Earth Island Journal articles from September 2002

Earth Island Journal archives from September 2002

Math is hard. (Dear Journal).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... I am a public interest low-level toxin researcher with an undergraduate degree in physiological biochemistry. Recently I saw, in two different publications, statements to the effect that nuclear waste from nuclear power plants was likely to...

Picture perfect? (Dear Journal).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... I wanted to write to you about the cover photo for the Summer '02 issue. It is colorful and eye-catching but if you look at it carefully you will see that there is something really wrong. The lighting is most unnatural. If you look at, or...

Unhappy trails, part I. (Dear Journal).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... In Stolen Skies: The Chemtrail Mystery, William Thomas writes: "Because the Federal Aviation Authority requires military tankers and transporters [sic] to cross continental airspace at altitudes below 30,000 feet, ensuring safe separation...

Unhappy trails, part II. (Dear Journal).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... How did a conspiracy theory out of Nexus Magazine sneak into Earth Island Journal, which usually has very high reporting standards? William Thomas' article on so-called "chemtrails" (Summer 2002) doesn't contain a single verifiable fact, and is...

Unhappy trails, part III. (Dear Journal).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Thanks for publishing Stolen Skies: The Chemtrail Mystery. It's about time environmentalists were awakened to this bizarre and troubling phenomenon. No doubt the professional debunkers are unhappy that this is edging into public awareness via...

Re: matriotism. (Dear Journal).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Mother's Day is ready-made for conversion into an earth-wide matriotic holiday. Didn't Mother's Day begin with women seeking a way to stop sending their sons off for cannon fodder? Who needs all that smarmy hearts-and-flowers stuff if it's...

Corrections.(Brief Article)(Correction Notice)
September 22, 2002... On page 3 of the Journal's Summer 2002 issue, we stated that sod roofs can "cut the heat of a concrete structure by 37C (99F)." A difference of 37[degrees]C is approximately 67[degrees]F. On page 15, the item "Tinder or Tenure" stated that...

Big changes at Earth Island Journal.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Dear Readers, There are exciting new developments afoot at Earth Island Journal. First, after more than 15 years at the helm of the Journal, Gar Smith has assumed new duties as Earth Island Institute's Roving Editor. Gar is working...

Note from the editor.(Brief Article)(Editorial)
September 22, 2002... We'd like to thank our devoted readers who filled out and returned the reader surveys in the previous issue of the Journal. We haven't crunched the numbers yet, but one thing's clear: you care deeply about this publication. We received both...

A nautilus for Climate Solutions. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Climate Solutions authors Guy Dauncey and Patrick Mazza, and their publishing house New Society Publishers won the coveted Nautilus Award at the New York Book Expo in May, 2002 for their book Stormy Weather: 101 Solutions to Global Climate...

Lust for power. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... The International Marine Mammal Project's dolphin safe tuna program made the pages of Newsweek in May 2002 giving IMMP publicity described by one Earth Islander as "the kind money can't buy." The article recounts the story of how the dolphin...

Orcas in recovery. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(killer whales)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... IMMP was one of the organizers of a three-day Orca Recovery Conference in Seattle in May-June, 2002 that discussed how to save the orca whales of Washington State and southwestern British Columbia. The conference coincided with an outreach...

Heading for the (big) hill. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Bay Area Wilderness Training (BAWT) has chosen the seven lucky participants in its first mountaineering expedition, destination California's Mount Shasta, the second highest volcano in the lower 48 states. Participants are all enthusiastic...

Africa travelers needed. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).
September 22, 2002... Global Service Corps (GSC) is looking for interns for its sustainable agriculture program in Arusha, Tanzania. Participants will travel to Africa, learn farming techniques and teach them to local farmers and communities. The experience includes...

Surf for a better planet. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Grassroots Globalization Network (GGN) has published the second installment in its Community Solutions briefing series "Community Forestry in Sub-Saharan Africa." GGN is also offering "The Informed Activist," a guide to progressive activist...

And the winner is ... (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... ... David Steichen from Berkeley, California. Earth Island Journal proudly announces the recipient of a $50 gift certificate from greenfeet.com as the winner of the reader survey prize draw. We received 278 print surveys by our June 1 deadline...

Happy birthday, DRB! (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Brower Day is coming up Saturday June 29, celebrating the 90th anniversary of Dave's birth. To be held at two garden sites on Sacramento Street in Berkeley (on Woolsey and Harmon Streets), this year's event provides CPR (Conservation,...

