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Water & Conservation

‘Green Pharmacy’ the Rx for Drug Pollution in Environment?

With nearly $800 billion in drugs sold worldwide, pharmaceuticals are increasingly being released into the environment. The “green pharmacy” movement seeks to reduce the ecological impact of these drugs, which have caused mass bird die-offs and spawned antibiotic-resistant pathogens.

The standard that new drugs be safe for human consumption was first enshrined in U.S. regulations in 1938, after an antibacterial drug dissolved in a poisonous solvent killed 100 children. Now, armed with a range of evidence suggesting that wildlife and human health may be threatened by pharmaceutical residues that escape into waterways and elsewhere, a growing band of concerned ecotoxicologists and environmental chemists are calling for yet another standard for new medications: that they be designed to be safe for the environment.

The movement for “green pharmacy,” as it has been dubbed, has grown as new technology has allowed scientists to discern the presence of chemicals in the environment at minute concentrations, revealing the wide dispersal of human and veterinary drugs across the planet.

04/15/2010 0 comment

Renewable Energy Water & Conservation

U.S. Scientists Harness Electric Current from Living Algae Cells

written by Yale Environment 360

04/14/2010 1 comment

Clean Transportation Recycling & Waste Mgmt.Water & Conservation

The Week in Review: Smart Grid, Recycling, Hybrids & LEDs

written by

Top News: This week, President Obama startled both his allies and critics with a plan to permit drilling for oil off the Southern Atlantic states and in the Gulf of Mexico. Meanwhile the Secret Service, in a stroke of karmic justice, denied the president’s request for a hybrid limo.

On Saturday, Apple’s long-awaited iPad emerged to great fanfare, and with it some schwag and a initial smattering of green apps.

Wising Up to the Smart Grid: After years of talk and speculation, several big U.S. companies revealed that the smart grid lies at the center of their business plans. At the New York Auto Show, Ford and Microsoft announced energy-management software designed for the thousands of people who will plug in their electric cars or hybrids at home. Connecticut Light & Power applied for permission to scrap its flat-rate price structure in favor of one that penalizes customers for overloading the grid. Under the proposal, Connecticut electricity would be ten times cheaper at night than it would be in the middle of the day, when the A/C units are cranking.

04/09/2010 0 comment

Renewable Energy Water & Conservation

Broad Scope of EPA’s Fracturing Study Raises Ire of Gas Industry

written by Walter Wang

$EPA-fracturing-gas-drilling$ A federal study of hydraulic fracturing set to begin this spring is expected to provide the most expansive look yet at how the natural gas drilling process can affect drinking water supplies, according to interviews with EPA officials and a set of documents outlining the scope of the project. The research will take a substantial step beyond previous studies and focus on how a broad range of ancillary activity – not just the act of injecting fluids under pressure – may affect drinking water quality.

The oil and gas industry strongly opposes this new approach. The agency’s intended research “goes well beyond relationships between hydraulic fracturing and drinking water,” said Lee Fuller, vice president of government affairs for the Independent Petroleum Association of America in comments (PDF) he submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency.

04/08/2010 0 comment

Water & Conservation

‘High Def’ Underwater Imaging Developed

written by Yale Environment 360

U.S. researchers have developed broadband acoustic systems that they say will improve the ability to count and classify fish and zooplankton, an advance they liken to jumping from black and white television to high-definition TV.

While oceanographers have long used acoustic measurements to determine what lies under the sea, existing technologies use sound waves that measure only one or a few frequencies, producing data that can be ambiguous and open to different interpretations, particularly for small fish and zooplankton.

04/06/2010 0 comment

Clean Transportation Water & Conservation

Obama Proposal Would Allow Expanded Offshore Drilling

written by Yale Environment 360

The Obama administration is proposing to open vast areas of open water along the Atlantic coast, in the Gulf of Mexico, and off the northern coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling.

The proposal would end a longtime moratorium on drilling from Delaware to central Florida and would affect nearly 167 million acres of ocean and open 24 million acres in the eastern Gulf to development.

It would also authorize steps toward determining how much oil and natural gas lies off the coast of the Middle Atlantic and Southern states.

While the dramatic policy shift may gain some Republican support for the administration’s energy and climate initiatives, it is expected to alienate many environmental groups and Democrats who oppose expanded offshore drilling because of potential environmental impacts.

03/31/2010 0 comment

Water & Conservation

Plastic Pollution in Water Supplies to Be Investigated

written by Yale Environment 360

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says it will require new studies on the health and environmental effects of bisphenol A (BPA), a potentially harmful chemical found in thousands of everyday plastics.

The federal agency, which is looking to add the chemical to its list of “chemicals of concern,” will begin measuring levels of the chemical in drinking water and ground water supplies. More than one million pounds of BPA are released into the environment annually, EPA officials say.

While studies have shown that the chemical disrupts development in animals, that link has not been confirmed for humans.

03/31/2010 2 comments

Water & Conservation

Americans Less Concerned About the Environment, Poll Says

written by Walter Wang

According to a poll conducted by the Gallup Organization in early March , Americans are less concerned about eight specific environmental issues than they were one year ago. Fewer than half of those surveyed–32 percent–said they felt that that climate change will have an impact on their way of life as compared to a high of 40 percent in 2008.

