Knowledge for Responsible EarthiansGreen Mission News – March, 2023
Perennial Crops Boost Biodiversity Both On and Off Farms. Researchers Explain How.
Above and belowground, perennial crops including wheat, grasses, trees, and more provide habitat and nutrition to creatures that help make ecosystems whole.
https://civileats.com/2023/02/16/perennial-crops-boost-biodiversity-farms-habitat-science-kernza/
Washington lawmakers consider recycling overhaul legislation
The bill introduces a bottle deposit return system that includes a refund value of 10 cents per beverage container and an EPR system for paper products and packaging.
https://www.recyclingtoday.com/news/washington-lawmakers-consider-recycling-overhaul-legislation/
Groups Launch World’s First-Ever Climate Lawsuit Against a Commercial Bank
The French bank BNP Paribas “continues to write new blank checks to the largest fossil fuel companies without setting any conditions for an oil-free, gas-free ecological transition,” said one campaigner.
https://www.commondreams.org/climate
COMPOST Act, Zero Food Waste Bills Reintroduced
https://www.biocycle.net/compost-food-waste-bills/
The Edges Matter: Hedgerows Are Bringing Life Back to Farms
Researchers have found that planting hedgerows helps farmers sequester carbon in the soil, manage pests, and provide habitat for pollinators and other wildlife.
https://civileats.com/2023/02/14/the-edges-matter-hedgerows-are-bringing-life-back-farms/
‘Tipping Point’: IEA Says Surging Renewables to Be World’s Top Electricity Source by 2025
Climate advocates welcomed the forecast—although one expert stressed that the world doesn’t need “miracle technologies” or new nuclear power to meet its electricity needs.
https://www.commondreams.org/news/renewable-energy
AND
Electricity Market Report 2023
Pesticide Use and Climate Crisis Locked in ‘Vicious Cycle’ Backed by Polluting Industries
While agrochemical corporations promote “flawed solutions,” said one advocate, “we need deeper, transformative approaches to actually solve the root problems of our broken food system.”
https://www.commondreams.org/news/pesticides-climate-crisis-vicious-cycle
Bomb Train: Calls Grow for New Laws on Rail Safety After Toxic Disaster in East Palestine, Ohio
https://www.democracynow.org/2023/2/24/east_palestine_norfolk_southern_train_safety
Train Derailments Get More Headlines, But Truck Crashes Involving Hazardous Chemicals Are More Frequent and Deadly in U.S.
https://www.ecowatch.com/truck-crashes-hazardous-chemicals.html
Activist Erin Brockovich Leads East Palestine Residents in Town Hall Meeting
Brockovich’s Friday night Town Hall filled the auditorium and also two overflow rooms at East Palestine High School
The Edges Matter: Hedgerows Are Bringing Life Back to Farms
Researchers have found that planting hedgerows helps farmers sequester carbon in the soil, manage pests, and provide habitat for pollinators and other wildlife.
https://civileats.com/2023/02/14/the-edges-matter-hedgerows-are-bringing-life-back-farms/
Congress Killed a Bill to Give Farmworkers a Path to Citizenship. What Comes Next?
A look inside the complicated failure of the Farm Workforce Modernization Act.
Get your garden in tune with the environment by going biodynamic
https://www.washingtonpost.com/home/2023/02/15/gardening-home-biodynamic-tips/
Ecocide — Not Eco-Activism — Is a Crime Against Humanity, Says Steven Donziger
Truthout interviews Donziger as he awaits a Supreme Court decision over whether to take up the final appeal in his case.
Fishing communities create marine refuges to protect Chile’s biodiversity
Wildlife warning: More than 330 species contaminated with ‘forever chemicals’
Risk to wide variety of threatened and endangered species worldwide
Latin America’s Food Paradox
Making export-oriented agriculture a political priority is nothing new in the region. Since the colonization, the Spanish favored producing export commodities, such as sugar, over basic staples aimed at feeding the local population. A similar logic applied to a string of other commodities, including bananas, coffee, and cacao, as well as grains and meat. More recently, Green Revolution-style agriculture has taken hold throughout much of the region, with large swaths of land given over to this fertilizer- and pesticide-heavy production. Argentina and Brazil have bet big on genetically modified soy and corn, which is exported to feed pigs and cattle in developed countries and China. Monocultures also predominate, such as sugar, which is used to produce ethanol, and palm oil, a key ingredient in ultra-processed foods.
https://foodtank.com/news/2023/02/latin-americas-food-paradox/
Perennial Crops Boost Biodiversity Both On and Off Farms. Researchers Explain How.
