ApocaDocuments (15) for the "Biology Breach" scenario from this week
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Sun, Aug 1, 2010
from Seattle Times:
Oysters a sign of trouble from Puget Sound acidity
Pacific oysters in the wild on Washington's coast haven't reproduced in six seasons. Scientists suspect ocean-chemistry changes linked to the fossil-fuel emissions that cause global warming are helping kill these juvenile shellfish.
The oceans are becoming more acidic, and that corrosive water is finding its way into Puget Sound.
No one knows how it will impact the Sound's sea life. But scientists in laboratories around the globe increasingly find corrosive water can alter marine systems in strange, subtle and sometimes worrisome ways. ...
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The whole planet's losing its sex drive!
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Sun, Aug 1, 2010
from Huffington Post:
Scientists Find Evidence That Oil And Dispersant Mix Is Making Its Way Into The Foodchain
Marine biologists started finding orange blobs under the translucent shells of crab larvae in May, and have continued to find them "in almost all" of the larvae they collect, all the way from Grand Isle, Louisiana, to Pensacola, Fla. -- more than 300 miles of coastline -- said Harriet Perry, a biologist with the University of Southern Mississippi's Gulf Coast Research Laboratory.
And now, a team of researchers from Tulane University using infrared spectrometry to determine the chemical makeup of the blobs has detected the signature for Corexit, the dispersant BP used so widely in the Deepwater Horizon
"It does appear that there is a Corexit sort of fingerprint in the blob samples that we ran," Erin Gray, a Tulane biologist, told the Huffington Post Thursday. Two independent tests are being run to confirm those findings, "so don't say that we're 100 percent sure yet," Gray said.... "There are so many animals that eat those little larvae," said Robert J. Diaz, a marine scientist at the College of William and Mary.... ...
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... oh me oh my oh / son of a gun, there ain't no fun / on the bayou.
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Sun, Aug 1, 2010
from DaijiWorld (India):
Toxic Cancer-Causing Dyes Found in China Garments
Toxic dyes that can cause cancer have been detected in some garments in China, creating concern that buyers may also be exposed to health hazards.
Beijing's municipal bureau of industry and commerce said in a latest quality test report that 65 clothing brands in the country have failed to meet quality standards, the Global Times reported.
Coats produced by a Beijing-based company were found to contain decomposable aromatic amine, a cancer-causing textile dye that was banned by authorities in 2006. The poisonous dye cannot be washed out of the fabric and is easily absorbed by human skin, which can cause cancer over long-term exposure, the China Textile News said.... "Wearing a T-shirt could lead to cancer? It sounds like nonsense. But since the authorities have found something, we'd better not wear such clothes any more," she said. ...
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The race to "cheap" can be so expensive.
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Fri, Jul 30, 2010
from New York Times:
Oil Dispersants Shifting Ecosystem Impacts in Gulf, Scientists Warn
"This is a management decision, to use dispersants," College of William and Mary marine science professor Robert Diaz said yesterday. "It doesn't make the oil go away, it just puts it from one part of the ecosystem to another." That dispersed oil now hovers, diluted in the water column, posing a challenge for scientists to track and measure the subsea plumes. Mapping the long-term effects of the nearly 2 million gallons of dispersant used by BP PLC may well be equally difficult, given the array of unanswered questions that surround the products' rapid breakdown of oil droplets and their chronic toxicity.
In other words, while dispersants may have helped spare the Gulf's birds, the chemicals are likely shifting dangers to other species lower in the food chain. The National Research Council described dispersant use in 2005 as "a conscious decision" to direct hydrocarbons to one part of the marine ecosystem, "decreasing the risk to water surface and shoreline habitats while increasing the potential risk to organisms in the water column and on the seafloor."... ...
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BP wouldn't want to just make it seem gone. C'mon, they're a member of the planet too!
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Fri, Jul 30, 2010
from Huffington Post:
China Oil Spill Far Bigger Than Stated, U.S. Expert Says
But Rick Steiner, a former University of Alaska marine conservation specialist, estimated 60,000 tons (18.47 million gallons) to 90,000 tons (27.70 million gallons) of oil actually spilled into the Yellow Sea.
"It's enormous. That's at least as large as the official estimate of the Exxon Valdez disaster" in Alaska, he told The Associated Press. The size of the offshore area affected by the spill is likely more than 400 square miles (1,000 square kilometers), he added.... The estimates, though rough, could complicate China's efforts to move on from its latest environmental disaster: Dalian's mayor already declared a "decisive victory" in the oil spill cleanup, state media reported this week....
Steiner, who worked on the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill, announced the China estimates after touring the oil spill area as a consultant for the environmental group Greenpeace China.
