(Photo by Scott Bauer, courtesy of the USDA Agricultural Research Service)
many think that lindane is unsafe and are calling for its removal from the U.S. market. (photo by G & A
Scholiers)
An environmental group is calling for the United States to ban a pesticide used to treat head lice. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman reports:
Transcript
An environmental group is calling for the United States to ban a pesticide used
to treat head lice. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman reports:
Lindane is most commonly used as a pesticide for corn, wheat, and other grains.
It’s also used as a medication to kill lice and scabies. But the Food and Drug
Administration warns that lindane should only be used when all other treatment
options are exhausted. That’s because the FDA has found that in very isolated
cases, lindane can cause seizures or even death.
Kristin Schafer is the Program Coordinator for the Pesticide Action Network. The
group is seeking a ban on lindane in the United States.
“This is the type of chemical that there’s no reason not to get it off the market.
It’s dangerous, it builds up in our bodies. It’s particularly dangerous to children
and there are alternatives for all uses.”
Schafer says 52 countries and the state of California have already banned lindane.
Canada plans to eliminate agricultural uses of lindane by the end of the year.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chris Lehman.
The EPA wants communities to do more to protect drinking water from a harmful microorganism. That could mean several changes for cities around the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
The EPA wants communities to do more to protect
drinking water from a harmful microorganism. That could mean
several changes for cities around the Great Lakes. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Ten years ago, a Cryptosporidium outbreak in Milwaukee led to
the deaths of more than 100 people who had weakened immune
systems. The outbreak sickened 400,000 other people.
Since that time, Milwaukee has made 100 million dollars in water treatment plant
improvements. Milwaukee waterworks superintendent Carrie Lewis
says the EPA’s plan to make all drinking water treatment
systems monitor and guard against the microbe means some
cities face new construction at their water treatment buildings.
“Because one doesn’t easily add more barriers to
organisms like Cryptosporidium without adding more physical plant
to the water treatment plants.”
Lewis expects some cities to debate the cost and benefits of the
rule package.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Chuck
Quirmbach reporting.
A pile of food waste awaits processing at a Duluth, Minnesota composting site. A wide variety of materials arrive each day - anything from unused frozen dinners to sheet rock to bird droppings from a nearby zoo. Photo by Stephanie Hemphill.
Lots of people have a compost pile in the backyard. They throw their grass clippings and kitchen scraps in a pile and let it sit. Eventually it turns into rich black stuff that can be spread on the garden. Many cities around the Great Lakes collect residents’ yard waste and turn it into compost on a bigger scale. In Duluth, Minnesota, they’ve taken it a step further. An industrial-sized compost operation uses some surprising ingredients. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill reports:
Transcript
Lots of people have a compost pile in the back yard. They throw their grass clippings and
kitchen scraps in a pile and let it sit. Eventually it turns into rich black stuff that can be spread
on the garden. Many cities around the Great Lakes collect residents’ yard waste and turn it into
compost on a bigger scale. In Duluth Minnesota, they’ve taken it a step further. An industrial-
sized compost operation uses some surprising ingredients. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Stephanie Hemphill reports:
There’s a steady stream of cars and pickups as people drop off leaves and branches. They’re
piling up their yard waste at the compost site of the Western Lake Superior Sanitary District in
Duluth, Minnesota. The Sanitary District takes care of the trash for Duluth and nearby towns.
At the back, four rows of future compost are cooking in the sun. They’re about 6 feet tall and
half a block long. They were mixed by a master chef of compost, Charlie Hitchcock. He’s about
to cook up a new batch. Today’s mix starts with biodegradable bags of kitchen scraps from
several restaurants.
“It’s a small load today, but it’s food waste and there’s animal hair that’s thrown in from some of
the pet grooming places. A lot of protein and nitrogen in that, I guess.”
Hitchcock consults a laptop computer to create his recipe. He plugs in the weight of the food
waste. The computer program tells him the right proportions of wood chips and leaves to mix in.
