ground - The Environment Report

Energy Rush Threatens Sage Grouse

There is concern that new noises from energy research will disrupt the sage grouse's mating patterns (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)

The push is on to find more energy in
western states. And wildlife experts are trying
to figure out how some rare birds will react to
the increase in mining and gas exploration. Bob
Beck reports biologists studying sage grouse are
introducing new sounds into their research:

Transcript

Gail Patricelli is a researcher from the University of California at Davis. She studies the
mating habits of birds. And she says the habits of the sage grouse are the most
interesting. The males gather each spring on their traditional mating grounds,
known as a lek.

“The males gather during the spring, puff up and strut around. The females come
down to the leks during their breeding season, to pick
a mate. So they basically comparision shop. You will see females move along the lek,
sometimes by themselves, sometimes with big groups of females. But then they pick who they are
gonna mate with, they mate with them, and then they leave. And that’s the end of their
relationship.”

Beck: “What’s odd about this, is this all sounds vaguely familiar.”

Patricelli: (laughs) “A lot of people say that, but humans are very different. It’s sort
of analogous to a singles bar where people are just going to hook up.”

(sage grouse sound)

Patricelli watches and listens to these birds at a mating ground in Wyoming. She’s
learning how males get the attention of females.

“They have some particularly cool behaviors where they produce a sound that
radiates from vocal sacks on their chests – which are very bizarre looking
structures. But the sound comes out of the vocal sack, so the male has to aim the
sound appropriately at the female in order to impress her to mate.

(sage grouse sound)

So it’s not just his ability to
have the biggest, loudest, flashiest signal, but also to actually aim it appropriately at the
female. He has to know how to put on a good show, but respond appropriately and
be sensitive to what the female is doing.”

But the search for more energy is bringing new gas drilling and big trucks closer to
sage grouse mating grounds. This is happening at the same time the birds’ numbers
are declining. Researchers’ fear is the noise from energy development is disrupting
the sage grouse’s ability to hear each other, which is critical.

(truck sounds)

To find out, Patricelli is introducing recordings of gas rigs and trucks into her
research. She wants to see if sage grouse can adapt to the noise.

“So, there’s things that a lot of animals do to deal with noise in the environment.
And sage grouse may or may not be able to do that. They are not the brightest
(laughs) birds in the world.”

Wildlife Biologist Stan Harter works for the Wyoming Game and Fish department.

He’s watching the research with interest. Biologists worry that the birds are leaving
their mating grounds, trying to get away from the noise. His fear is that if the birds
are relocating they might be putting themselves at risk.

“In my mind, the birds can maybe move over here and strut okay, but are they
getting good nesting conditions over there? Maybe not. Is there a way we can allow them to co-exist more friendly?”

Harter openly admits that the sage grouse has declined in the West to the point
where it could show up on the endangered species list. If that happens, it could shut
down major portions of the state’s important energy economy. Similar to how the
spotted owl shut down logging in the Northwest.

So, wildlife officials are trying to find ways to make the birds and energy
development co-exist. They’re hoping that Patricelli’s research will guide them, not
just in reducing the noise, but in developing a plan to protect the sage grouse
population into the future.

For The Environment Report, I’m Bob Beck.

The Incredible, Edible Weed

Garlic mustard ranges from eastern Canada, south to Virginia and as far west as Kansas and Nebraska (Photo courtesy of the National Parks Service's Plant Conservation Alliance)

An invasive plant called Garlic Mustard is
taking over forests in the Eastern half of the country,
and it could be causing long term damage. Julie Grant
reports that some people are getting smart in their
efforts to get rid of Garlic Mustard:

Transcript

Brad Steman spends a lot of time in the woods. He likes the serenity.
But as we walk through this park, he winces. The entire forest floor is
carpeted with one plant and one plant only: Garlic Mustard.
Thousands of them. The thin green stalks are as tall as our ankles.

Steman calls it “the evil weed.” Its triangle-shaped leaves shade out
wildflowers, so they don’t grow. Even worse, Steman says Garlic
Mustard poisons baby trees.

“So a forest filled with Garlic Mustard you will see very little
regeneration of that forest, very few seedlings, small trees. So
looking down the line, once those large trees start dying off there’s
nothing to replace them. And that now is the greatest threat to our
Eastern forests.”

Steman says every year Garlic Mustard is spreading farther into the
woods. Anywhere the ground is disturbed.

