Tag: society

Daily Green Dilemmas

  • Paper or plastic? Just one of the decisions we face everyday. (Photo by Lisa Ann Pinkerton)

Sometimes, the more choices you have, the more stress you feel.
That’s the case with some people when it comes to taking care of the environment.
As Karen Kelly reports, being environmentally aware can be a burden:

Transcript

Sometimes, the more choices you have, the more stress you feel.
That’s the case with some people when it comes to taking care of the environment.
As Karen Kelly reports, being environmentally aware can be a burden.

(sound of buses)

So I’m standing at a bus stop.
I’ve been shopping all day and my arms are
weighed down by bags.
It’s freezing cold and I face a moral dilemma.
Do I wait for the bus, where I will stand in the aisle balancing my bags?
Or do I slide into the comfy back seat of a nearby taxi?
Taking the bus is a better choice for the environment because it uses less fuel.
But taking a cab is the better choice for a lot of other reasons.

And that is the type of choice that we face all day long.
It seems that a lot of people here in Ottawa, Canada debate these choices – and often feel kind of guilty:

“Do you ever find that you’re agonizing over decisions in terms of how they might affect the environment? Yes, often… for example, I like to consume a lot of water, I take a lot of baths. So I find myself making compromises: if I take two baths this week, then I will hang my clothes on the clothesline as often as possible.”

Anything I wish I did better? I wish I would stop indiscriminately throwing stuff on the ground.

A litterless lunch. Is that hard to do? Yeah, because if you want to take a chewie or something, you can’t take it out of the wrapper, you just throw it away anyways…it’s hard.

Seriously, these issues are everywhere, and it can get a bit overwhelming.

June Tangney is a psychology professor at George Mason University in Virginia.
She says no one person can do it all:

“I think it’s a good thing, actually, that we’re that aware of so many different ways that we have an impact on the environment. But I think it’s better to consider it as a menu of options and then make informed judgements about which ways will have the biggest impact on protecting the environment.”

Tangney says we also have to decide what works in our life.
Do I have enough money for a hybrid car? It costs more.
But maybe I have time to walk instead of drive.
Now, some people argue that we should be feeling anxious about the environment, but Tangney says that won’t help us solve the problem:

“If we have a serious emergency on our hands, what we don’t want is a population that’s depressed, anxious, ashamed, and overwhelmed. We want people who are aware of the facts and psychologically able to make important decisions on how to best meet the challenges.”

Tangney suggests making trade-offs.
For instance, she used disposable diapers on her three kids.
Then her family volunteered for a clean water advocacy group.

She says there’s always another environmental choice to be made. You won’t have wait long.

For the Environment report, I’m Karen Kelly.

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A Battle Over the Treatment of Livestock

  • The treatment of laying hens is one part of the issue getting a lot of attention in Ohio. (Photo source: LEAPTOUY at Wikimedia Commons)

Recently, six states have changed their laws to require
better conditions for farm animals. But there’s a battle
brewing in one state that’s putting a new spin on the debate.
Julie Grant reports:

Transcript

Recently, six states have changed their laws to require
better conditions for farm animals. But there’s a battle
brewing in one state that’s putting a new spin on the debate.
Julie Grant reports:

The Humane Society of the United States says it’s shameful
the way animals are treated on many American farms. Paul
Shapiro says veal calves, pregnant pigs, and egg-laying
hens are all kept in cages so small – it’s cruel.

“Hundreds of millions of egg-laying hens in the nation are
confined in tiny battery cages that are so restrictive the birds
are unable even to spread their wings.”

Shapiro says some farms house millions of hens, all
squished into tiny cages, and none of them get the chance to
nest, or act in any way like natural chickens. The Humane
Society has spent millions of dollars pushing for change in
California and other states.

But when the Humane Society hit Ohio with its campaign,
the state Farm Bureau Federation pushed back.