Above and belowground, perennial crops including wheat, grasses, trees, and more provide habitat and nutrition to creatures that help make ecosystems whole.
https://civileats.com/2023/02/16/perennial-crops-boost-biodiversity-farms-habitat-science-kernza/
Amid war, Ukrainian biologists fight to protect conservation legacy
Oil and gas industry spent $124.4 million on federal lobbying amid record profits in 2022
The High Cost of Cheap Tuna. US Grocery Retailers ranked.
In Greenpeace USA’s second scorecard measuring the human rights and sustainability practices of
major US supermarkets in tuna supply chains, all but one retailer received a failing score. Overall,
we saw only marginal improvements in scores since last year.
That said, this report shows some early signs of movement in the right direction — a handful of retailers,
while not nearly doing enough to get them across the line of a passing grade, have still recorded
healthy improvements in their scores. And one — Aldi — has even managed to pass by a whisker.
https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Tuna-Retailer-Report-2nd-Edition-.pdf
Designing locally-appropriate conservation incentives for small-scale fishers.
More than a third of all elasmobranch (shark and ray) species are at risk of extinction due to overfishing. Indonesia is both a hotspot of elasmobranch biodiversity and one of the leading shark and ray exporters in the world, putting already critically endangered species such as hammerhead sharks and wedgefish under great pressure.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320722003743
We Face a Climate Abyss, But There Are Sparks of Hope, Robert Pollin Says.
We must embrace the positive developments so that we can build effectively from them, the progressive economist argues
1.5°C – dead or alive?
The risks to transformational change from reaching and breaching the Paris Agreement goal
The historical failure to sufficiently tackle the climate and ecological crisis could create consequences that challenge the ability of societies to tackle the root causes of this crisis.
https://www.ippr.org/research/publications/1-5c-dead-or-alive
The Ohio train derailment underscores the dangers of the plastics boom.
As the petrochemical industry grows, the disaster is a reminder of the health and safety risks that accompany reliance on fossil fuels.
https://grist.org/transportation/ohio-train-derailment-east-palestine-plastics/
Scientists confirm plastic is a new threat to the Andean condor in Peru.
“We were very surprised to find plastic in so many samples. When we finished our field work, we began looking at the birds’ pellets— regurgitated balls that are made up of undigested matter — and we were surprised to find an excessive amount of plastic,”says Gamarra-Toledo, a researcher in ornithology at the Natural History Museum of Peru’s National University of San Agustín de Arequipa.
https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/scientists-confirm-plastic-is-a-new-threat-to-the-andean-condor-in-peru/
‘A Colossal Giveaway’: A Tax Break for Big Polluters Is Also Starving Public Schools in Texas
In December, legislators killed a controversial abatement program known as Chapter 313, but its effects will last decades.
https://capitalandmain.com/a-colossal-giveaway-a-tax-break-for-big-polluters-is-also-starving-public-schools-in-texas
In Brazil, criminals dismantle one of the best-preserved swaths of the Amazon.
– – The Terra do Meio Ecological Station spans 3.37 million hectares (8.33 million acres) in the Brazilian Amazonian state of Pará and is home to hundreds of wildlife species, including many threatened with extinction.
– – Despite its protected status, Terra do Meio has come under growing pressure, with data showing deforestation doubling in 2022, reaching 4,300 hectares (nearly 11,000 acres).
https://news.mongabay.com/2023/02/in-brazil-criminals-dismantle-one-of-the-best-preserved-swaths-of-the-amazon/
America’s capacity to generate carbon-free energy from solar and wind power grew
during 2022.
Climate Central’s WeatherPower™ tool produces daily estimates and forecasts of solar and wind generation at local scale across the continental United States. To study America’s growing renewable electricity capacity and generation, we analyzed
WeatherPower data from 2022 and compared the findings to data from 2021.
https://assets.ctfassets.net/cxgxgstp8r5d/6BuGVQSGXiYCzlY1JKPnuv/33f2b4be15e7464e9ed82479ae0ff32c/FINALWeatherPower_Year_in_Review_2022__EN_1.pdf