing Ourselves edited by Kenny Ausubel with J.P. Harpignies (Sierra Club...

The hidden cost of embodied energy.(Matters of Scale)(Illustration)
May 1, 2004... Energy used to heat a conventionally built house in Vancouver, Canada for one year 101 MILLION BTU Energy used to make and transport the materials to build that conventional house (embodied energy) 948 MILLION BTU...