"It's habitual for governments to understate oil spills," Steiner told a news conference. "But the severity of the discrepancy is unusual here."
An official with Dalian's propaganda department told The Associated Press he was not aware of Steiner's estimates and had no comment. ...
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When the propaganda department is speechless, it's serious!
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Fri, Jul 30, 2010
from CBC:
BPA found in cash register and ATM receipts
A senior scientist with Environmental Working Group says the reason for concern is the amount of BPA found on receipts.
"The BPA is in much higher concentration in the receipt and much higher concentrations are available to be wiped off the receipts," Dave Andrews told CBC News.
The University of Missouri laboratory did the analysis on 36 receipts gathered from automated teller machines, and major retailers such as McDonald's, KFC, Wal-Mart and Safeway.
The total amount of BPA on receipts was 250 to 1,000 times the amount typically found in a food can or plastic bottle.... "It's a concern that retail workers who are handling receipts all day long would be exposed to higher amounts," he said.... People working in the retail sector had 30 per cent more BPA on average than other Americans.... It also warns not to use an alcohol based hand sanitizer after handling a receipt as it causes greater absorption of the chemical.
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Does the fun never stop?
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Thu, Jul 29, 2010
from University of Calgary, via EurekAlert:
Gender-bending fish on the rise in southern Alberta
Chemicals present in two rivers in southern Alberta are likely the cause of the feminization of fish say researchers at the University of Calgary.... "We found that chemicals - man-made and naturally occurring - that have the potential to harm fish were present along approximately 600 km of river," ... The study focused on two rivers in the South Saskatchewan River Basin: The Red Deer and Oldman rivers, located in southern Alberta, Canada. The water was analyzed for more than two dozen organic contaminants, many with hormone-like activity, commonly found in wastewater or rivers impacted by human and agricultural activity. Compounds detected in the water included synthetic estrogens (birth control pill compounds and hormone therapy drugs); bisphenol A, a chemical used in making plastics; and certain types of natural and synthetic steroids that are byproducts of agricultural run-off and cattle farming.... Our results showed females make up 85 per cent of the population of longnose dace. In the upstream locations, females comprise 55 per cent of the population," says Habibi... ...
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And what males remain... are exhausted.
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Thu, Jul 29, 2010
from BBC:
Floods wash barrels of chemicals into China river
Rescue teams in north-east China are working to retrieve 3,000 barrels of chemicals washed into a major river, state media say.
Severe floods washed the barrels, from two chemical storage facilities, into the Songhua river in Jilin city.
Around 400 barrels have been recovered so far by workers at eight stations on the river. Water quality was being checked and no chemicals had yet been found in the water, state media said.
Several parts of China have been hit by flooding in recent weeks, amid the worst seasonal rains in a decade.
Elsewhere in Jilin, 30,000 people in the town of Kouqian were said to be trapped by floodwaters after a reservoir and two rivers burst its banks.... The remaining 3,000 contained flammable chemicals, it said.
Water supplies in the city of 4.5 million people were briefly suspended and panic-buying reported as residents stocked up on bottled water. ...
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Something tells me that any catastrophic flood would have flooded the river with lots of chemicals.
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Wed, Jul 28, 2010
from International Business Times:
Common Herbicide Suspected in Frog Sex Changes
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will present findings in September on the safety of atrazine, one of the most commonly used herbicides in the U.S. But some studies seem to show that the chemical affects the sexual development of amphibians, raising concerns about its effect on people. Two studies earlier this year, one from the University of California at Berkeley and the other at Canada's University of Ottawa, say exposure to atrazine at concentrations below the EPA limit can cause abnormalities. Syngenta, atrazine's largest producer, maintains that atrazine has demonstrated its safety.... When the EPA presents its evaluation in September, it will seek peer review, but many groups representing farmers and the chemical industry are worried that the agency could ban it. ...
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Apparently, farmers and chemical industry people don't mind a little hermaphroditism.
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Wed, Jul 28, 2010
from San Francisco Chronicle:
Scientists say soot a key factor in warming
Soot from diesel engines, coal-fired power plants and burning wood is a bigger cause of global warming than previously thought, and is the major cause of the rapid melting of the Arctic's sea ice, Stanford climate experts say.
The evidence of mounting pollution by carbon particles in soot has been inadequately counted in international government debates over policies to cope with the warming problem, according to Stanford's Mark Z. Jacobson, leader of the university's Atmosphere and Energy program and a professor of civil and environmental engineering.
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Soot?? What are we, trapped in a Dickens novel?
