Jennifer Marohasy

The green-forced “clean-up” by General Electric of PCBs in Hudson River sediments has — to no one’s surprise — backfired.  Read more here.

After surpassing the United States as the world’s largest producer of household garbage, China has embarked on a vast program to build incinerators as landfills run out of space. But these incinerators have become a growing source of toxic emissions, from dioxin to mercury, that can damage the body’s nervous system.  Read more here.  And [...]

YESTERDAY the US President, Barrack Obama, urged action to curb “dangerous carbon emissions that contaminate the water we drink”.
If you consider carbon dioxide a “dangerous contaminate” and want to get rid of the carbon dioxide in say the soda, before you drink it, then shake the bottle first. Fizzing allows dissolved carbon dioxide gas to [...]

DESPITE intense opposition from farmer groups and scientists, the European Parliament voted last week to approve new regulations that could ultimately outlaw up to one-quarter of the pesticides on the European market.  Read more here.  [Subscription only.]

The European Union (EU) is developing a new ‘Thematic Strategy for Pesticides’ including a proposed new ‘Sustainable Use Directive’.  According to the UK’s Pesticide Safety Directorate the new regulation could outlaw up to 85 percent of pesticides currently used by farmers and render conventional agriculture as it is currently practised unachievable.  Professor Sir Colin Berry, [...]

ELEVEN per cent of Mount Isa children have lead poisoning, a Queensland Health study has confirmed.
The results, released today in Mt Isa, confirm stories in The Australian in recent weeks and years.
The study shows that of 400 children aged one to four in the mining town, 45 had blood levels higher than 10 micrograms per [...]

According to a new report by Greenpeace, Apple’s iPhone may contain potentially hazardous chemicals. Read the full report entitled ‘Missed Call: iPhone’s hazardous chemicals’
Article here in Accountancy Age.
Something else for Apple Board member Al Gore to tackle?
Apple’s environmental policy is here.

I occasionally get emails from the other side of the world with a query about something environmental that is uniquely Australian.
It was not so many years ago that John Berlau emailed me about the Murray River and also bushfires. He was writing a book. It’s now published. Called ‘Eco-Freaks: Environmentalism [...]

There was a crash in the production of chlorofluorocarbons (CFC) following the signing of the Montreal Protocol in 1987.
By 1999 atmpospheric levels of manmade ozone destroying chemicals had leveled off and since 2003 there has been a 7 percent drop in the amount of chlorine and bromine in the lower stratosphere (10-25 km). This [...]

“Controlled indoor spraying of the infamous pesticide DDT is poised to make a comeback in countries that have tried and failed to do without it in the battle against malaria,” reports news service Reuters.
The Institute of Public Affairs* has published several proponents of DDT, including Roger Bate in an article titled ‘The Ban on DDT [...]