“So here’s a big stand of it along a trail. This is typically where it
starts. This is thick. This is a healthy stand. There’s potential there
for an explosion. So we should probably pull some. I’ll pull some;
you don’t have to pull any.”

Thank goodness he’s doing it – that looks it looks like tedious work.
Steman crouches down and starts pulling them out of the ground,
roots and all. He sprayed herbicide on some of it, and so far this
season he’s filled 35 big garbage bags with Garlic Mustard plants.
He’s sick of weeding. But it doesn’t look like he’s made a dent here.
All along the Eastern half of the US and Canada people are pulling up
Garlic Mustard from parks and just throwing it away. But some
people don’t like this approach.

“All these people are very shortsighted when they’re doing that.”

Peter Gail is a specialist in edible weeds.

“They’re not looking for other alternative uses – creative ways to use these plants that would be
profitable, that would be productive.”

Gail says: “If you can’t beat ‘em, eat ‘em.” People brought Garlic
Mustard to the US in the mid-1800s because they liked it, to eat. And
they even used it for medicine. Yep. That same nasty weed.

Gail says today Garlic Mustard just needs an image makeover.
Some weeds have become big stars in the cooking world. A few
years ago Purselane was just an unwanted vine, with its fleshy, shiny
leaves matted to the ground. Now it’s known as a nutritional
powerhouse, and is the darling of New York and LA eateries. Gail
wants that kind of fame for Garlic Mustard.

“This is a Garlic Mustard Ricotta dip, Garlic Mustard salsa, stuffed Garlic Mustard leaves – these are all things you can do with this stuff. It’s fantastic!”

Garlic Mustard seeds taste like mustard, the leaves taste like garlic
and the roots are reminiscent of horseradish.
Gail says people should go after Garlic Mustard in the parks, but then
they should take it to farm markets to sell.

“My normal statement is that the best way to demoralize weeds is to
eat them.
Because when you eat them they know you like them and they don’t
want to be there anymore, and so they leave.”

(blender sound)

Today Gail decides to blend a pesto using the early spring leaves.
He picks every last Garlic Mustard in his yard to make a batch.

“Well there it is, garlic mustard pesto. And it isn’t bad, is it?”
Julie Grant: “It’s delicious.”

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.
Gail: “I’ll use that on ravioli tonight.”

Active Spring Flooding Season

Dutchtown, MO, March 20, 2008 -- Areas remain under flood water. Much of Missouri has been affected by recent flooding. (Photo by Jocelyn Augustino, courtesy of FEMA)

Spring floods are hitting some parts of the country,
and the National Weather Service predicts high waters might hit
more states. Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

Spring floods are hitting some parts of the country,
and the National Weather Service predicts high waters might hit
more states. Chuck Quirmbach reports:

There were record snowfalls in some northern, eastern and western states during the winter. Soil
moisture in some areas is very high. With the potential for spring rainstorms, the National
Weather Service says conditions are above average for flooding. Deputy Director Vickie Nadolski
says the threat will last a while.

“As you see the temperatures start to warm up in the summer, then certainly the ground will start
to dry out a bit more, but right now it’s quite saturated.”

Nadolski urges the public to listen to warnings of flash floods and river flooding. She warns
against driving or walking into flood waters.

The National Weather Service says soil moisture is not as high in states with prolonged droughts,
and that a lot of rain or snow there will bring temporary improvement to local reservoirs.

For The Environment Report, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

Warm Weather Shuts Down Logging

Mild winter weather is shutting down logging operations across the region. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:

Transcript

Mild winter weather is shutting down logging operations across the
region. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:

Rain and mild temperatures have caused the ground to thaw, making
logging impossible in some places.

Al Steege is with the Keweenaw Land Association in Ironwood in
Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. He says logging in the UP is down about
75 percent for this time of year.

“I’ve been here ten years, I don’t remember a winter quite like this.
We’ve had winters where there’s been a lot of snow and that has caused
some issues with us logging, but as far the temperature-wise, I don’t
remember the ground situations being quite like they are this year.”

Steege says the UP needs single-digit temperatures for several nights in a
row to get logging production back up. The winter logging season runs
through mid-March. Some areas in the UP, Minnesota and Wisconsin
can only be logged in the winter because they stay too wet in the
summer.

For the GLRC, I’m Erin Toner.

