Greenlist(tm) Bulletin 12/08/2006
This is the weekly bulletin of the TURI Library, reporting a selection of recently published titles we have acquired. Our pledge is to keep the bulletin relevant to your work and brief -- no more than 10 titles. You are welcome to send a message to jan@turi.org if you would like more information on any of the articles listed here.
Titles here, abstracts below them:
- Environment Agency Invites Nanotechnology Talks
- Business and Ecosystems: Ecosystem Challenges and Business Implications
- Environmental and Occupational Causes of Cancer Re-visited
- EPA Qualification Helps Cytec Market Eco-Friendly Products
- Environment Matters at the World Bank: Good Governance and Environmental Management
- Pure carbon nanotubes pass first in vivo test
- Environmental justice and toxic exposure: Toward a spatial model of physical health and psychological well-being
- Persistently Clean?
- Water Use Reduction at an Auto Assembly Plant
- Inquiry Turns To Humans On Pollutant, Hormone Tie
1. Environment Agency Invites Nanotechnology Talks
SOURCE ICIS Chemical Business Americas, v270 n16, October 30 - November 5, 2006, p14
ABSTRACT The EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) has
invited more than 500 organizations and individuals to take part in a public
consultation on the risks and benefits of nanotechnology. The EPA will use the
consultation to design and develop a stewardship program. The EPA said the
program will complement new and existing chemical initiatives under the Toxic
Substances Control Act, and will provide a "firm scientific foundation for
regulatory decisions." The EPA added that its nanotechnology program was
set to include public and scientific consultations to discuss risk-management
practices and characterization of nanoscale materials, and workshops examining
the pollution prevention opportunities for nanoscale materials. Representatives
from industry, environmental groups and federal agencies have been invited to
take part in the consultation process.
2. Business and Ecosystems: Ecosystem Challenges and Business Implications
DATE 2006
SOURCE Earthwatch Institute; IUCN; World Business Council for Sustainable Development; World Resources Institute
ABSTRACT Over the past 50 years human activity has altered ecosystems faster and more extensively than ever before in human history. That is the main finding of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA), a four-year, international, scientific appraisal of the condition and trends in the Earth’s ecosystems. The MA classified ecosystem services, the benefits people and businesses obtain from ecosystems, into four categories: Provisioning – goods such as food, water and fiber; Regulating – biophysical processes controlling natural processes; Cultural – providing recreational, aesthetic or spiritual values; Supporting – underlying processes such as soil formation, photosynthesis and nutrient cycling. The MA assessed 24 ecosystem services and found the majority to be degraded. The MA2 also identified six interconnected challenges that are of particular concern for business as these further affect the integrity of ecosystems and their capacity to provide services: Water scarcity; Climate change; Habitat change; Biodiversity loss and invasive species; Overexploitation of oceans; Nutrient overloading. This Issue Brief explores the six challenges, discusses their implications for businesses and provides examples of corporate responses.
WEB LINK
http://www.wbcsd.org/DocRoot/TG54Y61bSf5w1ATAROjJ/
Business%20and%20Ecosystems_211106_final.pdf
3. Environmental and Occupational Causes of Cancer Re-visited
AUTHOR Clapp, Richard W.; Howe, Genevieve K.; Jacobs, Molly
SOURCE Journal of Public Health Policy, v27 n1, April 2006, pp61-76
ABSTRACT We recently completed a review of scientific
evidence, particularly epidemiologic evidence, regarding the contribution of
environmental and occupational exposures to the overall cancer burden in the
4. EPA Qualification Helps Cytec Market Eco-Friendly Products
SOURCE PCI Paint & Coatings Industry,v22 n11, November 2006, p21
ABSTRACT Cytec Industries Inc., a global specialty chemicals and materials company, was recently named as the first company to qualify for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Sustainable Futures program, which includes approval for a shortened regulatory review process for certain new products. As a result, the EPA’s Pre-Manufacturing Notice review period for Cytec products assessed as low overall risk will be halved from the minimum of 90 days to only 45 days, thus increasing the speed at which eco-friendly products can reach the marketplace.
WEB LINK
http://www.pcimag.com/CDA/Articles/Company_News/
535db7aefc01f010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0____
5. Environment Matters at the World Bank: Good Governance and Environmental Management
DATE 2006
SOURCE World Bank
ABSTRACT Strengthening governance is now an integral
component of the World Bank’s approach to development assistance. Symptoms of
weak governance include problems with the distribution of revenues, non-payment
of taxes, restricted entry and competition in markets, questionable quality of
the regulatory framework, poor control of corruption or graft, questionable
attention to civil liberties, transparency and accountability, and instability
or violence and crime. It is impossible to determine the developmental cost of
poor governance, but world-wide bribery alone is estimated to exceed $1
trillion dollars annually. The management of water, forests, fisheries,
wildlife, and other natural resources is too often subject to poor governance,
which contributes to degradation—such as depleted soils, insufficient and
polluted water, rapidly disappearing forests, and collapsed fisheries— and
threatens the health and livelihoods of millions of people. These problems are
particularly acute in poorer countries, in which people are most dependent on
their natural resource base. In many developing countries, the costs of
environmental degradation have been estimated at 4 to 8 percent of GDP
annually. Yet such resources are a vital part of these countries’ overall
wealth. The World Bank’s recent Wealth of Nations found that in poor countries
(excluding oil states) natural resources make up 25 percent of total wealth,
compared to 16 percent for produced goods and services. The central focus of
the World Bank’s Environment Strategy and program is to promote poverty
reduction while managing this natural wealth for current and future
generations. This past year, the World Bank launched, in collaboration with
donors, NGO partners, and other international organizations, a global program
on sustainable fisheries—PROFISH. This initiative focuses on facilitating
stakeholder dialogue, providing technical assistance and policy advice, and
enhancing fisheries sector capacity and skills. In addition, the World Bank’s
forest program is supporting regional forest governance activities to curb
illegal logging and support the development of a more level playing field among
legitimate forest operators.
