Real Christmas Trees are Second Only to No-Tree-at-All

Fake Christmas trees might be convenient and seem environmentally beneficial at first glance, but their environmental costs—measured in greenhouse gas emissions and landfill space—far outweigh their benefits.--National Geographic.

The environmental superiority of real Christmas trees is an accepted fact except among the sellers of artificial trees.

Artificial trees are made from a kind of plastic called polyvinyl chloride, which is derived from petroleum and can contain lead or other harmful toxins. Furthermore, according to the U.S. Commerce Department, about 80 percent of fake trees are manufactured in China, where most electricity is generated by burning coal—one of the dirtiest fuel sources.  They come to the user on ships that burn diesel and emit noxious gasses.  Fake trees do not biodegrade.

In contrast, real trees are completely recyclable, and they are grown in the United States on thousands of farms that employ an estimated 100,000 people.

As far as water use is concerned, real trees, it is true, use lots of water, but they are usually grown in areas where water is plentiful. It is almost certain that the process of manufacturing plastic trees uses more water.  No actual figures are available to substantiate this claim.

These are only some of the many reasons that real trees are second only to no tree at all as an environmental option.

 

 

More from National Geographic

 

New Jersey’s New “Fertilizer Law” Is Designed To Protect the State’s Water

New Jersey has recently enacted a new Fertilizer Law, designed to protect waterways from becoming overly nourished.   The new law sets limits on the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus that can be used on lawns and restricts the times when fertilizer can be applied. It is considered the toughest such law  in the nation.

The amount of nitrogen that consumers can use is limited to 0.9 pounds on 1,000 square feet of ground per application, and 3.2 pounds per 1,000 square feet for the year. That is a 10 percent reduction from  the previous limit of a pound.  Professionals can apply up to a pound of nitrogen per 1,000 feet in each application, and are not to exceed 4.25 pounds for the year.

There have been difficulties for some landscapers.

Read full details NY Times.

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Prozac, Effexor and Tegratol from Human Waste Can Expose Fetuses to Genetic Modification

Fish exposed to psychiatric medicines showed gene patterns similar to those found in people with autism, in a study suggesting a link between drugs that get into the human water supply and the brain development disorder.

Researchers put antidepressants Prozac and Effexor, as well as antiseizure drug Tegratol into water tanks of minnows. Tests showed that the same genes turned on in people with autism were also triggered in the fish after exposure.

The findings suggest that small amounts of psychiatric medications found in the drinking supply may be a cause of autism, the researchers said. Psychiatric drugs have been linked to autism-like symptoms in studies of rats exposed to the medicines, according to the study.

Concentrations of the drugs are found downstream from water treatment plants that process human waste that contains the medicines.  The molecules make their way into the supply downstream, where pregnant mothers who drink the water can pass the exposure to their fetuses.

More Details.

NSF Certifies Its Very First Product Under the New Flushability Standard

NSF International, the prestigious certifying agent water treatment products as well as foods and many consumer goods,  has certified the first product – SCA’s TENA ® Flushable Washcloths (adult-sized wipes) – under the NSF Flushable Consumer Products Certification Program. The NSF ‘Certified Flushable’ mark on certified TENA Flushable Washcloths helps buyers differentiate between flushable and non-flushable products by eliminating confusion.

While overall wipes usage has increased at a rate of 10 percent per year, flushable wipes only make up roughly five percent of the overall wipes category.* Yet, wastewater treatment facilities face increased challenges as a result of  non-flushable wipes products entering treatment systems through toilets, which leads to clogging and other negative effects on wastewater collection and treatment systems that can increases costs and the risk for sewer spills.

More Details

Bottleless Water Coolers for Homes and Offices

The best way to have bottled water is to get the bottle out of the picture and process the water with your own treatment unit.  Coolers are now available that provide the same delivery system as bottled water coolers but avoid the expense and hassle of buying, carrying,  and changing bottles. The savings in money and time and bother

can be exceptional.

Modern bottleless coolers can provide a variety of water temperature options, some with hot, cold and “cook” (ambient temperature) water, others with cold only, others with cold and cook only.

Part of the allure of having a bottled water delivery service, however, is not having to clean and maintain the cooler itself.  The article below, from a leading seller of bottleless coolers,  demonstrates that taking care of your cooler isn’t as hard as you thought.

How to clean a bottleless cooler, sanitize the reservoir, and change the filter

A major reason people do not switch from rented coolers to bottleless coolers is the perception of convenience. These people believe that maintaining a cooler is a skill reserved for experts and learning how to do so would be too difficult. We believe in you and your ability to clean the cooler, sanitize the reservoir, and change the filter with ease and confidence.