Keith Stimpert is spokesman for the Ohio Farm Bureau. He
says there’s a reason cages are a certain size for hens,
calves, and pigs: the animals’ safety.

“You can expand space, but you’re going to increase
aspects of fighting or cannibalistic behavior, or the chance
for that sow to fall down while she’s pregnant.”

Stimpert says the Humane Society doesn’t understand
livestock.

So instead of negotiating with the Humane Society, the Ohio
Farm Bureau is proposing something new: a state board to
oversee the care of livestock.

“I think we, in this case, can get to a better resolution on
animal care by organizing this board.”

The board would include family farmers, veterinarians, a
food safety expert, and a member of a local chapter of the
Humane Society, among others.

Voters will probably be asked in November to decide
whether to change the state constitution to create this board.

But the Humane Society’s Paul Shapiro says the board will
be stacked by the Farm Bureau. He calls it a power grab by
big agriculture.

“Keep in mind that these are people who have opposed,
tooth and nail, any form of agricultural regulation for years,
and now, all of a sudden, in just a few weeks, they’ve gotten
religion and feel grave urgency to enshrine in the state’ s
constitution their own favored system of oversight.”

Shapiro says this board will only protect the status quo. And
that’s not good for the animals.

Egg producer Mark Whipple runs a small farm in Clinton,
Ohio. He’s got about 1,500 hens. We caught up with him
delivering eggs at a local health food store.

He says his hens are free range.

“There ain’t no cages, really. They go in the box, lay their
egg, and go out and run around with the rest of ‘em, go eat,
drink, I don’t know, just be free.”

Whipple says he was never inclined to cage the hens.

You might expect him to side with the Humane Society on
this debate. But he doesn’t trust them to make decisions for
farmers.

“I don’t know that they really know where their food comes
from – other than they go to the grocery store or they go to
the refrigerator. Unfortunately, that’s a lot the mentality of
the world right now, so far removed from the farm at all,
knowing about livestock.”

Whipple says there are good producers and bad producers
out there – just like any business. He would rather see a
board like the one proposed by the farm bureau than a
mandate on cage sizes from a Washington DC-based
lobbying group.

But the Humane Society says the board proposed by the
Farm Bureau won’t make things better. If it’s approved by
voters this November, the Society plans to place its own
initiative on animal treatment on the ballot next year.

Meanwhile, other farm states are considering the Ohio Farm
Bureau’s approach and might soon have their own advisory
boards on how to treat animals.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

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Prop 2 to Give Animals More Leg Room

  • By 2015, Proposition 2 in California forces farms to make sure the animals are given enough room to move around. (Photo by Kinna Ohman)

Voters in California are drawing
a line in the sand when it comes to the
factory farming of animals. They overwhelmingly
approved a ballot measure to ensure that
hens, calves and pigs are treated more
humanely. Julie Grant reports:

Transcript

Voters in California are drawing
a line in the sand when it comes to the
factory farming of animals. They overwhelmingly
approved a ballot measure to ensure that
hens, calves and pigs are treated more
humanely. Julie Grant reports:

Right now, in most states, calves raised for veal, pregnant
pigs, and hens that lay eggs are caged so tight they can
barely move.

By 2015, Proposition 2 in California forces farms to make
sure the animals are given enough room to move around.

Michael Markarian is a vice president with the U.S. Humane
Society, which spent millions to get the issue approved.

“You cram these animals into cages barely larger than their
bodies. They’re practically immobilized their entire lives. I
mean, what could be more basic than giving an animal some
freedom of movement?”

Opponents of the issue say this will cost farmers and
consumers. We’ll see more imports from countries that don’t
have these kinds of laws.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

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Dumpster Divers Find Their Gold

  • One man's junk could be another man's organic groceries or building material. (Photo by Andrew Purtell)

A group of activists has found a way to live almost entirely off the stuff other people throw away. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Amy Coombs finds one person’s trash is another’s ethical lifestyle:

Transcript

A group of activists has found a way to live almost entirely off the stuff other people throw away. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Amy Coombs finds, one person’s trash is another’s ethical lifestyle:


(Sound of dumpster opening and rummaging)


“Cheesy bread, it’s kind of nice heated up… Some people love this crap.”


