The Social Effects of the Rains in Rio

By now, you may have heard of the devastation in Rio de Janeiro and Niteroi (across the bay from Rio de Janeiro). On Tuesday,the city received 288 millimeters (11.3 inches) of rain in a 24-hour period. Stop and think about that - nearly a foot of rain in 24 hours. The results were devastating. Well over 100 were dead before Wednesday, and that was before more mudslides in the mountainous areas buried hundreds more alive, leaving Niteroi to declare a state of emergency while Rio declared three days of mourning and dealt with destruction in the storm's wake as well. Overall, news sites and blogs alike have done a good job covering the story, and I have little to add to them in terms of the basic facts of the immediate story.

However, the deaths point directly to the social inequalities of Brazil and remind us once again how class, race, and environment are inherently tied together in this type of disaster. In Rio, the poor and marginalized were most directly impacted. This is because of the simple arrangement of urban space in Rio de Janeiro. And this isn't a recent project - state-led efforts to displace the poor from the best land in the city date back to the late-1800s. While the government has tried to improve infrastructure in the favelas (notably during Leonel Brizola's terms as governor from 1983-1987 and 1991-1994), that hasn't prevented the elites over the 20th century from buying up and developing the best land, flat and near the beach, within the city, forcing the poor to the outskirts of the city or to build the favelas along the side of the region's mountains. And when rains like this happen, what would have been a landslide that perhaps affected few suddenly turns into a catastrophe that leaves hundreds dead.

And it's really hard to blame the favelados for this. Certainly, where they build had and has very real environmental consequences, but to place the blame for this on their shoulders is to ignore the broader socio-economic realities and history of Rio for well over 100 years. Due to the enormous gap in wealth (which only increased in Brazil in the last 30 years of the 20th century), as well as increasing urbanization throughout the 20th century (the country went from 70% rural/30% urban in the early-20th century to 70% urban/30% rural by the 1980s, even as the population grew), Rio's poor have constantly found them forced to live and get by in the geographically and environmentally worst places available (the landslide in Niteroi that buried 200 was built on top of an old landfill, not exactly prime real-estate). Indeed, it's quite common to see luxurious apartment buildings in places like Sao Conrado, Tijuca, Ipanema, Botafogo, and elsewhere within direct eyeshot of a favela, making the tragedy only that much more painful for the poor. Those with the least in Rio were stripped of everything they had, within eyesight of apartment buildings housing Rio's middle- and upper-classes, resting safely on flat, solid ground.

Certainly, the rains in Rio and the loss of life are horrible and sad, no matter how you cut it. But this isn't an isolated incident, or a once-in-a-lifetime kind of disaster; it's a direct result of issues revolving around poverty and urban space. Virtually none of the dead from these rains are middle- or upper-class. They were safe in land and buildings that have been their province for generations, even while the poor were excluded, isolated, and forced to make do with the options available to them, which by and large happened to be mountainsides that could erode in heavy rainfall. Obviously, favelas do lead to environmental degradation that can result in loss of hundreds of lives; at same time, city has adopted policies since late-1800s that have forced poor to the "marginal" parts of Rio, either on outskirts and/or forcing poor to build fragile housing along moutains; thus, when there is plenty of rain, favelas suffer disproportionately while middle-class and upper-class housing is safe. And while certainly the nearly-foot of rain has led to a very high death count, these kinds of landslides are not infrequent on a smaller scale when Rio sees even moderate rainfall (which happens annually), affecting both people's lives and basic infrastructure in the city. And thanks to climate change, some climatologists predict Rio (and Brazil) can expect with much greater frequency the kind of rainfall they saw Tuesday, which will undoubtedly lead to the deaths of more of Rio's poor, all while the wealthy and well-off can look out their windows, click their tongues at the tragedy, and never think about the broader social processes that have led to such a loss of life.

Bad News for Environment and Environmentalists in the Amazonian Basin

There have been some pretty terrible news stories regarding the Amazonian basin over the last few days that are worth pointing out.

First, a leading Amazon activist was shot and killed yesterday in the state of Para, just hours after a court delayed the retrial for the murder of Dorothy Stang. Pedro Alcantara de Souza was the leader of landless farmers in the rural state of Para, and two men on motorcycles apparently shot Souza 5 times in the head while Souza was riding his bicycle. While authorities are sending a team from Belem (the capital of Para) to investigate, the murderers have not been taken into custody. I usually hate to jump to conclusions, but given the strength of elite landowners in the region, combined with Souza's opposition to what are often illegal land-grabs on the part of those same elites, this was almost certainly a contract murder. Such is the way it often works when individuals fight for greater land reform and more equal distribution in the Amazon; it happened with Stang, it happened with Chico Mendes, and it most likely has happened again with Souza.