It’s aiming for the ideal combination of carbon and nitrogen. Most loads are about half wood
chips.
“Because it aerates it pretty good. And then I just keep punching a number in on the leaves until
I get between a 25-to-1 to a 35-to-1 on a C-N-N ratio, carbon to nitrogen.”
(tractor starts)
The key ingredient that’s loaded in Hitchcock’s mixture is different every day. That’s because the
sanitary district is always trying to divert stuff that would normally go to the landfill. Lately
they’ve been going after some of the garbage itself, not just yard waste. And sometimes that
garbage comes from some exotic places.
(bird sounds from zoo)
Dave Homstad takes care of the birds at the Lake Superior Zoo. He’s giving the parrots some
fresh water.
(parrot chit-chat)
He slides out the bottom of the cage and whisks sawdust and bird droppings into a black plastic
bag.
“The composting stuff goes into a black bag, so that we can keep them separate. And then
anything that can be composted goes in here and then eventually into a dumpster for that
purpose.”
The dumpster gets filled with uneaten food, animal bedding, like straw and sawdust, and animal
dung. At the composting site, the dumpster-load from the zoo might be mixed with scraps from a
coffee shop. A commercial fishing operation brings fish guts. Even sheetrock is ground up to
become compost. The latest addition is waste grain from the elevators on Duluth’s lakefront.
(train sound at elevator)
The Cargill elevator handles 50 million bushels of grain every year.
Roger Juhl manages the operation. He says there’s some spillage when railroad cars have to be
changed from one type of grain to another.
“So we have to clean them out and dump them onto the tracks, and then pick them up and put
them in the dumpster. And that’s where they’ll go to this recycling center.”
Juhl says he’ll probably save some money. He’ll still have to pay the hauler to take the grain
away, but he won’t have to pay for dumping it in the landfill. What’s even better, Juhl says he’ll
be doing something good for the environment.
“Hopefully it’ll be useful for something.”
It’s put to use, all right, in Charlie Hitchcock’s compost mixer.
(compost sound back up)
The mixer’s been turning for 15 or 20 minutes. Hitchcock peers into the barrel. The ingredients
look like chunky dirt, and smell like day-old garbage. He reaches in for a handful.
“I do the squeeze test on it. If you get it packed tight without moisture coming from it, it’s within
the 50% range, which is good.”
Hitchcock is learning how to turn an amazing variety of stuff into compost. Some days he gets a
load of spoiled vegetables from a grocery store. Other times it’ll be outdated frozen dinners.
“When I get a lot of wet pasta, I use some sheetrock and mostly grindings. That’s shredded up
tree branches and limbs that we have. I don’t put leaves in it because the pasta’s so wet, it gets
real gumbo-y.”
After six months in a pile, the compost is ready for customers, like Suzanna Didier.
“I mean, I’m glad they’ve figured out a way for us to decrease the amount of garbage that goes
into the stream, into the waste stream, because obviously that needs to be slowed down a bit. So,
it’s great.”
It’s an expensive operation that doesn’t pay for itself. Officials hope to recoup half their costs by
selling compost. As they get more raw materials, it’ll become more cost effective. Someday,
they hope everyone in Duluth will send their kitchen waste for composting.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Stephanie Hemphill.
Lawn pesticides are killing a lot more than grubs and weeds, according to the National Audubon Society. They want to let people know that if they use the chemicals, they are unintentionally killing birds. And they’re possibly putting their families at the same risk. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Joyce Kryszak has more on the educational campaign:
Transcript
Lawn pesticides are killing a lot more than grubs and weeds, according to the National Audubon
Society. They want to let people know that if they use the chemicals, they are unintentionally
killing birds. And they’re possibly putting their families at the same risk. For the Great Lakes
Radio Consortium, Joyce Kryszak has more on the educational campaign:
People throughout the region have been scooping up dead bird corpses and sending them off for
testing since the West Nile Virus first hit. But research shows West Nile is usually not to blame.
