11.06.06
Planet under pressure
Although this series of articles came out in 04, it’s an important group of articles addressing our immediately problems to date;
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11.07.06
seismic testing
U.S. funded seismic surveys proposed for marine and terrestrial
environments on BC’s central and north coast pose a threat
to the region’s salmon and marine mammals.
batholiths
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11.11.06
Proposed toxin ban misses biggest threat
(jpod female breaches infront of car carrier ship)
Proposed toxin ban misses biggest threat
October 30, 2006
VANCOUVER – Proposed federal regulations to restrict a hazardous group of chemicals fail to address the most important chemical of them all, says a new report from the David Suzuki Foundation.
Fireproof Whales and Contaminated Mother’s Milk: The Inadequacy of Canada’s Proposed PBDE Regulations examines a group of chemicals used as flame-retardants (specifically PBDEs, or polybrominated diphenyl ethers) that are found in a wide range of products including clothing, computers, motor vehicles, and furniture. PBDEs are accumulating at an exponential rate in several areas in Canada, including the Arctic. Canadian women and killer whales have some of the world’s highest concentrations of these commonly encountered toxic chemicals.
“The breast milk of Canadian women contains the second highest level of PBDE concentrations in the world, behind Americans,” says David Boyd, environmental lawyer and report co-author. “Unfortunately, the proposed regulations won’t solve the problem.”
Canada’s proposed regulatory approach focuses on three commercial mixtures of PBDEs and calls for the virtual elimination of two of them, pentaBDE and octBDE. The proposal fails however, to ban the most widely used chemical, decaBDE, which breaks down into the very same chemicals that are being banned for health and environmental reasons.
“Under the proposed regulations, Canada is effectively prohibiting the import, manufacturing, and sale of chemicals that are no longer commercially available, while ignoring the most heavily used chemical,” Mr. Boyd says. “The only way to protect Canadians and environment from PBDEs is to eliminate them entirely.”
The report presents substantial scientific evidence that decaBDE is the most prevalent and widely used PBDE product in Canada and is persistent, toxic to humans and animals, and bioaccumulative; the three necessary requirements for a chemical to be banned under the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.
The population of killer whales that frequent British Columbia’s southern waters consists of only 23 reproductive females, says Dr. Scott Wallace, sustainable fisheries analyst at the David Suzuki Foundation.
“These endangered whales are the most contaminated marine mammals on the planet,” Dr. Wallace says. “To protect endangered species and the health of our children, the federal government has a legal obligation to ban all substances that are persistent, toxic, and accumulate in our bodily tissues. It’s an obligation that includes the strict regulation of decaBDE.”
In addition to looking at the health and environmental effects of PBDEs, the report presents several key, workable solutions to address the inadequacies of the current Canadian regulatory proposal. These recommendations include:
Prohibit the manufacturing, import, sale, and use of all PBDEs (including decaBDE) in Canada;
Support a global ban on all PBDEs pursuant to the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants; and,
Address PBDE knowledge gaps with research programs and bio-monitoring of the Canadian population.
The full report, Fireproof Whales and Contaminated Mother’s Milk: The Inadequacy of Canada’s Proposed PBDE Regulations can be found online at: http://www.davidsuzuki.org/WOL/Publications.asp
For more information contact:
Jason Curran
Communications Specialist, David Suzuki Foundation
Office: (604) 732-4228
Cell: (604) 961-9591
jcurran@davidsuzuki.org
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11.16.06
Whale hunters set for grim mission of mercy
Team to kill about 80 struggling belugas trapped under ice in Canadian North
They’re on a mission of mercy, but it’s one overlaid with a dose of the hard reality of the Canadian North.
A team planned to leave Tuktoyaktuk, NWT, at first light this morning, bound for a group of about 80 beluga whales trapped by ice and taking turns at a diminishing breathing hole. The hunters can’t save the beleaguered whales, so they’ll do the next best thing.
The crew will set up camp today and within a day expect to start killing the whales. As each of the three- to four-metre mammals comes up to use its blowhole, it will be hit first with a harpoon. When it resurfaces, it will be shot, dragged onto the ice and butchered.
“It’s a lot of muktuk,” said Tuktoyaktuk Mayor Jackie Jacobson, using an Inuit word commonly translated as blubber. He said the usable animal products would go into cold storage until they can be distributed to residents of the hamlet or to nearby communities.
Full story: Globe & Mail
11.29.06
UN wants Canadians, others to be responsible about tossing electronic junk
Tuesday » November 28 » 2006
UN wants Canadians, others to be responsible about tossing electronic junk
Dennis Bueckert
Canadian Press
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
OTTAWA (CP) - Canadians threw out 67,000 tonnes of obsolete computers, cellphones and printers last year, probably not aware that this junk harbours toxins that can kill.
Now the UN Environment Program warns that much of the rich world’s electronic junk is being dumped in developing countries where it can pose serious health risks to those who handle it.
Electronic trash is laced with arsenic, selenium, cadmium, chromium, cobalt, mercury and other toxic metals.
Canada is among more than 160 countries who are meeting this week in Nairobi, Kenya in hopes of updating the Basel Convention on Hazardous Waste to deal with the problem.
Achim Steiner, head of the UN Environment Program, told the conference consumerism was driving a “growing mountain of e-waste” and a lot of it is being dumped in poor African countries.
He referred to a recent case in Ivory Coast, where fumes from European toxic waste killed at least 10 people and left more than 70,000 seeking medical treatment.
Now the impoverished country is spending $30 million to retrieve the waste and send it back to France.
“This is a scar on the conscience of the international community,” said UNEP spokesman Nick Nuttall.
