Category: Environment

Environment, Nature

Chopping Down Trees Creates Legal Liability

Washington (CAR) Analysis | June 19, 2021 by Attorney Michael Wells; Image Credit: AdobeStock

Trees provide everything from oxygen to habitats for animals, yet they are chopped down with impunity. The damage to the environment is incalculable. To put it into perspective, however, half the number of trees exist now than those in existence when humans first evolved; fifteen billion trees are cut down annually; and ten percent of climate change is attributable to chopping down trees. Environmental carnage aside, legal liability and criminal liability exist for cutting down trees that do not belong to the harvester.

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Climate Change, Eco, Environment, EPA, Ethics, Wildlife

Golf Courses and the “Good Life” May Kill You

Washington (CAR) Analysis | June 12, 2021, by Michael Wells

You do not need to be a character in a Lifetime movie to be poisoned by arsenic. Same goes for some other deadly chemical. Just spend time on a golf course or near one. Contrary to what golf affocinadios claim, golf courses are not good for the environment even though many of the courses look like a cross between Xanadu and Shangri La. Pesticides, herbicides, rodenticides and other chemicals abound on golf courses, according to Fred Siegel’s book Environmental Hazards: Are you Exposed?, and they seep into the soil and run off onto property nearby.

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Climate Action, Climate Change, Eco, Environment, EPA, Health, soil

Environmental Justice for Gordon Plaza | Systematic Failure to Protect Health

Washington (ONGC) Analysis | June 7, 2021 by author and climate journalist Noreen Wise

Gordon Plaza is a subdivision in the New Orlean’s Desire neighborhood that was developed on the ASL hazardous waste site in the early 1980’s. The first residents, excited about securing their little piece of the pie, moved into their new homes in 1981, 40 years ago. Most of the houses are modest ranches with 3 bedrooms and 2 baths, on 5,000 square ft lots. The properties were federally funded and intentionally marketed as affordable housing to low income wage earners seeking an opportunity to move on up. 

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circular economy, Climate Action, Environment, Ethics, Wildlife

Top 5 Vegan Beauty Brands | Vegan Scene

Washington (GGM) Analysis | June 2, 2021 by Sarah J. Kings

Consumer ethics has never been such a hot topic!  Compassionate and eco-friendly shoppers are searching for resources and products everyday. With many making changes in their diet and fashion choices, there has never been a better time to switch out your old cosmetics and trade them in for vegan alternatives. Vegan beauty brands do not rely on animal cruelty and animal products or biproducts to create makeup. Here is a list of five major vegan and cruelty free beauty brands that are focused on both ethics and sustainability. 

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Climate Action, Climate Change, Eco, Environment, Health, soil

Climate Change and the Explosive Book: Environmental Hazards, Are You Exposed?

Washington (CAR) Analysis | May 28, 2021 by Climate Journalist Noreen Wise; Special Guest author Fred Siegel Environmental Hazards, Are You Exposed?

Today’s atmospheric carbon level is 419.53 ppm, up two points from just a week ago. Additionally, scientists announced today that within the next five years we are 90 percent likely to break yet another record for the hottest year in recorded history, which despite 197 countries joining the Paris Agreement, and working so hard to reduce global warming, shows that we’re tracking in the wrong direction. 

How is this possible?

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Climate Action, Environment, Ethics, National Parks, Wildlife

Leave No Trace — A Parents Guide

Washington (CAR) Analysis | May 26, 2020 by Sarah J. Kings; Image Credit: AdobeStock

You are trying your best to head an eco-friendly family.  You are recycling and upcycling like a champ, you’re careful not to waste water or gas, and maybe you’ve even incorporated Meatless Mondays into your routine. With all the planet conscious talk around your house, your kids are probably starting to show a little love for Mother Nature too.

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Climate Change, Eco, Environment, Oceans

Russian Roulette | Great Pacific Garbage Patch 2X Size of Texas Keeps Expanding

Washington (CAR) Analysis | May 17, 2021 by Attorney Michael Wells

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch (GPGP) floats, swirls, and grows in the North Pacific between Hawaii and the coast of North America. It is 1.6 million kilometers around (about 1 million miles), which is three times the size of France and two times the size of Texas. It weighs roughly 80,000 tons, and the only way to view the massive expanse is through photos from space. Discarded fishing lines, nets, and other fishing equipment comprise about half of the mass of the GPGP. Used plastics coming from land make up the vast bulk of the rest of the GPGP. According to the acclaimed documentary, Midway: Message from the Gyre, 136,000 seals, sea lions, and whales are killed each year from the GPGP. Beaches of islands in the vicinity of the GPGP are littered with dead bird carcasses, which are filled with plastics from the patch. If you think you are not affected by this, you are wrong because eventually these plastics will end up on your plate through a process known as bioaccumulation where the plastics pass to organisms and then to humans. And 84% of the plastics contain at least one toxic, cancer causing agent, which makes eating seafood like a game of Russain roulette.

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Environment, Nature, trees

Fairfax Student Reveals Native Shrub Carbon Storage Champions

Washington (CAR) Analysis | May 14, 2021 by Climate Journalist Noreen Wise

The planet will keep revolving around the sun, no matter how destructive and irresponsible humans are. But we humans won’t. Humans are mammals. Mammals rely on our habitat to survive. And mammals eventually become extinct when our habitat disappears. Eighty mammals have gone extinct in the past five centuries.

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Climate Action, COVID-19, Environment, Nature

Trees for Love | Planting Seedlings to Remember Those We Lost to Covid

Washington (ONGC) Analysis | May 14, 2021 by author and climate journalist Noreen Wise

Back on October 24, 2020, when covid was ramping up for another major assault, both physical and economic, we hosted a free distribution of native redbud and button bush seedlings, at Parking Lot P at George Mason University in Fairfax Virginia. The campaign was called Trees for Love and the seedlings were being planted to remember those we lost to covid in our communities. Fairfax ReLeaf supplied the seedlings. The Fairfax Tree Commission was the essential liaison that made this all possible, enabling the free seedling distribution to come to fruition by connecting these various organizations. 

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Climate Change, Eco, Environment

Fear Waterspouts and Climate Change Calamities

Washington (ONGC) Analysis | May 7, 2021 by Michael Wells

Waterspouts can suck marine life out of the ocean and toss it onto land. And waterspouts can do the same thing with hazardous chemicals on the ocean floor such as 27,000+ barrels of DDT recently discovered off the coast of Los Angeles. Fortunately, this has not happened yet, but it certainly could especially since more and more waterspouts are popping up all over the world due to an increase in severe weather caused by climate change. Any potential calamity climate change may (will) create is not a “what if?” question. The better questions to ask are “how bad?” and “when?”

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