Studies done on about eighty thousand dead birds found in New York state showed aesthetic
lawn care products were the leading killers.
William Cooke is a regional coordinator for the Audubon Society. He says the toxins from these
common product rivals the chemicals used on golf courses and farms.
“We’re going to have our kids play on this, we’re going to have the dog play on this, and then come
into the house? People are not connecting between the pesticides they put down and the impacts.
And we’re doing this for a green lawn?”
Cooke says the national educational campaign hopes to alert more than a million people to the
dangers of pesticide use. It will also tell people how to find and use organic alternatives to
maintain a healthy lawn and environment.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Joyce Kryszak.
A recent newspaper report says that the White House stopped the EPA from issuing a warning about widespread asbestos-contaminated insulation last spring. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:
Transcript
A recent newspaper report says that the White House stopped the
EPA from issuing a warning about widespread asbestos-contaminated
insulation last spring. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton
reports:
Zonolite insulation was produced in this country from the 1940’s through
the 1990’s, and almost all of it was made from ore that came from one mine
in Libby, Montana. Thousands of miners were killed or sickened because
the ore was contaminated with an extremely lethal asbestos fiber.
But it was only last year that the EPA decided to issue a public health
emergency warning to residents and workers who could come in contact with
Zonolite insulation in homes where it had been installed.
A St. Louis Post Dispatch investigation revealed that the White House Office of
Management and Budget intervened, and the EPA never issued the warning.
The Post Dispatch reports that EPA chief Christine Todd Whitman was
outraged by the decision.
Hundreds of thousands of homes in Michigan and Illinois probably have
Zonolite insulation. The insulation is often strewn loose in attics.
It’s silvery-brown and comes in feather-light pieces ranging from the size
of a pea to the size of a nickel.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Tracy Samilton.
As fall bird migration nears its end, scientists in Chicago are seeing what they say is an encouraging trend. Fewer migrating birds are hitting the windows of tall high-rises. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jesse Hardman has more:
Transcript
As fall bird migration nears its end…scientists in Chicago are seeing what they say is an encouraging trend. Fewer migrating birds are hitting the windows of tall high-rises. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jesse Hardman has more.
Scientists at Chicago’s field museum say an estimated one hundred million birds die every year after hitting windows. They say many of those deaths come during annual migrations. Bird expert Dave Willard says he’s been patrolling Chicago’s McCormick Place convention center for twenty years…collecting winged casualties of fall migration.
Willard says those numbers are starting to go down.
“In 1996 we might have picked up anywhere between five hundred and one thousand birds in the fall, this fall it will be probably under fifty.”
Willard and his colleagues suggest bright light confuses night migrators who use the stars and moon to navigate. He says this year’s drop in death is a direct result of a city initiative asking buildings to pull window shades and dim lights at night. Willard says other Great Lakes cities like Toronto are trying similar programs.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium I’m Jesse Hardman.
According to the Humane Society and the American Bird
Conservancy, hundreds of millions of small animals and birds are killed
each year by domestic cats. The two organizations are working together
in an effort named “Cats Indoors! The Campaign for Safer Birds and
Cats.” But Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator, Julia King,
wonders just how safe is too safe:
Every year, thousands of families across the country are forced to make
a difficult decision. A loved one has died, and their organs could be
used for transplant. As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly
reports, an innovative group in Albany, New York is using volunteer
donor mothers to help families through the process:
Fall begins with unrivaled energy and beauty, but when the colors fade, it seems melancholy hangs in the bare trees as everything braces for winter. Great Lakes Radio Consortium Commentator Julia King explores the eternal link between nature’s cycle and an acceptance of death:
Every year, thousands of families across the country are forced to make adifficult decision. A loved one has died, and their organs could be usedfor transplant. As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports,an innovative group in Albany, New York is using volunteer donor mothers tohelp families through the process:
(Photo by Scott Bauer, courtesy of the USDA Agricultural Research Service)