Epa Proposal to Limit Toxic Release Data

Every year companies have to file a report with the Environmental Protection Agency on the toxic chemicals they release into the air, water, or ground. This information is made available to the public. And proponents say this database has led to the cleanup of countless facilities. Now, the EPA says it wants to cut back on the amount of information gathered. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has more:

Transcript

Every year companies have to file a report with the Environmental
Protection Agency on the toxic chemicals they release into the air,
water, or ground. This information is made available to the public, and
proponents say this database has led to the clean-up of countless
facilities. Now, the EPA says it wants to cut back on the amount of
information gathered. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush
has more:

The EPA says it wants to make things easier on companies that are
required to file yearly reports on the toxic chemicals they work with.
Instead of filing a report every year, officials say they want companies to
file a report every other year.

Dr. Michael Harbut heads up the Center for Occupational and
Environmental Medicine in southeast Michigan. He says
epidemiologists rely on the annual reports for research into human
diseases:

“What’s being proposed here is a marked reduction in the data available
to persons who are involved in the fight against cancer, and to persons
who are involved in the fight against the most common killers in the
United States; heart disease, lung disease, and diabetes.”

EPA officials say having companies report every other year will help
improve data quality, and will allow them to conduct more analysis
on the data that’s submitted.

For the GLRC, I’m Mark Brush.

Host Tag: The EPA will take public comments on the proposed changes
until January 13th.

Rethinking Water Runoff Design

Rainwater that falls on paved areas is diverted into drains and gutters. If the rainfall is heavy enough, the diverted water can cause flash flooding in nearby rivers and streams. (Photo by Michele L.)

Some planning experts are worried that the rapid development in cities and suburbs is paving over too much land and keeping water from replenishing aquifers below ground. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham
reports:

Transcript

Some planning experts are worried that the rapid development in cities and suburbs is
paving over too much land and keeping water from replenishing aquifers below ground.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

In nature… when it rains… the water slowly soaks into the ground and makes its way
through the soil and rock to eventually be stored as groundwater. Some of it makes its
way underground to be stored in aquifers. And some of it slowly seeps through the rock
for a while and then resurfaces as springs to feed streams during times when there’s not a
lot of rain. It’s a natural storage system and a lot of cities rely on that water.

But when we build buildings and houses and parking lots and roads, a lot of the land
where the rain used to soak into the ground is covered up. Instead the rainwater runs off
the hard surfaces and rushes to stormwater gutters and ditches and then overloads creeks
and rivers. Even where there are big expansive lawns in the suburbs… the rain doesn’t
penetrate the ground in the same way it does in the wild. The grass on lawns has shallow
roots and the surface below is compact… where naturally-occurring plants have deep
roots that help the water on its way into the earth.

Don Chen is the Executive Director of the organization Smart Growth America. His
group tries to persuade communities to avoid urban sprawl by building clustering houses
and business districts closer together and leave more natural open space.

“With denser development you have a much lower impact per household in terms of
polluted runoff.”

Chen says the rain washes across driveways and parking lots, washing engine oil, and
exhaust pollutants straight into streams and rivers instead of letting the water filter across
green space.

Besides washing pollutants into the lakes and streams… the sheer volume of water that
can’t soak into the ground and instead streams across concrete and asphalt and through
pipes can cause creeks to rise and rise quickly.

Andi Cooper is with Conservation Design Forum in Chicago. Her firm designs
landscapes to better handle water…

“Flooding is a big deal. It’s costly. That’s where we start talking about economics. We
spend billions and billions of dollars each year in flood damage control.”

Design firms such as Cooper’s are trying to get developers and city planners to think
about all that water that used to soak into the ground, filtering and being cleaned up a bit
by the natural processes.

Smart Growth America’s Don Chen says those natural processes are called infiltration….
and Smart Growth helps infiltration…

“And the primary way in which it does is to preserve open space to allow for natural
infiltration of water into the land so that there’s not as much pavement and hard surfaces
for water to bounce off of and then create polluted runoff.”

People such as Chen and Cooper are bumping up against a couple of centuries or more of
engineering tradition. Engineers and architects have almost always tried to get water
away from their creations as fast and as far as possible. Trying to slow down the water…
and giving it room to soak into the ground is a relatively new concept.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is trying to get communities to give the idea
some consideration. Geoff Anderson is the Acting Chief of Staff for the EPA’s Office of
Policy, Economics and Innovation.