Additionally, foreign industry is also taking a toll on the environment, with the government's help. I've commented before that environmental policy may be one of, if not the single, deficiencies historians may find in Lula's government. These problems are not always limited to the Amazon, either; a hydroelectric dam that the Brazilian government contracted out to a Canadian company is wreaking havoc on both the environment and citizens in rural Minas Gerais. The dams are one of Lula's pet projects, and he's pushed heavily for hydroelectric power to supply Brazil's growing population with energy. In doing so, he's been nearly blinded by the highly-problematic use of dams, even while ignoring less destructive options like sun- and wind-power (and with well over 4500 miles of coastline, Brazil could easily take advantage of both). Instead, people in the interior are forced to witness dislocation and destruction in the name of hydroelectric power. Certainly, as he gets ready to leave office, Lula is enjoying some of the highest approval ratings he's ever had. However, it's worth repeating: his administration has been far from perfect, and as we begin to assess it historically, environmental policy will mostly likely be a dark stain on what has probably been one of the greatest administrations Brazilian history has seen.

Of course, Brazil isn't the only one facing these issues from foreign investment. This week, a court ruled in favor of Chevron in an arbitration case between the oil giant and Ecuador. Chad has commented before on the role of petroleum companies in the Spanish Amazon. Certainly, oil companies didn't need any more encouragement to degrade the environment and the residents of the Amazonian basin, but the court's ruling in this case certainly strengthens Chevron's arguments that it has done nothing wrong in spite of overwhelming evidence otherwise.

Brazil - Highest Use of Pesticides in the World

Of the many environmental issues facing Brazil, this isn't usually anywhere on the list:

Brazil became in 2008 the world’s top consumer of agriculture pesticides (ahead of the US), and continues to use a range of dangerous pesticides banned in other countries, according to a study released Friday. [...] Acccording to the Anvisa report released to the press, 64% of sweet peppers contained chemical residue above the limit allowed by Anvisa. In total, 15% of the fruit and vegetable samples investigated by Anvisa exceeded the allowed limits.

Although this is news to me, it's in no way surprising news. The Brazilian agro-industrial elites are one of the most contemptible and powerful groups in Brazil. That they are willing to use these pesticides to maximize profit and production with no consideration for the effects they'd have on the workers or on the populace that eats these fruits and vegetables is far from shocking - elite landowners have already repeatedly displayed a general disregard for the lives of others.

This is of course terrible news for the poor agricultural workers who work in producing this food, though. The landowners in these agricultural areas (almost always in the Northeast, North, and West) have ridiculous amounts of power at the local levels, controlling almost all levels of regional politics, and the workers to my knowledge are unable to unionize or really offer much of a challenge to the landowners. I openly admit my knowledge of rural labor practices in Brazil isn't the best, but while things have changed some since the 1960s, there is no doubt that the landowners still have an inordinate amount of power, and any rural-poor resistance I'm familiar with is not tied up in unionization, but more in the Landless Workers Movement (MST), whose angle is more about getting their own land than fighting for better pay, safer conditions, or unionization.

The report says that ANVISA [National Health Surveillance Agency] is "considering" banning 13 of these pesticides in Brazil. I hope they are able to do this, but I have my doubts, especially if the decision requires congressional approval, since a not-insignificant number of senators and politicians are tied directly or indirectly to the major agro-industrial companies, sometimes even heading these companies while serving as governor, as in the case of Mato Grosso state's governor, Blairo Maggi, head of the Maggi food corp. [As an added "race in Brazil" bonus, notice the race of the people the company invites to work for them on the Maggi homepage and compare that to how most Brazilians actually look.] Still, the report should raise more than a few eyebrows in Brazil, and some of these pesticides will get banned. But overall, I'd say awareness among the general population of what is being used in the production of food in Brazil is even lower than in the United States.

A Second Chance at Justice in the Dorothy Stang Murder

Last year, I was dismayed when a Brazilian court overturned the conviction of Vitalmiro Bastos de Moura, who was earlier convicted for ordering Stang's guilt.

