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James Corless, Surface Transportation Policy Project
James Corless is the northern California campaign manager for the Surface Transportation Policy Project. STPP works to promote better transportation and land-use planning, walkable communities, public transportation, and citizen involvement in decision-making. Sunday, 18 Jul 1999 TRUCKEE, Calif. For countless immigrants, it’s been reinvented time and again as the ultimate promised land. One writer calls […]
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Grandfathers' Clock Running Out
The EPA has discovered that a number of old, coal-fired power plants, “grandfathered” under the Clean Air Act, seem to have flouted the law by making major renovations to produce more power without installing required pollution controls. The EPA is still investigating and no action has yet been taken against the power companies, but the […]
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A-Salt on Whales
A vigorous international campaign is mounting against plans by Mexico and Japan’s Mitsubishi Corp. to build the world’s largest salt plant on a Pacific lagoon that is a major breeding ground for gray whales. The proposed saltworks on the San Ignacio Lagoon in Baja California would pump 6,600 gallons of water out of the lagoon […]
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House Beautiful?
Enviros scored a number of victories in an Interior Department funding bill passed by the House last night. The House will now run up against the Senate, which has inserted a number of anti-environmental passages into its version of the bill. The House bill would bar the use of federal funds for building logging roads […]
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Green Eyeshades
A panel of the National Research Council is urging the federal government to resume development of a “green” accounting system that would calculate, in addition to standard economic measurements, the costs of such things as resource depletion and environmental and health damage from pollution. The Commerce Department had been working on just such a system, […]
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Reefer Madness
Between 70 and 90 percent of coral reefs in the Indian Ocean have been destroyed by human activity, marine biologists say, and unless action is taken the remaining reefs will likely be destroyed as well. Sewage dumping, soil erosion, and dynamiting by fishers are all taking their toll, but the most serious problem facing the […]
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Building Owners Painted into a Corner
The feds announced yesterday that they are launching a big crackdown on building owners who fail to notify tenants that their homes may contain lead paint. Attorney General Janet Reno, Housing Secretary Andrew Cuomo, and EPA Administrator Carol Browner said the government had fined four District of Columbia property owners $87,000 and ordered them to […]
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It's Sick, Itzik
Israel’s environment is in deplorable condition, according to a year-long study released yesterday by the Israel Economic Forum for the Environment. The nation’s aquifer systems suffer from serious salination problems, construction is encroaching on open space, and air quality has deteriorated to the point that one in 10 Israeli children has asthma, according to the […]
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Not So Presto Change-o
In a twist that has surprised scientists, new analyses indicate that the growth rate of climate change has declined about 25 percent since 1980. Climate change is still underway, but now researchers believe that humans may have more time than previously thought to cope with the problem. Scientists don’t understand why this has happened because […]
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Old King Coal Reigns On
Pollution from coal-burning power plants is on the rise in the U.S., spurred by competition in the electric market that has encouraged utilities to rely more heavily on the cheaper power generation method of burning coal, two environmental groups charged in a report yesterday. Electricity production from coal-burning power plants rose 16 percent from 1992 […]