“Anything you can do to keep that water on site and have it act more like it does in its
natural setting, anything you can do to sort of keep that recharge mechanism working,
that’s helpful.”

The EPA does not require that kind of design. It leaves that to local governments and the
private sector. The Conservation Design Forum’s Andi Cooper says sometimes getting
companies to think about treating water as a resource instead of a nuisance is a hard
sell…

“You know, this is risky. People tell us this is risky. ‘I don’t want to do this; it’s not the
norm.’ It’s becoming less risky over time because there are more and more
demonstrations to point to and say ‘Look, this is great. It’s working.’ ”

But… corporate officials are hesitant. Why take a chance on something new? They fear
if something goes wrong the boss will be ticked off every time there’s a heavy rain.
Cooper says, though, it works… and… reminds them that investors like companies that
are not just economically savvy… but also have an environmental conscience.

“A lot of companies are game. They’re open. If we can present our case that yes, it
works; no, it’s not risky; it is the ethical thing to do; it is aesthetically pleasing; there are
studies out there that show you can retain your employees, you can increase their
productivity if you give them open spaces to walk with paths and make it an enjoyable
place to come to work everyday.”

So… doing the right thing for the environment… employees… and making investors
happy… make Wall Street risk takers willing to risk new engineering to help nature
handle some of the rain and get it back into the aquifers and springs that we all value.

For the GLRC… this is Lester Graham.

RETHINKING WATER RUNOFF DESIGN (Short Version)

Rainwater that falls on paved areas is diverted into drains and gutters. If the rainfall is heavy enough, the diverted water can cause flash flooding in nearby rivers and streams. (Photo by Michele L.)

An Environmental Protection Agency official wants local governments to take a broader view when making land use plans for their communities. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

An Environmental Protection Agency official wants local governments to take a broader view
when making land use plans for their communities. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester
Graham reports:

Often planners don’t look past their own city borders when making decisions. Geoff Anderson
wants that to change. He’s the Acting Chief of Staff for the EPA’s Office of Policy, Economics
and Innovation. Anderson says city officials often look at land use planning one site at a time
instead of looking at how their decisions will affect the entire area…

“The two scales are very important and I think in many cases too much is paid to the site level
and not enough is given to the sort of broader regional or community context.”

Anderson says that’s especially important when planning for stormwater drainage. He says too
many communities think about getting the water to the nearest stream quickly without thinking
about how that rushing water might affect flooding downstream.

For the GLRC, this is Lester Graham.

Thirsty City Waits for Water Diversion Law

Diversion of water from the Great Lakes is a controversial issue. Many worry that diversion could affect life in the ecosystem. Others worry about obtaining sources of fresh water for drinking. (Photo by Brandon Bankston)

Great Lakes governors and their counterparts in Canada are working on a legal agreement called Annex 2001. The document will determine how water from the Great Lakes will be used and who gets to use it. Controversy has already erupted over the possibility of one city’s bid for the water. The city is looking toward the completed Annex for guidance. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Christina Shockley reports:

Transcript

Great Lakes governors and their counterparts in Canada are working
on a legal agreement called Annex 2001. The document will determine how
water from the Great Lakes will be used and who gets to use it. Controversy
has already erupted over the possibility of one city’s bid for the water.
The city is looking toward the completed Annex for guidance. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Christina Shockley reports:

Dan Duchniak says he’s an environmentalist.

“We have the low-flow showerheads in our house, we have the low-flow faucets, we have the high-efficiency washers and dryers, our kids know about those, you know, they think they’re fun.”

But Duchniak is in the middle of a bitter fight with other environmentalists and officials over his area’s largest natural resource: water from Lake Michigan. Duchniak is the water manager for the City of Waukesha, Wisconsin. It’s just west of Milwaukee. Waukesha is only about 20 miles from the Lake Michigan shore. Right now, Waukesha gets its water from wells that tap an aquifer deep within the ground. But Duchniak says the wells won’t sustain the long-term needs of the city.

“As the water levels drop, the water quality degrades, and what happens is we’ve seen an increase in different water quality parameters, one of those being radium.”

And radium is a health problem. In very high doses, radium can cause bone cancer. To solve its water problems, the City of Waukesha might ask for access to Lake Michigan water. But even though the community considers the lake part of its back yard, there’s a major problem. Even though it’s close, Waukesha sits outside the Great Lakes basin.