6. Pure carbon nanotubes pass first in vivo test
ABSTRACT In the first experiments of their kind,
researchers at
WEB LINK http://www.media.rice.edu/media/
NewsBot.asp?MODE=VIEW&ID=9078&SnID=2012157300
7. Environmental justice and toxic exposure: Toward a spatial model of physical health and psychological well-being
AUTHOR Bevc, Christine A.; Marshall, Brent K.; Picou, J. Steven
SOURCE Social Science Research, v36 n1, March 2007, pp48-67
ABSTRACT The relationship often assumed by environmental
justice researchers is that proximity to a hazardous waste site is a measure of
exposure to harmful chemicals. Few researchers, however, explicitly address the
methodological challenge of measuring the causal relationship between toxic
chemical exposure and health problems. To better understand the methodological
task of moving beyond the proximity-exposure assumption, the three most
commonly used quantitative methodological approaches in environmental justice
research are briefly outlined. Using geographic information system techniques,
we operationalize toxic exposure as an interval-level variable and integrate
this data with geocoded health and social survey information. We develop a
methodological design that enables researchers to assess what factors cause
mental and physical health problems for individuals living in contaminated
areas. The results of the hierarchical multiple regression analyses indicate
that sociodemographic, perceived exposure, objective exposure, and food
consumption variables are significant predictors of physical health and
psychological well-being. We also found a significant relationship between
physical health and psychological well-being. The data used in this paper were
collected in a low-income, African-American community in
8. Persistently Clean?
AUTHOR Brodie, Christopher R.
SOURCE American Scientist, January-February 2007
ABSTRACT More than a million pounds of antimicrobial
chemicals from soap and other products flow into the nation's sewers every
year. Do these compounds pose a risk? Product manufacturers say no, pointing to
data that show only traces of the two most common antibacterials, triclosan and
triclocarban, in treated wastewater. What happens to the remainder is less certain.
The stock explanation has been that the majority is broken down during the
treatment process. The fraction released into surface water was thought to meet
the same fate sooner or later. Thus, much of the claim that these products are
safe rested on the fact that they were rendered harmless in treatment plants or
just beyond. New data puncture that conclusion: 50 percent of triclosan and 76
percent of triclocarban remain unchanged by aerobic and anaerobic digestion in
a typical wastewater facility, according to a pair of recent reports. This
large intact fraction isn't going out with the treated water—the old estimates
are correct in that respect. Rather, it is trapped in the sludge at the bottom
of the treatment tanks. Most of that sludge gets spread on the ground to
fertilize pasture, forests and human food crops. Triclosan and triclocarban are
small organic molecules that give antimicrobial properties to personal-care
products such as soap, deodorant and toothpaste as well as durable goods such
as cutting boards, baby carriers and socks. Overall, Halden's team estimates
that more than 100,000 pounds of triclosan and over 300,000 pounds of
triclocarban are spread on the ground as sludge each year in the
WEB LINK
http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/54434
9. Water Use Reduction at an Auto Assembly Plant
DATE 2006
SOURCE
ABSTRACT Misunderstanding the true cost of utilizing raw
materials such as water can frequently result in poor management choices
regarding how the raw materials are used. Metal finishing operations are
notorious for using large quantities of water in their processes. The common
perception is that “water is cheap” so, it can be used liberally to ensure that
work-pieces are adequately cleaned, rinsed and coated. While it may be true
that the actual purchase of the water itself is relatively inexpensive, the
cost to using the water within the processes may be considerably more expensive.
A 2004 assessment performed by the Illinois Waste Management and
WEB LINK http://www.wmrc.uiuc.edu/main_sections/info_services/
library_docs/TN/tn07-086.pdf
10. Inquiry Turns To Humans On Pollutant, Hormone Tie
AUTHOR Fahrenthold, David A.
SOURCE
ABSTRACT Growing evidence that chemicals in the
environment can interfere with animals' hormone systems -- including the
discovery that male Potomac River fish are growing eggs -- has focused the
attention of environmentalists and scientists on a new question: Are humans
also at risk? In recent years, researchers have linked some common chemicals to
troubling changes in laboratory rodents and wild animals, including
reproductive defects, immune-system alterations and obesity. For now, no
connections to human ailments have been proved. But some studies have provided
hints that people might be affected by crossed hormones, and activists wonder
if this kind of pollution could contribute to diabetes, birth defects and
infertility. "There's a lot of concern that a lot of chemicals to which we
are exposed routinely, and without our knowledge, are interfering with the way
hormones work," said R. Thomas Zoeller, a professor of biology at the
WEB LINK
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/
12/03/AR2006120300992_pf.html
You are welcome to send a message to jan@turi.org if you would like more information on any of these resources. Also, please tell us what topics you are particularly interested in monitoring, and who else should see GREENLIST. An online search of the TURI Library catalog can be done at http://greenlist.turi.org/ for greater topic coverage.
Compiled by the TURI Library, University of Massachusetts Lowell, 2006
This page updated Friday November 09 2007