Salem-News.com Environment articles Page 37

Lawsuit Filed to Overturn Latest Spotted Owl Critical Habitat

“... This rule is plainly illegal” - AFRC's Tom Partin.

(PORTLAND, OR) - Today, the American Forest Resource Council joined the several other groups, in a lawsuit to overturn the latest Northern Spotted Owl critical habitat designation.

The case was filed in federal District Court in Washington, D.C., against the Secretary of Interior and the Director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Fish Caught off Fukushima Show Record Levels of Radioactive Cesium

Record cesium level detected in fish caught near Fukushima nuclear plant.

(KYODO Japan Times) - Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Friday it detected a record 740,000 becquerels per kilogram of radioactive cesium in a fish caught in waters near the crippled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station.

That is equivalent to 7,400 times the state-set limit deemed safe for human consumption.

Newport Researchers Working with Fishermen to Reduce Bycatch in Groundfish Trawling

(NEWPORT) - Researchers working with the groundfish fishing industry in the Pacific Northwest have tested a new “flexible sorting grid excluder”.

It is a type of bycatch reduction device that shows promise to significantly reduce the incidental bycatch of Pacific halibut from commercial bottom trawl fishermen.

Jaguars, Ranchers, Loggers and Bureaucrats

“It’s a protected animal, but there’s nobody there to protect it except us” - Abner Rios, lifelong local resident

(LAS CRUCES, NM) - Last summer, Mexican rancher Abner Rios noticed a curious thing. Cows that were ready to give birth wandered off only to come back from pasture alone. “We began to notice that pregnant cattle were not returning with calves,” Rios told FNS.

EPA`s Final Health Assessment for TCE and Trichloroethylene (CASRN 79-01-6)

For those who seek to better understand the deadly toxin TCE, trichloroethylene.

(SACRAMENTO, CA) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released the final health assessment for trichloroethylene (TCE) to the Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) database in 09/28/2011.

IRIS is a human health assessment program that evaluates the latest science on chemicals in our environment.

Wind Energy: A Faith Based Initiative

As many as 4500 wind turbines have been built -- and abandoned -- in California alone.

(OCEANSIDE, CA) - Maybe wind turbines would be a good investment if the things actually worked. But they don’t. Not that well.

Study: Sludge-Based Fertilizer May be Causing Human Illnesses

“Study participants told us that the onset of the symptoms occurred while the sludge was being applied or soon after” - Amy Lowman, MPH

(CHAPEL HILL, NC) - Treated municipal sewage sludge—the solids from sewage treatment—may be causing illness in people up to a mile from where it is spread on land.

Those are the findings from researchers at the Department of Epidemiology at the University of North Carolina’s Gillings School of Global Public Health.

Mountain View CA: TCE Plume Remediation Will Take 100 Years

Irvine Great Park TCE Cleanup: What doesn’t USEPA know and when didn’t they know it?

(LAGUNA BEACH) - Mountain View and Irvine might be 400 miles apart here in California but they are populated by the same regulatory oversight players and exhibit similar remediation dynamics.

These include, but certainly not limited to nebulous timelines, indeterminate environmental and human health impacts plus vague eventual cost projections.

Oil Explorers Beware: Hackers Are Eyeing What You Know

Some companies in the industry don't even have a formal security framework in place.

(LONDON) - While most would think that the risks junior oil and gas companies are taking in exploring new frontiers as far away as the remote reaches of Africa are related to government instability and conflict, another risk they face is right at home and lies right beyond their network firewalls.

Cyber security breaches are becoming more common place as the ranks of junior companies swell and take on new exploration venues with a great deal of energy.

Calvert Cliffs Reactor/License Denial - NRC Upholds CC-3 License Rejection on Foreign Ownership Grounds

Commissioners stopped short of completely dismissing UniStar’s license application.

(WASHINGTON DC) - NRC Commissioners today upheld the denial of a construction/operating license for the proposed Calvert Cliffs-3 nuclear reactor in Maryland.

The decision marks the first time in history that NRC Commissioners upheld the denial of a license for a commercial nuclear reactor, and only the second time a license for a commercial nuclear facility has been denied.