Well, in the wake of the good news in Peru today, there's more great news out of Brazil:

A Brazilian court on Tuesday ordered the arrest and retrial of an Amazon rancher acquitted of orchestrating the murder of American nun and rain forest activist Dorothy Stang.
Para state's top court reversed last year's not-guilty verdict for Vitalmiro Moura on a technicality, ruling that a video used by the defense was not admissible as evidence, the state prosecutor said.

This is just outstanding. Over the past two decades, over 1,100 environmental activists and poor people have been murdered in Brazil's Northern and Northeastern regions over land disputes and conservation efforts, and for way too long, the elites behind these murders and the land-grabs that precede or follow them have remained immune. Moura's overturned conviction last year was definitely a low-point in the justice system in Brazil. But this new ruling changes everything - Moura can go back to the courts where he was originally found guilty (Brazil has no double-jeopardy laws), and hopefully witness the same justice that the poor men who were convicted and whom he hired to murder Stang. It's rare that justice gets a second chance, especially against Brazil's landed elites; hopefully, this ruling will help overturn that trend. I doubt it will, but even if it doesn't, at least there's a chance for Moura to end up back in jail, where he rightfully belongs.

Wipe Yourself, Kill a Spotted Owl

We race through natural resources in ways that are so second nature to us that we don't even think about it. Take toilet paper. You are cutting down trees for this. Where do those trees come from? What is the effect on the Earth every time you (or I!) go for the extra soft double ply?

The environmental damage from toilet paper is massive.

Some of the paper comes from tree farms. But way too much comes from virgin or second-growth forest that we need for many other reasons--fighting climate change first and foremost.

What options do we have? Recycled toilet paper is a great idea. 19th century Americans used corn cobs, supposedly the origin of the term "corn hole." Maybe we don't want to go that old timey. But the great boreal forests of Canada are coming down every time you wipe yourself. We need to think hard about just how we impact nature and do what we can do mitigate the damage our existence causes. This is certainly one area where we can sacrifice a little bit of comfort, if that is indeed the right word for two-ply, super soft toilet paper, to take a significant step in saving the planet from destruction.

The Death of Biofuels

This AP story claims that corn-based ethanol is dead and that Mexico's tortilla crisis in 2006 killed it.

Basically, it was when the price of tortillas rose rapidly in 2006 and into 2007 that people began to realize that societies needed to use food to feed people rather than feed their vehicles. Mexicans freaked out about this. I was in Mexico City as this was happening and it dominated front-page headlines almost every day.

I wonder if corn-based fuels are dead though. Certainly U.S. policy makers, particularly powerful politicians from farming states have no intention on letting it die. And does anyone think that American consumers will not clamor for ethanol once gas prices rise again? Certainly American consumers are more concerned with gas prices than starvation in the developing world.

The lesson of the story is that biofuels are alive and well. But not in ways that help U.S. politicians. Ethanol from Brazilian sugar has proven to be pretty effective with little affect on the world sugar supply. Europeans use rapeseed. But none of this means giant profits for American agribusiness.

At the core of the issue is scarcity. Food prices have gone up for many reasons. There are too many people on the planet. People in China, India, and Brazil want to eat like Americans. They want to drive and live like Americans too. We want to have more things every day. All of this takes up precious land and resources. While we definitely should not be taking food out of people's mouths to drive our Hummers, the problem of food prices, hunger, and scarcity run far deeper than just fuel.

Around South America

-In Peru, official outrage erupted as a magazine ran pictures of a nude model sitting astride the national flag. Defense officials are outraged, wanting prosecution of the journal, while the journal's editor suggests there is no higher patriotism than celebrating national holidays and symbols by placing a naked woman on top of the flag. Seriously.

-Alvaro Uribe offered the rarest of rare things yesterday: criticism of the U.S. from his own mouth. Uribe took the U.S. to task for giving extradited drug-lords lighter sentences in return for information. I'm not sure who's right or wrong here; I don't think that more draconian sentences is going to solve the drug problem in Colombia (working on the demand-side will), but certainly lighter sentences in the U.S. prisons probably don't have many drug-lords shaking in Colombia, either.