Power to the people. (Making waves: Earth Island in the news).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... After three years of training, volunteer coordination, fundraising, community organizing and hard work, the first community-owned and operated micro-hydro system in Sarawak, Malaysia is now up and running in Long Lawen. The project is a result...

Alberta oil extraction hurts native people. (Boreal Forest Project).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... The most gripping fact about the business of extracting oil from the sands of northeastern Alberta is that no one seems to know how bad it is going to be for the boreal forest. Even less is known about the potential impact on the local First...

US mask slips in Bali. (World Sustainability Hearings).
September 22, 2002... During the recent negotiations at the Bali UN pre-conference leading up to the World Summit on Sustainable Development this fall, conference Chair Emil Salim of Indonesia put his hand over his microphone. Leaning to a colleague, he asked in...

Scientists speak out for dolphins. (International Marine Mammal Project).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... This coming September, Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans will be making a final "finding" on the question of whether chasing and netting dolphins to catch tuna causes "significant adverse impacts" on depleted dolphin populations (see EIJ...

Keiko progresses to freedom in Iceland. (International Marine Mammal Project).(killer whale from 'Free Willy')(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Keiko, the orca star of the movie Free Willy who is himself being freed from captivity, spent the summer of 2001 offshore on numerous occasions exploring wild orca pods. He wears an advanced satellite tracking system which allows his location...

IMMP in Colombia. (International Marine Mammal Project).(Brief Article)(Column)
September 22, 2002... I have been working with river dolphins for the last seven years in Colombia. In October 2001 I started working with IMMP's International Monitoring Program, to conserve marine dolphin populations in the Eastern Tropical Pacific. We are...

The dolphin in love.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... "Once there was a very handsome man in a party. The man had a stingray as a hat, his watch was a crab, his belt a snake and his shoes were two smart black catfish. That elegant man danced all night with a young girl and fell in love with her....

Whalewatching takes off in Iceland. (International Marine Mammal Project).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Husavik, a fishing community of 2,500 inhabitants on the northeast coast of Iceland, was until recently known only for a beautiful wooden church built in 1907. But in the last five years Husavik has become the whale watching capital of Europe,...

Bush bashes climate report.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... A report on climate change was released by the US Environmental Protection Agency in early June, prompting criticism from the US energy industry and a hasty disavowal of the document by George W. Bush. The US Climate Action Report--produced...

Looming famine. (Africa).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Southern and Eastern Africa -- Millions of people in eastern and southern Africa are facing starvation unless international aid agencies can intervene. The food shortage is a consequence of a poor maize harvest caused by drought and floods....

Tusk, tusk, tusk. (Africa).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Southern Africa -- Four southern African countries are asking the UN to lift the ban on trade in ivory at a meeting in November, 2002 of the 158 signatories to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). CITES, passed...

Third time's the charm. (Africa).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Kenya -- Environmental activists have won a court order to prevent the government from disposing of 170,000 acres of the country's remaining forests--at least for now. The court order also stops the government from surveying the area, issuing...

Wildlife decline logged. (Africa).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Ethiopia -- Ethiopia's national Institute of Biodiversity Conservation and Research (ICBR) has warned the country is losing much of its unique wildlife. At Least four mammal and two bird species are facing extinction. Only 514 Walia ibex, fewer...

Exelon scrams. (Africa).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... South Africa -- Exelon Corporation, the world's third largest private nuclear utility has decided to pull out of the "pebble-bed modular reactor" (PBMR) development consortium. The remaining partners aim to continue the development. Exelon's...

Mines or mangoes? (South America).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Peru -- Residents of the small agricultural town of Tambogrande went to the polls June 2 in a referendum to choose their economic future. The choice lies between a town resplendent with groves of lemons, papayas and mangoes or one in which...

Rain in Ecuador. (South America).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Ecuador -- More than two months of torrential downpours in coastal Ecuador have killed 28 people and destroyed over 9,000 homes. Rice, coffee, and cocoa crops have been battered and washed away. Flooding and landslides buried roads and...

Ecotourism in Yunnan.
September 22, 2002... Yunnan Province in southern China has been called China's new Shangri-La. The region contains one of Asia's last untouched forests, where three of Asia's mightiest rivers the Yangtze, Mekong, and Salween pass within 44 miles of one another as...