Cleaning the cooler and sanitizing the reservoir:

You can easily wipe down the cooler with a light bleach solution (a tablespoon of bleach per gallon of water) or you can purchase a commercial water cooler cleaning agent such as Cooler Clean ™ or H20K ™. Wipe the lid of the cooler and remove both the lid and the reservoir cover. Drain any remaining water in the reservoir through the faucets. Using a dry paper towel, wipe out the inside of the reservoir to eliminate any film. Pour the commercial cleaning agent or bleach solution into the reservoir and fill with water. Wait 15 minutes and then drain the reservoir using each faucet. Repeat if necessary. Replace the reservoir cover and lid. Allow the reservoir to refill. Drain a few cups of water from each faucet and discard. Your cooler and reservoir are now cleaned and sanitized!

Bottleless coolers can be fed by either a filter or a reverse osmosis unit, in some cases built into the cooler unit, in others installed at a remote location, such as under a nearby sink.  Servicing the treatment unit is also a relatively easy process.  RO and filter makers provide instructions.

 Filter-Toting Woman Detained and Questioned, but No Charges Filed

In what seems to be becoming a common event, yet another airport terminal was evacuated when a water filtration device was discovered in a passenger’s luggage.  In a recent incident, a man was arrested for transporting drugs on an airplane inside a water filter.

In this incident, the woman passenger, who had boarded a plan at the Minneapolis airport with a water filter in her luggage, was not arrested. The water purification device was detected during bag checking and the Bloomington Police Department bomb squad was called in for investigation.

The gory details.

Water and Electricity Go Hand In Hand.  How A Shortage  of Cold Water Creates A  Shortage of Electricity

Climate change is bad for electricity supplies.  It takes electricity to process and deliver water, and it takes water to make electricity. What affects one side of the equation affects the other.

We burn coal or natural gas to boil water to turn turbines to produce electricity. Turbines produce more than 90 percent of our electricity.

Power generating plants are cooled by water in rivers or lakes.  As the water gets warmer, and less abundant because of global warming brought on by the greenhouse gasses produced by running the turbines, it gets harder to cool the plant and electrical production has to be cut back.

According to Scientific American, by 2040 electrical production may fall as much as 16 per cent in the summer, when we need it most for air conditioning.

More about this from Scientific American.

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Fort Peck Dam, Like Many US Dams, Needs Repairs that the Nation Cannot Afford

Proposed repairs to bolster Montana’s Fort Peck Dam following epic flooding along the Missouri River last year would cost more than $225 million, according to cost estimates released in 2012 by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

But with money short, Corps officials acknowledged they are able to afford only $46 million for damage assessments and repair work for now. Most of that will be spent on repairs to the dam’s spillway.

Dams, which often seem like a good idea when they’re in the planning stage, eventually become fiscal liabilities that will  need expensive repairs and even more expensive decommissioning.

Read the full story.

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America’s Aquifers Are Threatened by Over-pumping and Pollution

Twenty percent of US water for drinking, crop irrigation and everything else comes from underground water.  We seldom think of aquifers as being “endangered,” but that is actually the case, as we continue to overuse their water and pollute them with chemicals.

The great Ogallala Aquifer, beneath the Great Plains, supplies 27% of the nation’s farmland with irrigation water.  It has undergone decades of depletion through overpumping.

The Central Valley aquifers of California are also being rapidly depleted to supply the nation’s fruit and vegetable demand.

The mighty aquifers that supply New York and New Jersey are being drained and polluted.

Among the suggested aquifer-friendly actions we can take are “curbing fertilizer and pesticide use, responsibly disposing of pharmaceuticals and hazardous waste rather than flushing them down the drain, maintaining septic systems to reduce nitrogen pollution, and protecting open space to promote rainwater infiltration and aquifer recharge.”

 

Green Energy Experimenters in Oregon Are Pumping Millions of Gallons of Water into Newberry Volcano

In an ambitious plan being undertaken in Oregon, geothermal energy developers plan to pump 24 million gallons of water into the side of a dormant volcano to demonstrate new technology they hope will give a boost to a green energy sector.

They hope the water comes back to the surface fast enough and hot enough to create cheap, clean electricity that isn’t dependent on sunny skies or stiff breezes.

The site of the geothermal experiment  is the Newberry Volcano, 20 miles outside Bend. OR.

Read more.

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