Environmental Headlines, May 13-19, 2006
HUMBLE HEARTBROKEN AS TEEN DIES OF RABIES
Houston Chronicle, 5/13/06
Zachary Jones, a 16-year Humble High School student believed to have been infected with rabies by a bat, died Friday after a weeklong battle against the fatal disease.
“CARBON DIOXIDE…WE CALL IT LIFE,” US TV ADS SAY
Reuters, 5/18/06
WASHINGTON – A little girl blows away dandelion fluff as an announcer says, “Carbon dioxide: they call it pollution; we call it life,” in an advertisement targeting global warming “alarmists,” especially Al Gore.
SUPREME COURT TO DECIDE WHEN BEST POLLUTION CONTROLS REQUIRED
Environmental News Network, 5/16/06
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court agreed Monday to decide how tough the US government can be on 17,000 industrial plants and when it can force improvements in unhealthy air breathed by 160 million Americans.
GULF COAST RESIDENTS WARY OVER HURRICANES
Houston Chronicle, 5/17/06
Experts are baffled that over half of all US coastal residents don’t see a threat.
ERCOT CHIEF RESIGNS
Houston Chronicle, 5/17/06
AUSTIN – The chief executive officer of the organization that runs the state’s electricity grid resigned on Tuesday amid questions about his leadership style that surfaced after the state experienced its first rolling blackouts since 1989.
DRIVERS WARNED NOT TO BUY ‘GAS PILL’
Houston Chronicle, 5/18/06
AUSTIN – A small, smelly green ball marketed as a “gas pill” that saves fuel when dropped into a car’s tank is worthless and part of an illegal pyramid scheme, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said Wednesday.
IT’S EASY TO GET LOST IN OUR BIG, FAT, HOT, POLLUTED CITY
Houston Chronicle, 5/18/06
Houston was named MapQuest’s hardest city to navigate Wednesday. Need to know why?
HIGHWAY UGLIFICATION
Houston Chronicle, 5/17/06
Few pieces of legislation show what’s wrong with Congress so readily as the emergency spending bill to pay for the war in Iraq and hurricane recovery. Not only have members of Congress larded the bill with deficit-swelling, unessential, non-emergency pork, a senator has inserted language that would turn the legislation into a Billboard Regeneration and Highway Uglification Act.
LOUISIANA’S ‘GATORS APPEAR TO HAVE WEATHERED STORMS
GRAND CHENIER, Louisiana – It has been a tough nine months for Louisiana’s alligators, what with two major hurricanes wreaking havoc on their swampy habitat, then scant rainfall to dilute the saltwater that gushed inland.
ENVIRONMENTAL GROUPS WANT NANOTECH SUNSCREENS PULLED FROM MARKET
Environmental News Network, 5/17/06
WASHINGTON – Sunscreens made with submicroscopic particles pose a health hazard and should be recalled, environmental groups said Tuesday in asking the government to increase regulation of growing uses of the science of nanotechnology.
A REVOLT IN THE BREADBASKET OF DEMOCRACY
Orion Magazine, May/June
Monsanto already controls 91% of the GM seed market worldwide – corn, rice, soy beans – and has now set its sights on taking over America’s wheat.
RANDOM GOES GREEN
Publishers Weekly Daily, 5/17/06
Making one of the most dramatic environmentally conscious production moves of any major publisher to date, Random House announced Tuesday that it will be significantly increasing its reliance on recycled paper.