That means the area’s ditches and streams drain away from the lake. Rain water runoff and treated water from the sewer system flow toward the Mississippi River Basin. The governors and premiers might include a rule in the Annex 2001 that says communities sitting outside the Great Lakes basin must return treated water to the lake, if they use it.

Engineers who study water in the area say Waukesha could make the case that the city is already using Great Lakes water. That’s because the city’s wells tap into water beneath the surface that supply water to Lake Michigan. But environmentalists say that argument isn’t going to fly. Derek Sheer is with the environmental group “Clean Wisconsin.” He says Waukesha would be pumping a lot more water directly from the lake than the underground aquifer would replace.

“They’re not returning 13 million gallons of water back to the Great Lakes by any stretch of the imagination.”

But the city of Waukesha knows that if the finalized Annex 2001 looks anything like the early drafts, the city would have to return most of the water it uses back to the lake. Waukesha’s water manager, Dan Duchniak says that could be done in a combination of ways. The city could pump it back to the lake, pump it to a nearby stream that flows to the lake, or stop using the ground water completely and let it flow back to the lake.

People on both sides of the water issue seem to agree on one thing: because of the huge amount of water in the Great Lakes system, and its natural ebb and flow, the amount of water the City of Waukesha would take would not harm the Great Lakes’ ecosystem. Even if it’s not pumped back.

Art Brooks is a professor at the Center for Great Lakes Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

“The amount of water they intend to withdraw would probably lower the level of Lake Michigan on the order of a millimeter or so, probably less that five millimeters per year.”

But it’s not just Waukesha that has environmentalists worried. Professor Brooks and environmentalist Derek Sheer say if Waukesha gains access to Great Lakes water, it could set a dangerous precedent. Sheer doesn’t want other states and countries to start withdrawing Great Lakes water.

“If Waukesha and Arizona and Georgia and all these other places start pumping large amounts of water out of the basin, we could see a dramatic lowering of the water in the lakes.”

The city of Waukesha says it needs the water and would abide by whatever the Annex 2001 agreement sets down. And Waukesha’s water manager, Dan Duchniak, says that includes what it determines about return flow. He says arguing about the issue right now is a waste of time, since the Annex isn’t done. Beyond that, Duchniak says Waukesha is part of the Great Lakes system, and is not about to suck the lakes dry.

“Lake Michigan is in our back yard. We can see Lake Michigan from here. We’re not that far away from it.”

The experts say Waukesha would only be the first in line to ask for Great Lakes water. With suburbs sprawling away from the big cities on the lakes more and more towns will be eyeing the Great Lakes when demand for water exceeds their underground supplies.

A draft of the Annex could be ready this year, but it will most likely go through a lengthy series of votes before it becomes law.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Christina Shockley.

Wind Turbines Stir Up Neighbors (Part 2)

Most people think renewable energy is a good idea. It’s better
than burning fossil fuel to create electricity. But “green energy”
alternatives
can be controversial. Windmill farms are springing up all across the
nation.
Some people think the windmills are eyesores. But others say windmill farms
can help preserve the agricultural landscape by supplementing the income of
farmers. In the second of a two-part series on wind energy, the Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Linda Stephan reports:

Transcript

Most people think renewable energy is a good idea. It’s better than burning fossil
fuel to create
electricity. But “green energy” alternatives can be controversial. Windmill farms
are springing
up all across the nation. Some people think the windmills are eyesores. But others
say windmill
farms can help preserve the agricultural landscape by supplementing the income of
farmers.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Linda Stephan reports:

For 30 years, Matt Mauer raised crops and livestock on his farm about 10 miles from
the Lake
Michigan shoreline. Today, he’s in his backyard looking at the land now farmed by
his daughter
and son-in-law. Standing there, he feels a crop they’re not harvesting.

“The good Lord makes it windy all the time for us, so let’s use it, you know.
Because I’m like
everybody else. When I get up in the morning, I want lights.”

Mauer’s hoping to put four wind turbines on his family’s farm near Ludington,
Michigan. That
would power about 24-hundred homes. Nearby, a renewable energy company’s working with
other farmers to build a hundred turbines in the area. Mauer says many of his
neighbors want in
on the deal because they think wind energy could help save their farms.

