Palos Verdes on the Net (PVNET), a non-profit, has been formed to provide local municipalities with GIS services for emergency/disaster planning at low cost.
Via All Points Blog.
When A Disaster Occurs to One Person At a Time – Is it still a Disaster?
If terrorists had invaded the Upper East Side and done this to several thousand people at once, perhaps we’d have a government fund – like the 9/11 fund, say – try to reduce the bureaucratic load, and make things run smoothly.
However, when it only happens to one person at a time – it doesn’t seem to elicit the same response.
For those not persuaded that the United States needs not only national health insurance – but also disability insurance – consider the case of Susan Barron. If you have any illusions about the weakness of New York’s crime victims compensation system – read this. From Jim Dwyer‘s piece on the front page of the Times of December 22nd, “In an Instant, a Life of Helping Becomes One in Need of Help“:
This was life, until Susan Barron crossed Second Avenue on a Saturday morning two and a half months ago: an apartment on the East Side of Manhattan, where she has lived for decades. A fat Scottish terrier that she doted on. A psychology practice treating people with physical disabilities, offering “scholarships” to patients who could not pay full fees.
And she was a fixer — the friend who hunted down a kidney for someone in need of a transplant, mentor to a man starting his own therapy practice, regular volunteer on winter coat drives and at holiday soup kitchens. “That Jimmy Stewart character in ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ had nothing on her,” said one friend, a self-described cynic.
Then came the morning of Oct. 6. A few minutes before 11, a deranged man stole five knives from a restaurant on Second Avenue, stabbed the cook, then ran into the street. Ms. Barron, on a walk with the dog, happened into his path at 35th Street.
Screaming at her, the man chopped, hacked and stabbed her head and arms, straddling her after she fell to the street, picking up a new knife when he lost one from the force of his blows. The man, identified as Lee Coleman, was stopped only when an off-duty police officer shot him.
To those who witnessed it, the violence seemed to be a crime of toxic passion; they could not fathom the truth, that one total stranger had simply and suddenly set upon killing another.
They also could not imagine that Ms. Barron would live.
She did. Continue reading
NFL claims that concussions have no lasting effect
The NFL has been asserting that concussions don’t, in fact, pose a long-term health risk. This means that they’ve got access to health data no one else has – but it’s so secret that they can’t discuss it. From today’s Times, “For Jets, Silence on Concussions Signals Unease” by Alan Schwarz:
Laveranues Coles is equal parts receiver and raconteur, the New York Jets player who talks when no one else will. But upon hearing one subject — concussions, specifically the two he has sustained in the past year — he immediately lost his smile, and looked around the locker room to see who might be listening.
“I can’t talk about that,” he said. “You know I can’t talk about that.”
Then he walked away.
We note that the Jets receive government subsidies from the state of New Jersey, and the NFL exists, we understand, by virtue of a government antitrust waiver. Those matters entirely aside from any moral or legal responsibility. Back to the Times piece: Continue reading
Los Angeles Fire Department uses microbloggers for real-time intelligence
This suggests an exceptional organizational agility. Ellen Perlman of Governing.com has this piece, “Crazy Cool in L.A./A fire department taps into microblogging to keep itself on top of situations,” published in the November 2006 issues of Governing magazine.
Last May, Los Angeles firefighters had their hands full. A blaze was spreading through 800 acres of Griffith Park but they only knew what was happening from the side of the fire where their trucks were parked. To get a sense of the extent of the conflagration, firefighter Brian Humphrey sent messages to strangers on the other side of the fire — explaining who he was and asking them to call him right away.
How did he know whom to contact? Humphrey twitters. Continue reading
Cholera in Iraq
In mid-2003, the World Health organization reported on cholera in Iraq:
rom 28 April to 4 June 2003, a total of 73 laboratory-confirmed cholera cases have been reported in Iraq : 68 in Basra governorate, 4 in Missan governorate, 1 in Muthana governorate. No deaths have been reported.
From 17 May to 4 June 2003, the daily surveillance system of diarrhoeal disease cases in the four main hospitals of Basra reported a total of 1549 cases of acute watery diarrhea. Among these cases, 25.6 % occurred in patients aged 5 years and above.
New York Times: Study Finds Carcinogens near Canadian Oil Sands project
By Ian Austen in the Times on November 9th, “Study Find Carcinogens in Water Near Alberta Oil Sands Project,” more evidence of one of the myriad costs and risks that come with the use of fossil fuels:
OTTAWA, Nov. 7 — High levels of carcinogens and toxic substances have been found in fish, water and sediment downstream from Alberta’s huge oil sands projects, according to a new study.