-Ecuador's constituent assembly approved a new constitution for the country, now sending the issue to a national vote referendum at the end of September. Among the items that would be included in the new Constitution (if the population approves it, which it may not do) would be broader social programs; more presidential power to accomplish things (as the system is established now, Ecuador's Congress, wracked by cronyism, inefficiency, and a political elite that does little but take care of its own, can and does easily prevent anything from being done by what is probably a too-weak executive authority; the new constitution hopes to amend this); the president could close Congress once, but Congress could also unseat the president (with elections following in either circumstance); and, very interestingly for a Latin American and/or Catholic country, give same-sex unions the same rights as opposite-sex marriages.

-Bolivian indigneous groups from the Eastern lowlands are planning to meet with Congress in September to discuss how Chevron lied to Congress in an attempt to avoid paying $16 billion (with a "b") in damages for polluting the region (the decision stems from a case filed way back in 1993, and still has to receive a judge's approval some time next year). Representatives from the Cofan, Secoya, and Siona tribes are trying to get reimbursed for environmental damage caused by "dumping 18.5 billion gallons of toxic waste into Amazon waterways from 1964 to 1990, thereby decimating the ability of the indigenous groups to live off the rainforest. Texaco [bought by Chevron in 2001] also built roughly 1000 unlined open-air waste pits that have been leeching toxins into the soil and groundwater for decades." The indigenous leaders will be traveling in order to talk to Congress themselves and explain how Chevron's lobbyists, including Trent Lott, John Negroponte, and many other governmental officials past and present, have misled Congress and tried to get the U.S. government to pressure Ecuador to drop the case with the threat of withdrawal of economic support from Ecuador. (Erik may be right about coal companies in the U.S., but in my book, globally none is as despicable as the oil companies are.)

-Argentina's president Kristina Fernandez Kirchner has an amazingly sane take on how to deal with the drug issue, proposing to decriminalize possession and work harder at rehab programs and going after distributors and dealers (if you're going to attack the supply-side, that's the way to do it).

-The New York Times finally gets around to talking about the economic growth in Brazil that I've discussed before (for example, here, here, here, and here). The report offers the general picture of growth, but there are some pretty impressive stats, including the facts that "Brazil has shrunk its income gap by six percentage points since 2001, more than any other country in South America this decade," and that "while the top 10 percent of Brazil’s earners saw their cumulative income rise by 7 percent from 2001 to 2006, the bottom 10 percent shot up by 58 percent." I would just blatantly point out what the New York Times does not here, but is something I absolutely believe: these changes have happened in large part because of Lula's approach to governing, which has not shied away from investment but has avoided privatizations or short-term fixes, while simultaneously investing public money into social programs. Certainly, Brazil still has a very long way to go in terms of the income gap. Still, the facts that Lula's social programs are doing more than anybody predicted, people are gaining more access to purchasing goods that they previously never could afford, and Brazil's economy doesn't have any signs of slowdown ahead, as its currency is doing great and it's industrial base has diversified, are all excellent news, and I think a lot of the credit does belong to Lula on this.

-While we're on the subject of Lula, he took a new step in environmental protection, setting up a fund designed to "promote alternatives to forest-clearing for people living in the Amazon, and support conservation and sustainable development." As critical as I (and Erik and Randy) have been of Lula on environmental policy, this is truly a great step, primarily because it not only puts money into conservation efforts, but also because it puts money towards social programs that will hopefully prevent people from deforesting for money. I don't begrudge him his efforts to maintain sovereignty on the Amazon and in fact actually think the fund finally puts some efforts behind Brazil's rhetoric. (Up to this point, Brazil has often insisted that the Amazon is its business, and has often bristled at outside help, but without ever really trying to do much financially itself). Anyhow, this is just a small step, and will not radically shift Lula's environmental legacy. That said, it's still a great step in the right direction, and it's the best step he's taken environmentally yet.

-And finally, an interesting (if sometimes disjointed) article at the Times uses the rumor of a Brazilian immigrant winning the lottery to get into broader issues of what "the American dream" means to immigrants, how the economy's collapse is affecting them, and the ways in which modern technology allows Brazilians in the U.S. and Brazil to communicate more quickly than ever.

The Middle East, Food, and Water

This New York Times story does a great job of summing up the most important problems the world faces in the 21st century. The Middle East faces huge problems concerning population growth, food, and water. There are already far too many people living in the region. Given the lack of birth control in these Islamic nations, these numbers continue to skyrocket. The biggest problem with this is the dry and increasingly degraded environment of the region. They don't have enough water for their people to drink and they can't grow enough food for their people either. This is forcing these nations to make difficult choices, none of which are likely to have positive consequences.