Jean C. has been dumpster diving for eight years and no longer considers it a chore.


“Dumpster diving can be a spiritual endeavor if you happen to believe it’s a sin to throw away food.”


C. is an activist. She’s also an accountant and is by no means homeless. She says she dumpster dives for food, clothing, office supplies, and building materials because she can’t bring herself to support wasteful manufacturers.


“The point of the dumpster diving lifestyle is to reclaim the waste of consumerist society.”


After dumpster diving in four major metropolitan areas, C. says you would be amazed by how much perfectly good stuff society throws away. If you do your homework, she says you can find almost anything you want.


“We’ve found organic cherries and chocolate and organic tofu, organic tofu burgers, chocolate soymilk, once we even found a whole case of white wine.”


Probably not too surprisingly, health officials say the lifestyle raises some sanitation concerns. Jerry LeMoine is a Food Inspector at the Santa Cruz County, California Health Department. He says even if dumpster-divers go for high-quality organic foods, taking food from a dumpster is risky.


“Potentially any type of bacteria could grow in a dumpster. Flies can get into dumpsters, rats, other types rodents, disease vectors, so it’s just unknown as to what the conditions are there and conditions might change at any moment in a dumpster.”


Dumpster divers say they’re aware of the risks, but Jean C. says she exercises great discretion. She says wading knee deep through other people’s trash is no worse than grocery shopping, as long as you know what to look for.


“We never eat unsanitary or dirty food. We only take meats if they’re frozen or vacuum sealed. Once we found a whole dumpster full of smoked salmon that was not going to go bad for years – and that was good. Everybody ate it.”


Lee Turner,a long-time dumpster diver, says people throw things away because Americans are wasteful. Turner has spent the past thirty years troubleshooting ways to build gadgets from others’ trash. He’s even built a back woods cabin entirely from salvaged materials.


(Sound of crickets)


“Welcome to my home… This is the kitchen, spice rack, this is the food cabinet, got running water, there’s a rain barrel, see…”


(Sound of water)


Turner built his shack illegally in a public forest, but he says he’s always been careful not to hurt the surrounding environment. He considers dumpster-diving to be part of a larger love for Nature.


Turner says using material that’s headed for the landfill makes a lot more sense than buying wood and encouraging the lumber and timber industry to cut down more trees.


“Most of the materials are found materials. Some of the wood came out of dumpsters.”


Turner and C. have turned dumpster-diving into an organized effort. They target the highest quality products, they stake out factory dumpsters to learn when mislabeled items are routinely tossed, and look for store employees willing to leak information about the next scheduled inventory reduction. It’s a conspiracy to salvage.


“What happens in a dumpster-diving collective is that you need to get a small group of quiet people, hopefully, and have them take a large amount of food back to a central location, where you’re going to wash it and process it and redistribute it, so that everyone gets what they need.”


It’s impossible to know how many students, activists, and old nature lovers scour garbage cans, but dumpster-diving is becoming an increasingly popular sport. And despite the social inhibitions and threat of food contamination, activists such as Turner and C. say they won’t abandon their search for edible, usable and fixable refuse any time soon.


For the GLRC, I’m Amy Coombs.

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Parking Meters Take Toll on Cities (Part I)

  • "Meter cruising" is when people drive repeatedly around the block to find an open curbside parking meter. A new book says that not only is meter cruising a waste of gas, but a symptom of a larger urban planning problem. (Photo by Shawn Allee)

Finding a free parking space on the street is sometimes a big hassle. But cheap parking is beginning to be viewed as an environmental problem. A growing number of city planners say free parking isn’t really free. It just shifts the cost to taxpayers and society at large. In the first of a two-part series, the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee has a report on this new view of the ongoing search for a parking space:

Transcript

Finding a free parking space on the street is sometimes a big hassle. But, cheap parking is beginning to be viewed as an environmental problem. A growing number of city planners say free parking isn’t really free. It just shifts the cost to taxpayers and society at large. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee has a report on this new view of the ongoing search for a parking space.