The 75-page report, written by Kevin P. Timoney, an ecologist with Treeline Environmental Research, was commissioned by the local health authority of Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, where many residents say they believe the oil sands developments to the south are damaging their health.
Oil sands developments are generally vast open-pit mines that recover a form of tar mixed with sand. That tar, which is formally known as bitumen, is later separated and processed to produce oil. Most of the oil from the Alberta developments is sent to the United States.
Earlier studies by the province of Alberta had dismissed health concerns. And Dr. Timoney’s report, while highly critical of the government, does not make a specific link between the toxic substances and the oil sands. But many Fort Chipewyan residents did on Thursday.
“For years the community has believed that there’s lots of cancer,” said Donna Cyprien, health director of the Nunee Health Authority. “When they drank from the water, there was an oily scum around the cup. We now know there is something wrong.”
Mrs. Cyprien said that the local health board hired Dr. Timoney largely because it had lost faith in Alberta’s provincial health department.
Like Dr. Timoney, scientists who have reviewed his report say further studies are necessary to determine the cause and extent of the problem. But they also expressed concern about what his research had already found. “This could actually be worse, in some respects, than the Exxon Valdez,” said Jeffrey W. Short, a research scientist at the Alaska Fisheries Science Center who has studied the tanker accident that spilled 11 million gallons of oil off the Alaska coast in 1989.
Most disturbing, said Dr. Short, was the finding that from 2001 to 2005, concentrations in sediments of a group of chemicals called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons rose.
“These are substantial increases over and above the natural levels,” said Dr. Short, adding that the hydrocarbons “are notorious carcinogens,” found in tar and tarlike materials. In some cases, they were more than four times recommended limits in the United States. (Canada has no guidelines.)
Dr. Timoney concluded that the town’s treated drinking water was safe, but found high levels of arsenic, mercury and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in fish, which many people in Fort Chipewyan, especially members of its Native community, rely on for a substantial portion of their diet.
In an e-mail message, Howard May, a spokesman for Alberta’s Department of Health and Wellness, said that the government could not specifically comment on the report because it had not received a copy.
“There is nothing really new in these allegations, we have been looking into them for some two years now,” Mr. May wrote, adding that the government investigation has found “no higher incidence of cancer in Fort Chipewyan than the rest of the province, and we stand by that analysis unless and until we are provided with further evidence.”
Oil, then -unless it’s being used at the well head – after extraction, it needs to be moved somewhere for refining – a process which carries its own risks – stored – and then transported down the supply chain towards end users. And in each stage of this process, there are risks: in production (the article above provides an illustration). And in each mode of transportation, risks – of trucks overturning, pipelines accidentally or intentionally being ruptured, boats spilling their loads.
We don’t mean to make an argument against any and all use of petroleum – but that one of the many benefits of reduced consumption (reduced greenhouse gases, reduced cost, reduced air pollution), is a reduction in risks and costs connected to production.
Inhabitat: Ireland bans incandescents
Glasgow Wood Recycling Project
The Glasgow Wood Recycling Project – even better, their blog here – are connected to the Glasgow School of Art – and, if I understand this correctly, they’re buying wood waste, also taking it as donations, and trying to find (1) finished projects/products that can be made with what they’re collecting, and (2) forms of unused wood which are salable. By definition, they’ve given themselves a job that’s difficult – but which will get (or should get) easier with scale. [photopress:wood_box1_19_09_2002_21_29_05.JPG,thumb,alignright] Here are some images of what they’ve had for sale. We’re going to try to keep up with them – This could be a win-win – reducing waste, making cheaper materials available for small projects.
Thanks to Roy at Zero-Waste
for posting about the Glasgow Wood Recycling Project
.
Waterstudio – water-friendly, resilient architecture
From Jill Fehrenbacher and Sarah Rich
at Inhabitat, we learned about Waterstudio :
In the months following Katrina, one of the most interesting design solutions we found for dealing with rising water levels was the amphibious architecture of Dutch firm Waterstudio. Architect Koen Olthius specializes in a unique technology that allows land-based buildings to detach from the ground and float under rising water conditions. Olthius’ claim to fame is that he focuses exclusively on aqueous design – design for building in, on and at the water – in a country where water dominates the landscape.
This design – if a flood-prone city grid were designed around having, say, 10% of its building stock built this way – would provide precious evacuation time – and since these structures are might well survive serious flooding – they’re the avant-garde
of the recovery. Once the water recedes – these structures won’t need to be rebuilt.
Al Gore on Nuclear Power and Global Warming, 1992.
Al Gore, photographed for Time, earlier this year.