Should they export their food growth to poorer countries, as Saudi Arabia is doing? Not a terrible idea on one level except that it turns these other nations into colonies and could exacerbate political instability. Plus as nations like Pakistan also continue to see their populations explode, they will need that land and water for their own people.

Should they commit themselves to growing food wherever they can? This is a short-term solution at best because the soil is bad and because they increasingly don't have the additional water it takes to grow crops in the desert.

Should these nations protect the valuable farmland they have? Yes, but it's not going to happen. Land along the Nile and other major agricultural areas is also valuable for industrial developments and human habitation. Developers and industralists have more money and power than farmers. There is no sign that nations will go down this track.

Equally, there is little sign that the kind of population control necessary to bring these problems under control will happen either.

Of any Middle Eastern nation, it is not surprising that Israel is in the best situation. Their agricultural programs are the most modern and the best for conserving resources. And although many religious Jews and some policy makers are concerned that Israeli Jews are not having children at the rate of their Arab neighbors, in the long run their limited population could provide them with the best internal stability. Unfortunately however, as these same problems spiral out of control in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and among their neighbors, they will be surrounded by nations with massive social problems, huge populations, and very little internal stability, thus making Israel's security all the more tenuous.

The Chinese and Greenhouse Gases

This post at Global Labor Strategies is a nice summary of the Chinese problem with greenhouse gases.

A few notes:

1. I have wondered in the past whether China would be able to continue developing as a world power because of the massive environmental damage they are sustaining. I still feel this way. We are starting to see the beginnings of these problems as rising fuel prices are leading to food shortages among the world's poor. China is of course burning incredible amounts of coal to fuel their expansion. While they have lots of coal, it is not really sustainable as a long-term solution because of the incredible air pollution and because of world opinion.

But one way China may be able to contain these environmental costs and continue their development is becoming the world's leader in renewable energy. Certainly they have the centralized government structure to make this happen if it truly becomes a national priority. Turning a significant amount of resources to wind and solar energy makes a tremendous amount of sense for the Chinese and I expect they will embrace and improve upon these technologies as their way of maintaining their growth.

2. The author makes a very important point about western hypocrisy toward China. The United States and Europe continually chastise China for their greenhouse gas emissions. Yet, not only does the United States pump more greenhouse gases into the environment, but a huge percentage of those Chinese emissions result from them producing products for the developed world!

I have long been critical of people who talk about a "post-industrial society." This makes no sense at all. The United States, Europe, and Japan are just as reliant upon the Industrial Revolution as they ever have been. But they have exported the costs of the Industrial Revolution to Asia, Africa, and Latin America. So China, Mexico, and Indonesia have to deal with industrial pollution, deforestation, and greenhouse gas emissions. But so long as the developing world is demanding the products the Industrial Revolution provides for the cheap prices only available in the Global South, we are just as responsible for those emissions as the nation of production.

In addition, rising fuel prices are convincing some western nations to renege on environmental agreements. For instance, according to the GLS article, Italy's major electric producer is switching their largest plant from oil to coal and expects to increase their reliance on coal to 33% of its energy needs from the current 14% by 2013. The hypocrisy just got ranker. I have little doubt that Americans will engage in similar actions as our gas prices rise.

Pot, meet kettle.

This isn't to say that the West needs to agree with developing world leaders who use the history of western despoiling of the environment as an excuse for their own. Just yesterday, I chastised Brazil's Lula for saying these things. But at the same time, we can't just ignore our own consumption and criticize the producers.

3. The author closes with a very brief discussion of how climate change is a working-class problem. But it feels tacked on. Labor strategists have not done a good job of showing why environmentalism is a working-class problem. Working-class people have tended to be more resistant to environmentalism for several reasons, including the potential of losing their jobs, as well as cultural differences that have long alienated working-class people. Part of the problem is that these environmental problems seem so huge and unmanageable that it is hard to figure out what anyone is supposed to do, not to mention workers who have relatively little power in American society, who are trying to feed their families, and maybe watch a little TV in the evening.