If you’ve ever played the board game Monopoly, you’ve probably crossed your fingers as you approached the spot called “free parking.” If your token lands there, it doesn’t cost you anything.
It’s free.


But a researcher says there’s really no such thing as “free parking,” at least not in the real world. UCLA Professor Donald Shoup has spent 20 years dispelling the myth that free parking is good for everyone.


In his latest book, titled The High Cost of Free Parking, Shoup tries to show that empty cars are taking the public and the environment for a costly ride.


“Bad parking policies are connected to a lot of other problems we have in society, but people haven’t been able to trace them to parking, and I think I’ve tried to do that.”


Take one of the biggest traffic issues facing large cities: meter cruising. That’s when drivers circle a block again and again, waiting for a curb-side meter.


“The average time it took to find a parking space was about three minutes. That doesn’t seem like too much for an individual to spending hunting for a free parking space, but it adds up if everybody else does it.”


Shoup says meter cruising wastes millions of gallons of gas every year. It also creates a lot of traffic congestion and pollution. Meter cruising’s common to downtowns, but even neighborhood shopping areas face the cruising problem.


Here’s an example. Devon Avenue is a bustling commercial strip on Chicago’s far North Side. There are lots of Indo-Pakistani restaurants, Muslim book stores and Jewish bakeries there. On a typical Saturday, the area’s so popular that only a handful of parking meters stay open for more than a few minutes. And it’s no wonder. Parking at the meter only costs 25 cents per hour.


The situation’s made worse by neighborhood parking permits. That’s a policy that keeps nearby residential streets off-limits to shoppers and restaurant-goers. Walking down the sidewalk, Grace is toting several shopping bags that heave with fresh fruit and Indian condiments.


“I went on the side streets and found a place about six blocks away without a need for a permit and took it and walked in. It’s one of the first really beautiful days of spring, so it wasn’t a hardship.”


If it hadn’t been such a nice day, Grace might have been circling the nearby blocks, wasting gas, trying to find a space at a parking meter.


Local shop owners say too many customers don’t like the parking situation. So the store owners complain to the local alderman, Bernard Stone. Seated in his office, Alderman Stone says no politician can afford to ignore demand for cheap parking. So he’s come up with a solution.


Stone: “If you look over your head, you’ll see a drawing of a new garage that’s gonna be built at Devon and Rockwell.”


Allee: “When’s that gonna be up?”


Stone: “Well, it should be started very shortly, I’ve been working at it for ten years.”


Developers for that project promised to create 200 low-rate parking spaces. It’s a deal they’ve struck in exchange for free city-owned land where they want to build. But the expert on parking, Donald Shoup says as politically appealing as that type of solution is, it doesn’t work. It really doesn’t keep cruising in check.


His suggestion?


Well, he takes a page from both the free-marketeers and grassroots activists. First, he says raise the price for metered parking. A lot. He says how much takes a little calculating.


“We could call this the Goldilocks principle of curb parking prices. The price is too high if too many spaces are vacant and too low if no spaces are vacant. If about fifteen percent are vacant, the price is just right.”


Traffic engineers say keeping fifteen percent of spots open stops meter cruising. To save money, people leave their parking spots sooner and everyone can find new spots faster. Next, make higher parking prices politically attractive to shop owners by letting the neighborhoods keep the meter money. Critics say that’s a hard sell because many times, people worry the money will go to city hall instead.