“It’s hard to make a living just farming right now. And I consider the wind one of
the crops that
we could harvest. It will help keep farmers on the land. Like if, in this place, if
we could get
seven–thousand dollars a year, six-thousand dollars a year for four of them, that’d
make it a hell
of a lot easier to keep the people here and farm.”

The state government’s backing similar projects. It’s training financial advisors
to show farmers
how they can turn a profit with windmills.

But not everyone likes the idea. Some people who live in the area around the
planned windmills
say they’re worried the towers would destroy the region’s charm. That’s linked to
property values
and to tourism. And they don’t like the size of the proposed windmills. Each one
would be four-
hundred feet tall. The blades would have a diameter nearly as long as a football
field.

It’s a story that’s heard in many places. Cape Cod, Massachusetts, the prairies of
Illinois, and
around the Great Lakes. For example, a Michigan couple who wanted large-scale
turbines on
their property ended up losing a court-battle against local government that opposed
the plan. And
two turbines already in place in Mackinaw City – between Lake Michigan and Lake
Huron –
have some unhappy neighbors as well.

Thomas and Virginia Alexander’s home is about 15-hundred feet away from the windmills.
They’re in their eighties and they both wear hearing aids… but even without them,
they say the
windmills are loud…

Tom Alexander: “There’s things about it we don’t appreciate, at times the noise –
not always –
depending upon the wind and the direction.
Virginia Alexander: “Yesterday. Very noisy yesterday. The wind was high and they,
you could
really hear them.”
Tom Alexander: “Just a continual swish, swish, swish, swish, swish.”

Windmill developers say the sound is no louder than normal speech. But this noise is
different. It
goes beyond the frequencies of normal speech. The sound can travel long distances
through both
the ground and the air. They keep Virginia Alexander awake some nights.

Tom and Virginia Alexander’s son Kelly lives next door with his family. He calls
himself a
windmill victim. He has this advice for others:

“Don’t let them go in your backyard. There are places they can go. You don’t just
put those in
somebody’s backyard. I don’t think it’s right.”

A lot of people agree with the Alexanders. Even wind energy boosters concede that
location is
key to successful projects. David Johnson heads up the program for the state of
Michigan that’s
encouraging farmers to allow windmills on their land. He says turbines should be
constructed
where there’s lots of wind and few neighbors. But he says when people say ‘no’ to
windmills,
they should consider the alternative.

“So, does that mean that you should build another big coal-fired plant? Is that the
preferable way
of doing it with the global warming impacts and the mercury pollution and so on that
go with
that? Is that the choice that the public wants to make?

States across the nation are struggling to find the right balance between clean
energy and the
beauty of an uncluttered landscape. Few regulations are in place right now. More
and more,
communities will be facing the decision of whether clean energy and keeping farmers
on the land
is worth the price of adding wind turbines to the scenery.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Linda Stephan.

Epa to Lift Termite Pesticide Ban?

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is considering
extending the use of a pesticide that the agency once decided was
not safe around children. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is considering extending the use of a
pesticide that
the agency once decided was not safe around children. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s
Lester Graham reports:

The pesticide Dursban is sprayed on the ground during construction to protect new
homes from
termites. Four years ago, the EPA and Dow had agreed to phase out that use of the
pesticide by
the end of this year. Exposure to children was considered risky. Now, the EPA is
reportedly
considering lifting the ban. Jay Feldman heads up the environmental group Beyond
Pesticides.
Feldman says this would be like testing the safety of Dursban on humans without their
knowledge…

“They really should stop production, then stop use, do all the studies they want to
do with full
public disclosure and then revisit the issue. Not retain the use, allow people
unknowingly to be
exposed and then obviously put children at serious risk.”

In a report in The Washington Post, a Dow spokesperson indicated using new EPA
computer modeling, Dursban now “falls within an acceptable range” of federal
guidelines.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

Tag: ground

Energy Rush Threatens Sage Grouse

Transcript

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The Incredible, Edible Weed

Transcript

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Active Spring Flooding Season

Transcript

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Warm Weather Shuts Down Logging

Transcript

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Epa Proposal to Limit Toxic Release Data

Transcript

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Rethinking Water Runoff Design

Transcript

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RETHINKING WATER RUNOFF DESIGN (Short Version)

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Thirsty City Waits for Water Diversion Law

Transcript

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Wind Turbines Stir Up Neighbors (Part 2)

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Epa to Lift Termite Pesticide Ban?

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