I don't necessarily have any answers here either. But it is worth saying that environmental problems will affect working-class people faster and with greater effect. We are already seeing this with the global working-class, as poor people are facing higher food prices that they flat out cannot afford. Hunger is becoming a major world issue again because of fuel prices. It seems to me that labor needs leaders who make environmental issues central to their agendas. Organizing for inexpensive mass transit seems like a very intelligent idea for instance because it would provide their constituents cheap transportation so they wouldn't have to drive. Pressing for new technologies in electric vehicles seems like another possible place where labor could make a difference. It's going to take real leadership though because these solutions are several years down the road at the earliest.

Another Potential and Frustrating Step Backwards in Protecting the Amazon

Marina Silva has stepped down. Silva (not related to Lula) had some great ideas on how to integrate environmentalism into the national policy without sacrificing development needs, but according to this article, resigned in part because "She tried to work with other agencies for an integrated approach to protecting the environment — but lost almost every time she was opposed by another department" (such as Lula's reduction of IBAMA, the governmental environmental organization, last year).

Make no mistake - this is really a huge step backwards, and I'm really disappointed (though I'm not quite as angry with Lula as Randy is.) To be sure, Lula's plans for hydroelectric power (and failure to even consider wind power) is frustrating (to put it mildly), and his efforts to undo the institutions (like IBAMA) that resist hydroelectric power and work to save the environment is infuriating. But I also don't think you can totally ignore some of the small, but important, changes Lula has made. While the recent decision in the Dorothy Stang case is also frustrating, there have been small but significant steps taken against those who commit murder against environmentalists. Likewise, Lula's efforts to have the government patrol the Amazonian basin with military troops in an effort to reduce deforestation (particularly ranchers' deforestation) is another important step, albeit one that is far from failsafe and perfect; still, this is a bigger step in actively trying to reduce deforestation than his predecessors ever took.

Still, I really only differ with Randy in degree of disappointment. I know nothing about Carlos Minc, the replacement for Silva. Still, it's just really really disappointing. Marina Silva definitely could have been a major force for change and environmental protection in Brazil; that she was stymied in pretty much every effort she made is really almost too much. It's too soon to tell, but I have little doubt that, years from now, when scholars look back and evaluate Lula's eight years of administration, his environmental policies will be one of the low-points.

Justice Undone in the Dorothy Stang Case

This just infuriates me:

On Tuesday, after a two-day trial, a jury in Belém, in Pará State, acquitted the man, Vitalmiro Bastos de Moura, of conspiracy in the murder of Sister Dorothy Stang in February 2005.
The trial was the second in which a jury had considered Mr. Moura’s role in the killing. He was convicted and sentenced in May last year to 30 years in prison on charges of ordering the killing of Sister Dorothy, 73, who was a staunch advocate of protecting the rain forest.
Under Brazilian law, a retrial is required for first offenders who are sentenced to more than 20 years. This time, the jury voted 5 to 2 to accept the defense contentions that Mr. Moura had no motive to be involved in Sister Dorothy’s killing and that it had been carried out solely by Rayfran das Neves Sales, who confessed to shooting her and is serving a 28-year sentence.

I'm sorry, but no. Para, where Stang was killed, is notorious for corruption and the landed elite doing pretty much anything they want to, be it illegal logging, graft with politicians (who are also from the landed elite), and even intimidating and killing people who try to save the environment and fight for the rights of the poor. And there is just no way, who is already serving time for her murder, and who was a poor worker in the area, decided to just shoot Stang without any goading or payoff from anybody, particularly given that, this time, he just magically changed his entire story and said it wasn't Moura's gun and that nobody paid him off. No way. Not in this case, and not in just about any land-struggle case in Para. Tom Stang, Dorothy's brother, is dead on:“That guy [Sales]was offered up as a sacrificial lamb. But the darker forces that created him have been allowed to go free.” This is just terrible news in a case that should have seen fuller justice for an important voice in the land-rights and conservation struggles in Brazil.

Bottled Water Sucks

Bottled water is one of the most pointless products we consume. It is often no cleaner or better than tap water. In fact, it not uncommonly comes straight out of the tap, including one company that uses the Houston municipal water system. It is expensive. $1 for a bottle???? That is more expensive than gas. For something you can get out of your tap safely for free. Plus, bottled water is such an invented consumer product. Nobody drank bottled water 25 years ago. Today, everyone does. Has our tap water become less safe? No.

Bottled water also has tremendous environmental costs. While some people recycle those bottles, most just toss them in the trash. Ashley Braun has a great piece at Grist showing the damage these bottles cause.