“A poor country coming out of a civil war with little money, a country with many living on less than a dollar a day, is footing the bill for cleaning up toxic waste which has killed some of its citizens and poisoned thousands more.”
He cited a recent study of the marine environment that found heavy metals and other contaminants from obsolete electronic goods are starting to appear in coastal waters and marine sediments in Asia.
The Basel Convention, of which Canada is a signatory, was intended to prevent dumping of hazardous waste in poor countries. It requires exporters to obtain prior, informed consent of any country receiving waste.
But that regulation is being thwarted, partly because of corruption in recipient countries, and partly because it is hard to distinguish toxic waste from second-hand equipment that could still be useful.
Developing countries have proposed an amendment to the Basel Convention that would place a complete ban on the export of hazardous waste to their shores.
About 65 countries, including EU members, now have ratified the amendment but Canada has not, said Sarah Westervelt of the Seattle-based Basel Action Network. She hopes Canada will support the amendment.
Joe Wittwer, an expert at Environment Canada, said Canada will support a strong resolution on dumping of e-waste at the meeting in Nairobi, but he defended the “informed consent” approach.
In the United States alone, some 14 million to 20 million personal computers are thrown out annually. The number of cell phone users will reach two billion by 2008, and studies say cell phones tend to be thrown out within 18 months.
© The Canadian Press 2006
Copyright © 2006 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.
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12.31.06
Huge Arctic ice break discovered
Scientists have discovered that an enormous ice shelf broke off an island in the Canadian Arctic last year, in what could be sign of global warming.
It is said to be the largest break in 25 years, casting an ice floe with an area of 66 sq km (25 square miles).
It occurred in August 2005 but was only recently detected on satellite images.
Full Story: BBC
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01.12.07
Killer whale sightings increase in Arctic
As the Arctic sea ice shrinks, the number of killer whales spotted in Arctic waters has dramatically increased over the past six years.
That could be bad news for anyone who enjoys the taste of beluga, narwhal or bowhead whales. That’s because killer whales love eating these sea mammals, too, and they have quite the appetite, consuming on average more than 226 kilograms of food a day.
In particular, the number of killer whale sightings in the Hudson Bay has increased to 30 over the last six years, compared to only six sightings throughout the entire 1990s.
The 1980s only had six sightings as well. Before then, reported sightings per decade were even lower.
These figures come from research conducted by a group called Orcas in the Canadian Arctic, which began in September 2005, as a collaboration between researchers from University of Manitoba, the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and the Government of Nunavut.
Full story: Nunatsiaq News
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02.11.07
After 25 years, bowhead whale sanctuary is near
A deal to create Canada’s first sanctuary for bowhead whales has been signed between the federal government and Nunavut’s land claim organization after more than 25 years of talks and delays.
“These wildlife protected areas mean that the wildlife will be there forever, so we are happy about that,” James Eetoolook, vice-president of Nunavut Tunngavik Inc., which oversees the Nunavut land claim, said Friday.
The agreement in principle, which outlines funding and management for 12 other wildlife and bird sanctuaries in the eastern Arctic, must now be ratified by Inuit groups and Parliament. The Treasury Board must also sign off on the financial commitments.
While most of the areas affected are already protected, the deal marks the conclusion of negotiations on Isabella Bay, which people in the adjacent community of Clyde River have been trying to have protected since 1982.
Full story: Globe&Mail
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02.25.07
Marked for Duty
BAINBRIDGE ISLAND, Wash. — If they are allowed to police parts of Puget Sound, this is how Navy-trained dolphins and sea lions are expected to nab terrorists in wetsuits:
Using its sonar, a dolphin locates a swimmer approaching Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor, where Trident submarines with long-range nuclear missiles are based. Swimming through the water in spurts of up to 30 mph, the dolphin seeks out and bumps the swimmer with a “nose cup.” The device releases a strobe that rises to the surface. An armed Navy security team speeds toward the flashing light.
Sgt. Andrew Garrett and Navy dolphin K-Dog participate in a 2003 training exercise near the USS Gunston Hall in the Persian Gulf. The dolphin is outfitted with a tracking device that helps the handler when the dolphin is out of sight. (Photos By Brien Aho — Associated Press)
Alternatively, a sea lion collars swimmers around the piers of the naval base. Sea lions have excellent underwater hearing and, with their large eyes, can see underwater five times as well as people. Carrying a C-shaped leg cuff in its mouth, a sea lion dives, approaches the swimmer from behind and snaps the cuff around one ankle.
full story: Washington Post
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04.12.07
Whale Killing War Games
Enviro groups slam Canada’s sonar in naval mock-up.
Every two years, Canadian warships spend a month cruising Hawai’i, where they fire missiles and track “hostile” submarines on their ships’ mid-frequency sonar. The enemy subs in these high sea battles aren’t actually enemies at all: they are vessels from other friendly nations come to take part of the U.S. navy’s biennial Rim of the Pacific Exercises (RIMPAC) war games.
As in other years, last July Canada sent a delegation; this time, the Esquimalt-based frigates HMCS Algonquin, Vancouver and Regina, escorted by six CF-18 fighter jets from Bagotville, Quebec and two Aurora patrol aircraft from Comox took their turn in the waters off the 50th state.
Already by the late 1990s, the Natural Resources Defence Council (NRDC), a U.S. non-profit organization composed of scientists and lawyers, began sounding the alarm about what naval sonar was doing to whales and other marine mammals.
Joined by other groups, and mounting evidence, the NRDC says naval sonar kills whales and dolphins, and they’re trying to get the U.S. courts to stop American and Canadian warships from holding the next RIMPAC in 2008.
Full story: Tyee
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