Anger management. (North America).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... US (Florida) -- The Florida Senate voted unanimously to approve a bill that forces anyone convicted of intentionally killing or torturing an animal to attend anger management classes. The measure attempts to address the tendency of teenage...

Canada's domestic climate. (North America).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Canada -- The battle continues between Canadian provinces and the federal government over ratification of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on climate change. The government of Alberta the largest energy-producing province, withdrew from the discussions...

Pass on bass. (North America).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... US (California) -- More than go restaurants in Los Angeles and Orange Counties in Southern California have pledged to take Chilean sea bass off the menu to save it from overfishing and possible extinction. The action is part of a campaign...

One man's fish. (North America).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Mexico (Baja California) & US (southern California) -- The San-Diego-based conservation organization Wildcoast has written to Pope John Paul TI asking him to formally declare that sea turtles are meat, not fish--a kind of Catholic eco-labelling...

Turtle independence. (North America.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Hawai'i -- Every July 4 is Turtle Independence Day at the Mauna Lani Resort on Hawai'i's Big Island. At 9:30 a.m. tens of Hawaiian green turtles, or honu, will be paraded down from their nursery pools to the ocean accompanied by flag-waving...

Paradise traded for Canadian nickel.
September 22, 2002... The sleepy village of Goro lies on the southeastern coast of Grande Terre, the main island of the French "overseas community" of New Caledonia. Goro's few hundred residents look out across a tropical lagoon, circled by the world's second...

Finland number one. (Europe).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Finland -- Finland was judged the world's most environmentally healthy country, in a recent study by the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and the Center for International Earth Science Information Network at Columbia University for...

Or is it? (Europe).(Finland)
September 22, 2002... Finland -- Finland's future environmental health is another matter. A decision in May by the Finnish parliament to build a new nuclear reactor has caused dismay in a country where many recall the effects of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident....

German animals given rights. (Europe).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Germany -- Animals now have rights guaranteed by the German constitution following a 543 to 19 vote (with 15 abstentions) by the Bundestag, Germany's lower house of parliament. The victory came after 10 years of parliamentary debate and three...

Her Majesty's Egret service. (Europe).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... UK -- The Gurkhas, a Nepalese regiment and an elite fighting unit of the British army are to train members of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) in surveillance techniques perfected behind enemy lines. RSPB officials want to...

Topsoil in flight. (Asia).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... East Asia -- NASA satellite images picked up an "airborne ocean of dust" at its point of origin, the edge of the Gobi desert, northern China, only a few hundred mites west of China's capital Beijing. Whipped up by high winds, thick dust forced...

Taiwan's toxic tech. (Asia).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Taiwan -- Chemicals involved in the manufacture of TVs and semiconductors at the former RCA faculty in the county of Taoyuan, northern Taiwan leaked into soil and groundwater around the plant. Former plant workers are now blaming the pollution...

Fatal Flipper. (Asia).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Japan -- Concentrations of mercury nearly 5,000 times the Japanese government's Limit were found in samples of liver from small-toothed whales and dolphins on sale at 3apanese markets. Researchers from Hokkaido University found more than 1,970...

Thylacine reborn? (Oceania).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Australia -- The Australian Museum in Sydney has announced a breakthrough in its attempts to clone the extinct Thyladne. A team of scientists has successfully replicated genes from material taken from three preserved pups. The last Thylacine...

Coral reefs bleached. (Oceania).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Australia and Oceania -- Coral reefs around Australia and Pacific islands are suffering one of the worst episodes of bleaching on record. The Australian Institute of Marine Science, CRC Reef, and the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority...

Native forest saved. (Oceania.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... New Zealand -- Jubilant environmentalists applauded the New Zealand government's announcement in May, 2002, that there would be an end to logging of native rainforest on the west coast of the South Island of New Zealand. A total of 130,000...

Oil and the Bush administration. (Energy).(George W. Bush)
September 22, 2002... Last year, Vice President Dick Cheney hosted a series of meetings with a group of energy industry representatives and lobbyists. From these meetings, the Bush administration unveiled a controversial National Energy Plan, which consisted chiefly...

2002 Goldman Prizes awarded.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Three North American tribal leaders who have defended the Arctic Refuge from oil drilling, a Muslim woman who saved wartorn Somalia from the devastation of logging by charcoal exporters, and a Polish conservationist who is fighting to save...