They take three times as much water as they hold to create. Plastics make up 11% of landfills and no small amount of this are bottles. Much of the bottled water is coming out of the Great Lakes (and what bad has ever been dumped in those?), literally leading to lower water levels. The plastic in the bottles comes from oil.

There simply is no good reason for people with safe water systems to consume bottled water. If you want to make a simple move to help the environment, stop using these bottles. Buy a Nalgene bottle instead. It's still plastic but you can use it endlessly. You'll save tons of water, oil, and space by doing so.

Overpopulation

At the core of most of the Earth's environmental problem is overpopulation. Without such a huge explosion in the world's population in the last 200 years, most of the thorny issues we are dealing with would have never happened--climate change, species collapse, much of our pollution, etc. Simply put, there are far too many people on the planet. Until we get population growth under control, we have little chance to battle climate change.

JMG pines that it is almost impossible to have a serious discussion of overpopulation. He also provides a series of thoughts on the issue from various writers.

China, western Europe, and Japan are on the right track toward controlling population, even if China's is compulsory and resented by large sections of the population. Soon some of these places may see negative population growth, a very good thing. But until the rest of the world gets on board, including the United States, we can do only a limited amount of solving environmental problems.

Of course, there are many factors that go into deciding whether one has children. I'm not going to make an argument here that it is immoral to have children. Not only would most of my friends denounce me, but it is too complex of a problem to make such an easy denunciation. However, I will go so far as to say that having more than 2 children is immoral. Replace your population if you want to. But adding more people to the Earth is both unnecessary and will contribute to the environmental collapse of the planet.

However, if we can reach overall world population sustainability, we have the potential to stablize the world's environments. Lots of people will bemoan population sustainability. People are already freaking out in Japan and Europe over their flat or negative growth rates--many business and government leaders cannot fathom a growing economy without a growing population. This could be a problem. I don't really know. But it is increasingly necessary to come up with a population solution, not nation by nation, but at the global level.

Historical Image of the Day

Field taken over by Kudzu

Garbage

I find this Emily Gertz piece about Americans generating garbage remarkable.

We create 20% more trash per person than we did in 1990!!!

Where is that coming from? The proliferation of plastic bags you get at the store? Do we throw away more usable goods than we used to?

I didn't catch the "Marketplace Money" series where Tess Vigeland carried around her trash, but it's a useful exercise. Something has to be done about the creation of so trash. I would argue that utility fees for garbage should rise, but given the negligible effect rising gas prices have had on driving, I don't know that it would matter.

Our Disappearing Resources

Greenboy has a good post on declining amounts of key resources. Not only our oil supplies drying up, but we are seeing rapidly depleted sources of iridium, hafnium, silver, tin, and uranium. All of these elements play key roles in producing products we use every day.

We of the developed world have lived like kings for decades. We haven't given a second thought to our footprint on the soil, where our computers and other consumer products come from, or how our consumption affects people around the world. Now, China, India, Brazil, Mexico, and other "developing nations" are demanding resource consumption on the same level as the United States, western Europe, and Japan. We can't supply those products. We're already seeing rising oil prices. Expect to witness huge increases in the prices of computers and many other products in the next twenty years, prices high enough to be a slug in the gut to world economies.

Every human-made thing you see around you comes from somewhere. Most of it goes through heavy industrial processes to get there. Look around carefully. You are the last generation to live at this level of luxury.

Bird Declines

This article on the speeding decline of songbird populations in the East distrubed me greatly, though I had heard this before. Some numbers:

Bobwhite:
40 years ago--31 million
Today--5.5 million

Evening Grosbeak:
40 years ago--17 million
Today--3.8 million

The study suggests a few major reasons for this. Climate change likely has something to do with it. Increasingly industrialized agriculture severely decimates bird habitat and definitely played a part too.

But probably the biggest reason is suburban expansion. The worst culprits are often second home buyers building a home in a previously undeveloped field. They need roads, power lines, and other services. Those roads are deathways for animals, though not birds so much. Moreover, many animals, both birds and others, need undeveloped land. A home, even if it is 1/8 mile away from the next home, destroys that. Suburban development is actually better in many cases than ex-urban development. And of course, animals and humans often like the same habitat, particularly along waterways.

One of the bigger lessons here is that the few people have more of a negative impact on the environment than the middle to upper class person who builds a second home. Ironically, many of these people claim to be environmentalists. They recycle and give money to the Wilderness Society. But they impact the planet far more negatively than the city dweller.