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Wed, Jul 28, 2010
from Bloomberg:
China's Environment Accidents Double as Growth Takes Toll
China, the world's largest polluter, said the number of environmental accidents rose 98 percent in the first six months of the year, as demand for energy and minerals lead to poisoned rivers and oil spills.
"Fast economic development is leading to increasing conflicts with the capacity of the environment to absorb" demands, the environmental protection ministry said in a faxed statement in response to Bloomberg questions. ...
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But... but... growth is good isn't it?
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Wed, Jul 28, 2010
from The Detroit News:
Crews rush to contain massive oil spill in Kalamazoo River
At least 16 miles of the Kalamazoo River system have been touched by crude oil in what could rank as the Midwest's worst spill.
An unexplained rupture of an underground pipe south of Marshall has released more than 800,000 gallons of oil that has made its way to the river via Talmadge Creek. Gov. Jennifer Granholm activated the Michigan's Emergency Operations Center in Lansing to help coordinate state resources.
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When it rains... it pours... oil.
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Tue, Jul 27, 2010
from Detroit News:
Report: Children's exposure to toxic chemicals costs Michigan billions
Michigan could save billions annually by protecting children from exposure to environmental hazards, according to a study released today.
The report released by an Ann Arbor-based coalition of health and environmental groups examined direct and indirect costs of four childhood diseases linked to environmental toxicants: lead poisoning, asthma, pediatric cancer and neurodevelopmental disorders.
The study found treating those disorders costs Michigan an average of $5.85 billion each year. If all diseases with an environmental link were included, the number would be higher.
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Well... I guess to save money ... we can help out the little brats.
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Want more context?
Try reading our book FREE online:
Humoring the Horror of the Converging Emergencies!
More fun than a barrel of jellyfish!
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Mon, Jul 26, 2010
from Environmental Health News:
Urban air pollutants may damage IQs before baby's first breath, scientists say
In a sweltering summer in New York City back in 1999, Yolanda Baldwin was eight months pregnant with her first child. She lived across the street from a busy intersection and often wondered what the fumes might be doing to her unborn child. Now Baldwin and several hundred other mothers whose sons and daughters have been monitored for a decade have an answer: Before children even take their first breath, common air pollutants breathed by their mothers may reduce their IQs. A pair of studies involving more than 400 pregnant women in two cities has found that 5-year-olds exposed in the womb to above-average levels of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, or PAHs, score lower on IQ tests. The compounds, created by the burning of fossil fuels, are ubiquitous in urban environments. Columbia University scientists say their findings in Poland, published in April, bolster New York City data because they found the same effect in different conditions, in different parts of the world. This "adds to a growing literature implicating exposures to environmental toxicants with stunting of children's intellectual abilities," said Bruce Lanphear of Simon Fraser University. ...
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"Street smarts" takes on a new, melancholic meaning.
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Mon, Jul 26, 2010
from Scientific American:
Ancient Ocean Acidification Intimates Long Recovery from Climate Change
Of course the present era is hardly the first time the planet has seen higher levels of CO2. In fact, roughly 121 million years ago--during an age known as the early Aptian--global CO2 levels were likely higher than 800 ppm (and possibly as high as 2,000 ppm) thanks to cataclysmic volcanic eruptions. Now new research published in Science July 23 shows how ancestors of today's nannoplankton fared in those acidic oceans of long ago.
It was a time of "severe global warming," paleobiologist Elisabetta Erba of the University of Milan and her colleagues wrote, after studying the carbon isotopes embedded in deep seabed cores drilled in the Pacific Ocean and locations in the ancient Tethys Ocean, which existed during the Mesozoic era. The records reveal that acidification proved a big problem for nannoplankton. "During the Aptian episode, marine calcifiers experienced a major crisis due to increasing CO2-induced acidification," Erba says.
But that crisis was not a major extinction event. The nannoplankton responded by doing less shell-forming--the heaviest shell-formers, known as nannoconids, largely disappeared from the fossil record (although they did not go extinct, the same species reappear after acidification dwindles)--and by diversifying into new, smaller species. In some cases species even increased in abundance but shrank in size--by as much as 60 percent. "Malformation is also ascertained for some [widespread] species," Erba notes. It took at least 25,000 years for the new acidity levels reached in the surface waters to transfer to deeper waters, according to the research -- and the ocean took 75,000 years to reach its peak acidity for that episode, as well as at least 160,000 years to recover.... Regardless, the shells of at least one modern foraminifera in the Southern Ocean are already smaller than those of their ancestors from a mere century ago. And the modern buildup of atmospheric CO2 is happening far faster than these ancient episodes. "The current rate of ocean acidification is about a hundred times faster than the most rapid events" in the geologic past..." ...
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We're even worse than volcanoes?
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