In Earth In The Balance, 1992, Plume Publishing, New York, Gore wrote:
“Almost every discussion of substitutes for fossil fuels includes an argument over the role of nuclear power in our energy future. In fact, some opponents of positive action to save the environment try to cut short discussions of global warming with a dismissive reference to the political difficulties involved in building new nuclear reactors and expressions of exaggerated frustration with envrionmentalists, who, they imply are the principal obstacles to adopting nuclear power as the obvious subsitute for coal and oil.
“Of course, uncertainties about future projections of energy demand and economic problems like cost overruns were the major causes of the cancellation of reactors by utilities, well before accidents like those at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl heightened public apprehension. Growing concern about our capacity to accept responsibility for the safety of storing nuclear waste products with extremely long lifetimes also adds to the resistance many feel to a dramatic increase in the use of nuclear power.
“In my own view, the present generation of nuclear technology, light water-pressureized reactors, seems now rather obviously at a technological dead end. The research and development of alternative approaches should focus on discovering, first, how to build a passively safe design (whose safety does not depend on the constant attention of bleary-eyed technicians) that eliminates the many risks of current reactors, and second, whether there is a scientifically and politically acceptable means for disposing of – in fact, isolating – nuclear waste.
“In any event, the proportion of world energy use that could practically be derived from nuclear is fairly small and is likely to remain so.”
Chernobyl, 20 Years Later – Part Alpha
None
Chernobyl, 20 Years Later – Part Beta
We found out about Chernobyl because nuclear power plant operators in Sweden noticed their geiger counters indicating radiation – outside the reactor … From Der Speigel
Murderous Atoms
The Geiger counters continued to tick away for days as much as 2,000 kilometers (1,243 miles) away from the disaster zone, as air masses contaminated with radiation pushed across Europe. Many fears are justified. The major disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant proved the prophets wrong who underestimated the “residual risk” of nuclear energy. A look back from the archives of DER SPIEGEL.
The following article appeared in the May 5, 1986 issue of DER SPIEGEL:
The staff at Sweden’s Forsmark nuclear power plant, located on the Baltic coast north of Stockholm, was just changing shifts. It was 7:00 a.m. last Monday when workers passing through a routine check in the security sluice at the entrance to the plant’s reactor building set off warning signals.
Chernobyl, 20 Years Later – Part Gamma
Some people are saying ‘We need nuclear because we can’t burn coal or oil.’
That’s like smoking cigars or a pipe or chewing tobacco because you don’t want to smoke cigarettes, because cigarettes cause cancer. We all know cigarettes that cause cancer, and smokers “should” quit or cut down. But pipes, cigars, and chewing tobacco are still tobacco. “Quitting cigarettes and smoking cigars is like going from crack cocaine to powdered cocaine or heroin. Which is a better way to die? Lung cancer from smoking cigarettes or lung cancer from smoking cigars?
Der Speigel, May, 1986.
Der Speigel published Looking Back at Chernobyl, beginning April 19, 2006.
One fact jumps out – the accident at Three Mile Island (Wikipedia) which the NRC
describes as “serious,” is said to have released 15 curies of radioactive material. The explosion at Chernobyl disbursed “roughly 80 million curies of iodine 131 and 6 million curies of caesium 137, a “large part” of which was released into the atmosphere.”
Joni Mitchell once sang “Give me spots on my apples, but leave me the birds and the bees, please.”
You can see her recorded live on You Tube
Solar, wind, geothermal, hydro, oceanic hydro – these are available, and much more cost effective. They are the technologies of the future, available today.
Effect Measure: Primer on Bisphenol-A controversy
Effect Measure has a good explanation of what’s dangerous about Bisphenol-A. Because it’s so important – and outside of our expertise to paraphrase and summarize – and already so well-written – we’re going to, with apologies to Revere at Effect Measure – reproduce it in its entirety:
You’re in a crowded bar near the airport and your co-worker is trying to tell you something important. She wants you to do something before you drive her car to the garage for her. She is heading out of town. But you can’t hear her over the din from the crowd. It’s too noisy, too much cross talk. Later you discover she was telling you the gas gauge is broken and the tank almost empty. But you know that. After you ran out of gas on the freeway. Now imagine you are a developing fetus. Genes in your nervous system are turning on and off in a precise sequence in response to what’s going on in your developing brain. Your neurons are growing, making new connections, responding to the cues from other parts of the system that are also developing. The signals that coordinate this involve very tiny amounts of chemicals coursing through the blood stream. Hormones, like the the estrogens. But there’s a lot of noise from artificial chemicals that also stimulate cells, but not in response to a coordinated development plan. Chemical noise from the environment. Continue reading
Law of Diminishing Returns, Teddy Bear Corollary
None