Close to 50 percent of Americans believe the threat of global warming is exaggerated. Fifty-three percent believe that economic growth, especially with regard to jobs and unemployment, is more important even if it has a negative impact on the environment, according to Frank Newport, Gallup’s editor in chief, as quoted in an article in USA Today .

Surprisingly, many Americans perceive that environmental woes in the US are improving; those polled were less concerned about other environmental problems than at any other time in the past 20 years. According to Gallup, in 1989, 72 percent of Americans were worried about pollution of rivers, lakes, and reservoirs.

By 2004, only 54 percent were concerned, and 46 percent are worried about water pollution today. Concern about pollution of drinking water is at the top of the list.

03/30/2010 0 comment

Water & Conservation

Controversial Drilling Practice Hits Roadblock in New York City

written by Yale Environment 360

Hydro fracturing is a profitable method of natural gas extraction that uses large quantities of water and chemicals to free gas from underground rock formations. But New York City’s concerns that the practice would threaten its water supply have slowed a juggernaut that has been sweeping across parts of the northeastern United States.

The highly productive method of natural gas extraction known as “hydro fracturing” has spread rapidly across the United States in recent years, opening up vast new reserves in Texas, Wyoming, Pennsylvania, and other states.

Last fall, however, the process — also known as “fracking” — ran headlong into opposition from New York City. And for now at least, stiff resistance from the city, which fears the contamination of its pristine water supply in upstate New York, seems to have slowed the momentum behind this highly touted — and highly controversial — drilling technique.

03/29/2010 0 comment

Water & Conservation

Lower Ocean Oxygen Levels Predict Catastrophic Change

written by Walter Wang

There is a cascade failure going on in the world’s oceans that promises nothing but trouble in the future, and the problem stems in part from agricultural practices developed over the last half-decade aimed at growing more food on the same amount of land to feed rising populations.

A cascade failure is the progressive collapse of an integral system. Many scientists also call them negative feedback loops, in that unfortunate situations reinforce one another, precipitating eventual and sometimes complete failure.

The agricultural practices relate to “factory farming,” in which farmers grow crops using more and more chemical fertilizers, specifically nitrogen and phosphorus, which are the first two ingredients (chemical symbols N and P) listed on any container or bag of fertilizer. The last is potassium, or K.

03/29/2010 3 comments

Water & Conservation

Vulnerability of Water Supplies Hidden Underground

written by Environmental News Network

The Earth is truly a blue planet; 70 percent of its surface is covered with water. Unfortunately 97.5 percent of that is salt water, unusable for humans. Fresh water accounts for the other 2.5 percent, however, about two thirds of that is locked up in glaciers and in the icy poles. That leaves humans (and every other living creature on land) only about one percent of all the water on Earth to use.

If we break this down even further, we see more limitations. Of the one percent usable water, only one percent is actually on the surface and can be easily accessed. This includes lakes, rivers, and swamps. The rest is underground. The U.S. Geological Survey has estimated the actual quantities in cubic miles for water distribution on Earth and is as follows:
Continue Reading

03/27/2010 0 comment

Energy Efficiency Green Building Recycling & Waste Mgmt.Renewable Energy Water & Conservation

The Shanghai Tower: Beginnings of a Green Revolution in China

written by

The Shanghai Tower will be the tallest building in China by its completion in 2014, but that is not its biggest accomplishment. The term “vertical city” has been used to describe the cornucopia of spaces that it will offer including Class-A office space, a luxury hotel, high-end retail, and event space. This aspect still pales in comparison to the building’s biggest accomplishment, its innovation in green design.

With wind turbines, a complex rainwater collection system, two envelope layers that surround nine interior sky gardens, and an ingenious design that mitigates lateral loads from wind and reduces the necessary structural steel by over 20 percent, this building is setting the bar high for super-tall buildings. Remarkably, all of these sustainable strategies are being implemented in China.

To further explain the design process and to prove that sustainability in China is not that surprising, I asked Gensler’s Director of Architecture for the Northwest Region (who is speaking on behalf of the Shanghai based project team) a couple of questions regarding sustainable building in China and how the Shanghai Tower epitomized the emerging trend.

CleanTechies: I wanted to start off by asking you what the marketplace is like for sustainable building in China. Is it as popular or as big in China as it is in the United States?

03/25/2010 4 comments

Recycling & Waste Mgmt.Water & Conservation

New Water Calculator Shows How to Consume Less

written by Walter Wang

In recognition of World Water Day, Underwriters Laboratories (UL) has launched its new “Save Your Water” consumption calculator.

This device allows people to calculate their daily, weekly and annual water consumption by participating in an interactive virtual home walk-through online.

Their Web site also provides statistics on water consumption, as well as offering solutions to excessive household water use.

03/23/2010 0 comment

Water & Conservation

Water Sector Startups Innovate Efficient Use And Supply

written by Dustin Kahler

“Whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting over.” Often attributed to Mark Twain, whoever said that seemed to have quite a bit of foresight, something the mainstream cleantech community is only recently warming up to.

The fights over water use facing utility scale solar thermal projects in the desert Southwest may have a lot to do with opening the eyes of the clean-tech community, but the sector’s challenges and opportunities are much broader than that, as scores of Californians, Middle Easterners, and Australians will attest. So why, with the problems so immediate and demand remaining strong in the $58 billion annual market for water technologies, has water investment as a percentage of venture investment declined since 2005?

03/11/2010 1 comment

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