Dorothy Stang sees justice

I'm a little late to this (I had a guest the past two days), but yesterday, Vitalmiro Bastos de Moura was found guilty in the 2005 murder of Dorothy Stang, a major voice and proponent in environmental protection movemnt in Brazil. It is extremely refreshing to see one of the people accused in her murder actually found guilty - for years, landowners have, with impunity, hired people to kill those who try to protect the land. Certainly, things haven't gone perfectly, even in the conviction - Regivaldo Galvão, another suspect with far mroe money than Moura, has yet to be charged with anything, and without question the first conviction in more than a decade in a case like this isn't going to suddenly make wealthy landowners and corporations re-think their efforts towards illegal deforestation and land seizures in a country where more than 50 precent of the land belongs to barely more than 3% of the population. Still, this is really good news overall.

Reducing Brazil's Environmental Agency

While Lula's social record has been outstanding, his environmental legacy is increasingly in doubt. First, there was his new Amazon policy (which, while I was at first intrigued and thought it may work, I've since begun to think and become convinced it is more dangerous than useful). Now, there is the breaking up of IBAMA, Brazil's environmental organization. Lula is taking away from it its conservation efforts and turning it into a mainly-administrative arm of the government, which is a shame, given how successful and efficient IBAMA has been up to this point.

Randy has a lot more good insight, and is really worth checking out, but I'd just like to add a few comments. It's rather unfortunate to me that it seems in some ways Lula is falling into the "Order and Progress" trap here. Certainly, Brazil's energy needs are growing far more rapidly than its production. However, the Brazilian state has continuously tried to address this need with policies that put at danger the most fragile parts of the country, in this case, dams and pipelines. As Randy said, wind power is a totally viable option here (much like the U.S., yet strangely, both countries generally fail to use wind, though the U.S. does have more than one windmill). This effort to "modernize" by increasing state presence and technological capability on the fragile areas of Brazil most certainly is not a recent development. In the 1960s, building the Trans-Amazonian highway was one of Gen. Emílio Garrastazu Médici's pet projects to show Brazil was "developed". (Médici was the most repressive of the Brazilian general-presidents during the 21-year dictatorship). In the 1970s, Gen. Ernesto Geisel pushed for nuclear development, placing the testing areas in the Northeast near the Amazon basin, where they remained until the corrupt Collor administration (1990-92). Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the efforts to minimalize or prevent illegal deforestation were minimal, reaching perhaps their darkest period during the privatization-rush of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1994-2002). And now there's the reduction of IBAMA.

This isn't to say that Brazil is screwed, nor that there are people here who are still successfully fighting for conservation. As the article points out, the reduction of IBAMA still leaves several other points where governmental and environmental groups, ethnic indigenous groups, and NGOs can try to stop development projects that are of great harm to the forest. These groups are also rather efficient, and experienced at what they do. It is simply unfortunate to me that the office of the President of Brazil throughout the years has not tried to find more environmentally sound ways to carry out their development projects over the last 40+ years. Maybe Lula's decisions will not be as damaging as they seem to have the potential to be right now, but there's that ever present fear that we're not doing enough.

Global Warming: Example #2849

Generally, many parts of Brazil, especially in the rural tropical areas, face the chance of a dengue fever outbreak in their area, and such epidemics generally make the news. However, a recent epidemic is making particular news here in Brazil, not just in the media and the medical community, but among the environmentalists and climatologists here. There has been an outbreak of dengue in Rio Grande do Sul, which is Brazil's southern-most state, located on the border with Argentina and Urugay, well below the Tropic of Capricorn and one of the few areas in Brazil that is subject to cool autumns and colder winters (no snow, but periodically in the 30s Fahrenheit).

What does an epidemic in Brazil's southern-most state have to do with global warming? Well, it's simple - for the first time in recorded history, it is warm enough in Rio Grande do Sul that the mosquito that carries dengue has not yet died. In the past, the South was already getting into the 50s and 40s (Fahrenheit) by this time, but the temperature have gradually increased over the last 15 years, so that now, the temperatures have been in mid-80s well beyond when they should have, and reflect the broad warming patterns in Brazil's southern-most region (and throughout the country more broadly).Combine things like this with other recent disasters, including the increasing temperatures and the first hurricane to ever form in the Southern Atlantic in 2004, it offers reminders of how much trouble we are in.