But Shoup says it works. He points to some California towns, where the money goes to repair streets and even hire security guards. Professor Shoup’s supporters say he might be too optimistic about the prospects for change in our impulse to hunt for the closest, most perfect parking space.


Shoup says he wants to be remembered as the first who showed, unless you’re just playing games, there’s no such thing as free parking.


For the GLRC, I’m Shawn Allee.

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More Warming Warnings for Wildlife

A new report on global warming forecasts more uncertainty
for North American wildlife. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

A new report on global warming forecasts more uncertainty for North American wildlife. The
Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:


The Wildlife Society is a group of biologists, habitat managers and educators. The society has
looked over hundreds of peer-reviewed studies from the last few years on global warming and
wildlife. The report says the one degree Fahrenheit increase in average global temperatures over
the past century is already having some effect on species like songbirds.


The Wildlife Society also says a predicted larger increase in global warming will generally push
wildlife and habitats northward. Douglas Inkley of the National Wildlife Federation says this
northward push means migration corridors will need to be expanded.


“Generally on a North-South axis, would be the best direction to put those in, so that the wildlife
are able to move as the climate changes.”


The report also urges more measures to reduce emissions of pollutants that contribute to global
warming. The Wildlife Society will take up formal policy recommendations at its meeting in
March.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

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Relief on the Horizon for Allergy Sufferers?

  • To those who may recoil in terror from this picture, relief from peanut allergies may just be a vaccine away. (Photo by Mike Froese)

A new vaccine that reduces food allergies in dogs could
some day help people who suffer dangerous reactions to food like
peanuts, milk and wheat. The vaccine is also more evidence in
support of the so-called “hygiene hypothesis.” The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:

Transcript

A new vaccine that reduces food allergies in dogs could some day help people who suffer
dangerous reactions to food like peanuts, milk and wheat. The vaccine is also more
evidence in support of the so-called “hygiene hypothesis.” The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:


Allergies to foods like peanuts have become much more common over the past 20 years.
Some researchers believe it’s because, as a hygiene-conscious society, we’re no
longer exposing our bodies to infections that stimulate the immune system and protect
us from allergies. Pediatrician Dale Umetsu of Stanford University mixed a component
of Listeria bacterium and peanuts into a vaccine. He then gave it to dogs
with allergies so severe that one peanut made them sick.


“After the treatment, the dogs could tolerate up, on average, to 30 to 40 peanuts,
so this was quite an increase and the effect lasted several months, at least,
after the treatment.”


Umetsu says it could be five years or more before a vaccine is available for human trials.
A vaccine could help millions of people with food allergies.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Tracy Samilton.

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Glassing Bottled Water’s Image

  • While your bottle of water may depict this... (Photo by Ian Britton)

Over the past ten years, sales of bottled water have tripled. There’s a huge thirst for water that’s pure, clean and conveniently packaged. As part of the ongoing series, “Your Choice, Your Planet,” the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Victoria Fenner takes a look at why we’re turning to bottled water and whether it’s worth the price:

Transcript

Over the past ten years, sales of bottled water have tripled. There’s
a huge thirst for water that’s pure, clean and conveniently packaged.
As part of the ongoing series, “Your Choice, Your Planet,” the Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Victoria Fenner takes a look at why we’re
turning to bottled water and whether it’s worth the price:


On a warm sunny day, it’s easy to believe that sales of bottled water
are skyrocketing. People everywhere in this waterfront park in
Toronto are carrying plastic water bottles labeled with pictures of
glaciers and mountains. With a price tag of anywhere from fifty
cents to over a dollar a bottle, that’s a lot of profit flowing to
the companies that sell it.


But Catherine Crockett and Colin Hinz are packing water the old-
fashioned way. They don’t buy bottled water. Instead, they fill up
their own bottle before they leave home and refill it at the drinking
fountain.


Crockett: “Well, it’s cheaper and as an environmentalist, I’d rather
refill a container than waste a lot of money on pre-filled stuff that
isn’t necessarily any better than Toronto tap water. What’s the
point in paying a dollar for a disposable bottle full of what’s
probably filtered tap water anyway?”