Restoring the Sonoran pronghorn. (wildlife).(US-Mexican goats, Sonoran Desert)
September 22, 2002... At the US-Mexico border in southwestern Arizona, the old Peligroso/Danger signs dangling from the barbed wire facing Mexico do little to stop a furtive flood of foot traffic through the desert, despite its unforgiving conditions. Here, 14...

Draining the life from the land. (mining and indigenous people).
September 22, 2002... "Every time we take a breath," says former Hopi Tribal Chairman Ferrell Secakuku, "another 50 gallons of water are gone." As Peabody Western Coal Co. pumps three million gallons of pure drinking water a day from beneath Black Mesa, Hopi...

The promise of the commons. (culture).
September 22, 2002... Words are a form of magic. They conjure thought out of the confusion of experience, and they form the lens through which we see the world. Politics is largely a contest over words--over a version of reality. Those whose words prevail, rule; and...

African sisters. (activism).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... In 1988, a citizens' group from Seattle headed for the town of Limbe in Cameroon on the west coast of Africa to see if the two communities wanted to become sister cities. Dr. Millie Russell described her first impressions: "It was very busy...

What's wrong with cynicism. (culture).(Column)
September 22, 2002... A few years ago, Taco Bell took out ads in USA Today and other major newspapers. The fast-food company had bought the Liberty Bell, the ad explained, and would now call it the Taco Liberty Bell. The bell would stay at its same location, still...

Green and blue.(environmentalists)(Brief Article)(Column)
September 22, 2002... I remarked to a friend that on Sunday mornings my wife and I listen to NPR's environmental program Living on Earth. "My, what a cheerful way to start a week" he quipped. Environmentalism has created a public perception of itself as a home for...

Keepers of the door.(Brief Article)(Column)
September 22, 2002... I find much to be happy about, living in these times. Our unparalleled instant access to information about everything and every idea; the ease of travel to beautiful places; the closeness of friendships and loved ones; the spirited interchanges...

Singing under oath. (The Edge).(Earth First! activists Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney)
September 22, 2002... Oakland, California, May 7--Tuesday's court session in the case of Bari v. FBI was, as Earth First! plaintiff Darryl Cherney promised, "a humdinger." Twelve years after a bomb blast in the streets of Oakland, attorneys for Darryl Cherney and...

Jury awards Bari, Cherney $4.4 million.(Judi Bari)(Darryl Cherney)(Earth First! activists)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... OakLand, CA, June 11 -- The jury in Bari v. FBI has awarded plaintiffs $4.4 million for violation of the activists' constitutional rights and returned a verdict largely in favor of Earth First! activists Darryl Cherney and the Late Judi Bari....

DOE drops plutonium transport plan.(Department of Energy)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Livermore, CA -- Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment (CAREs) announced a significant victory May 17 in its efforts to keep plutonium in uncertified DT-22 canisters off US highways. The DT-22 is a 45-gallon container...

Calendar.(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... North America Urban Agriculture Workshop August 30-September 1, 2002 Goleta, California This weekend workshop will provide training on how to acquire land, capitalize, set up, grow and market from a small-scale urban plot....

The Post-Corporate world.
September 22, 2002... The Post-Corporate World: Life after Capitalism by David Korten Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2000 In this trenchant critique of global economics, David Korten argues that capitalism's proud claims to being the engine of wealth creation, the...

Take the ecoterror litmus test. (Voices).(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... When I heard that Colorado Representative Scott McInnis, who heads the House Subcommittee on Forests and Forest Health, was turning his attention to "ecoterrorists" in the wake of 9/11, I breathed a sigh of relief. It was about time, I thought....

PETA says no to testing. (Voices).(People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2002... Doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results is the classic definition of insanity. It is therefore quite disheartening to hear the clamor by some environmental organizations for more and more animal testing at the EPA...

The lesser evil. (Voices).(animal testing)(Brief Article)(Column)
September 22, 2002... A few years ago, a pregnant woman came to see me in clinic. She worked in a laboratory where she was exposed to a chemical solvent. She wanted to know whether the chemical might harm her fetus. A search of the data collected by the...

The problem with rodeo. (Voices).(Brief Article)(Column)
September 22, 2002... Rodeo season is upon us, and one can almost smell the testosterone in the air. Touted by its fans as "America's Number One Sport," others see rodeo as institutionalized animal abuse. Both may be right. The Humane Society of the US and the...