Hinz: “Personally I think a lot of what’s behind bottled water is
marketing and I don’t really buy into that very well.”


Colin Hinz’s suspicions are shared by Paul Muldoon, the Executive
Director of the Canadian Environmental Law Association. His
organization has done a lot of research on water issues. He says the
reality often doesn’t live up to the image that companies have tried
to cultivate.


“There’s no doubt in my mind that when a person buys bottled water at
the cost they pay for it, they’re expecting some sort of pristine 200
year-old water that’s from some mountain range that’s never
been touched or explored by humans, and that the sip of water they’re
getting is water that is so pure that it’s never seen the infringement
of modern society. In reality, pollution’s everywhere and there are
very few sources of water that has been untouched by human intervention
in some way, shape or form.”


Environmentalists say it’s not always clear what you’re getting when
you look at the label on an average bottle of water. First of all,
it’s hard to tell by looking at the label what the source of the
water is. In many cases, it comes from rural areas just outside of
major cities. It can even be ordinary tap water which has been
refiltered. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration does set maximum
levels of contaminants, and some labeling requirements as well. But
they don’t regulate water which is bottled and sold in the same
state. That’s one of the reasons critics of the bottled water
industry say the standards for tap water are at least as stringent,
and often even higher than for packaged water.


Lynda Lukasic is Executive Director with Environment Hamilton, an
environmental advocacy group in Ontario. She still has confidence in
tap water, despite the fact that the water supply in a neighborhood
in Hamilton was recently shut down because of the threat of
contamination.


“I think we’d all be better to focus on ‘what is the water
supply like in the place that we’re in?’ and ensuring that we’re
offering people who live in communities safe, affordable sources of
drinking water. And going the route of bottled water does a few
things. It creates problems in exporting bottled water out of
certain watersheds when maybe that’s not what we want to see
happening. But there’s also a price tag attached to bottled water.”


Paul Muldoon of the Canadian Environmental Law Association says there
are other costs associated with bottled water that can’t be measured
in dollars.


“Some of the costs of bottled water include the transportation of water
itself, and certainly there’s local impacts. There are many residents
who are now neighbors to water facilities with truck traffic and all
that kind of stuff. There’s also the issue of bottling itself. You’ve
now got containers, hundreds of thousands… millions of them probably.
So there is the whole notion of cost, which have to be dealt with and
put into the equation.”


There are many things to take into account when you pick up a bottle
of water. You can think about the cost and whether or not there are
better ways of spending your dollar. You might think about
convenience. And whether the added convenience is worth the price. Ask
yourself what you’re really getting. Read the label to find out
where the water comes from and consider whether it’s any better than
what comes out of your tap.


The bottom line is, be an informed consumer. And keep in mind that
the choices aren’t as crystal clear as the kind of water you want to
drink.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Victoria Fenner.

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New Vaccine for West Nile Virus?

Researchers might soon have a vaccine to protect birds from the West Nile virus. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

Researchers might soon have a vaccine to protect birds from the West Nile virus. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports.


The centers for disease control and the U.S. Army are getting help to develop a vaccine for prevention of the mosquito borne West Nile virus. Here in the U.S. in the past couple of years, the virus has been responsible for the deaths of thousands of birds from more than seventy species. Michael Hutchins is with the American Zoo and Aquarium Association. He says research into a vaccine ahs been driven by the need to protect birds in zoos.


“The current studies are to develop an injectable vaccine, but the intention is to try to take that and develop an ingestible variety that could be spread on bird feed and would therefore have a hopefully-big impact on wild birds as well.”


Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo, the Walt Disney Foundation, the Wildlife Conservation Society and the American Bird Conservancy have all contributed to the project. Hutchins says a vaccine could be developed as soon as the next month or so. For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.