EPA Notes Endangered Species Found On Plum Island - 1010WINS.com

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Plum Island Animal Research Center

A federal review of the proposed sale of a remote island housing an animal disease laboratory must include a study of any impact lab testing had on the environment, as well as consideration of endangered bird species found there, two EPA officials said this week.

"Any potential contamination threats to public health and the environment associated with the existing disease research facility should also be evaluated along with appropriate remediation or removal actions,'' Environmental Protection Agency regional administrators Judith Enck and H. Curtis Spalding wrote in a June 2 letter provided by the EPA to The Associated Press.

Access to Plum Island, off New York's Long Island, is restricted to the approximately 300 scientists and support staff working at the lab, although officials have allowed the media and public officials to visit on various occasions. Audubon New York volunteers have also been provided access to do research on the bird population there.

The federal General Services Administration is conducting an environmental impact study of the island. The government is considering selling the island because it is planning to move its animal research operations to a new lab to be built in Manhattan, Kan. The EPA's two-page letter was submitted as part of the public comment process being conducted in advance of the proposed sale.

Plum Island scientists research pathogens like foot-and-mouth disease, which is highly contagious to livestock and could cause catastrophic economic losses and imperil the nation's food supply. In the early 1950s, there was research into the potential use of pathogens for biological warfare. Besides the laboratory, which has its own wastewater treatment plant, the island is home to a defunct U.S. Army base.

A former Plum Island administrator, retired Col. David Huxsoll, a veterinarian who served as the lab's director from 2000 to 2003, has said that anthrax was among the diseases studied at Plum Island.

The EPA letter made no specific recommendations about addressing potential contamination at the lab.

The EPA administrators also noted that Plum Island is home to a number of federally protected endangered bird species, including piping plovers and roseate terns. Also, several hundred common terns, which are designated as a threatened species by New York state, are found on the island, they said.

Sean Mahar, director of government relations for Audubon New York, commended the EPA administrators' letter.

"This crown jewel of Long Island Sound supports such a great diversity of birds and other wildlife, and deserves the utmost protection possible,'' he said.

The EPA officials' letter said they would be willing to serve as a cooperating agency in the GSA's development of its environmental impact statement. A GSA spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday.

They also suggest that, while the immediate area around the current lab could be the site of future development, consideration should be given to keeping the remainder of the 840-acre parcel in its natural state.

They noted that the EPA and state environmental agencies in New York and Connecticut designated the island in 2006 as one of 33 "Long Island Sound Stewardship Areas.'' The designation was intended to raise awareness about the ecological resources found at the sites.

"We would also expect the EIS to address air and water quality impacts of the development and conservation alternatives under consideration, including the potential wetlands impacts and the need for drinking water and wastewater facilities,'' Enck and Spalding said.

The GSA environmental review is expected to be completed by the end of the summer, after which public hearings will be scheduled. At least one Long Island environmental activist considers the timetable unrealistic.

"This letter characterizes the island as a rare ecological gem that warrants protection,'' said Adrienne Esposito, executive director of the Citizens Campaign for the Environment. Her group rallied to defeat a proposed liquefied natural gas terminal in Long Island Sound in 2008.

"The island needs to be comprehensively assessed,'' she said. "Until we find out what's there, ignorance isn't bliss, ignorance is dangerous.''.

Oyster Decision Could Alter Bay - washingtonpost.com

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Sometime in the next few days, three men will make a decision that comes awfully close to playing God with the Chesapeake Bay.

[Photo caption: Eastern Oyster]

The officials -- Cabinet secretaries from Virginia and Maryland and a colonel in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers -- will choose whether the estuary should get a new oyster. Seafood interests want to transplant an Asian species to supplement the decimated Eastern oyster, which can no longer fill its role in the bay's ecosystem and the region's deep-fat fryers.

A lot of people think the answer should be no.

Environmental groups, states and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency say it's not clear whether the new oyster would become a kind of kudzu on the half shell, crowding out the old one, or simply die and waste everyone's money.

For now, the officials seem split. One is leaning against the Asian oyster, one is neutral and a third supports it, at least if the oyster is confined to shellfish farms.

Their choice could alter the Chesapeake in a way few recent decisions have. Once an animal that can lay 10,000,000 eggs is set loose, it's loose.

"There's no real experience in an open aquatic system like Chesapeake Bay . . . of completely removing a non-native species," said Donald F. Boesch, president of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. "So it really is a point of no return."

A favorable ruling could pave the way for watermen and shellfish farmers to put millions of the Asian oysters in the Chesapeake. That makes it the most important decision in a long regional debate -- all arising from the odd-sounding idea that one of America's great shellfish grounds needs a Chinese transplant to save it.

"This is the moment we've been waiting for, you know, 10 years. . . . We will potentially be looking back on this for decades to come, either with fondness or regret," said Bill Goldsborough of the nonprofit Chesapeake Bay Foundation.

The Chesapeake's Eastern oysters, which once filtered its water and provided a living for generations of watermen, have dropped 99 percent below historic levels, because of overfishing and a pair of diseases.

[Photo Caption: Critics of the plan to add Asian oysters, above, to the Chesapeake say they could do further harm to the native Eastern oysters - Photo Credit: By James M. Thresher -- The Washington Post Photo]

But Goldsborough said he thinks the Asian oyster is too much of a risk.

"It's like saying, 'We're going to replace our black bear with a panda bear from China, and assume the forest ecosystem is going to be fine,' " he said.

The officials are expected to make their decision in the next two weeks, although the ruling will not be officially made public until April.

One idea that had frightened environmentalists -- putting the Asian oysters overboard and letting them spread unchecked -- now seems unlikely to be chosen.

"It's probably not as seriously discussed as it was before," said Col. Dionysios Anninos, commander of the Corps of Engineers' Norfolk District and one of the officials who will decide the oysters' fate. "The scientists [are] telling us there's a lot of uncertainty" about that plan, he said.

But there's still a major fight left.

Seafood dealers and watermen want to create a network of shellfish farms, where sterilized Asian oysters would be suspended in the water in mesh bags or cages. They say it would provide benefits -- a natural water filter and a valuable harvest -- without the worry of the oysters multiplying on their own.

"If you're serious in Chesapeake Bay about restoring an oyster industry . . . why aren't we looking at all the tools in the toolbox?" said A.J. Erskine, president of the Virginia Seafood Council.

[Photo caption: Asian Oysters]

The council has a pilot project raising 1 million Asian oysters at farms in Chesapeake tributaries, including the Potomac River. They sell out, Erskine said. Customers say the oyster has a slight metallic aftertaste when eaten on the half shell and tastes just like an Eastern oyster when cooked in a stew.

But environmental groups and some scientists have objected, saying that some of the supposedly sterile oysters will turn out not to be. They say the oysters will make sperm and eggs, which will be carried off by currents and brought together to make baby oysters, called spat.

The Asian oyster, without so much as a leg or a fin, will have effectively escaped.

"It will happen, and we don't know when," said Roger Mann, a professor at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science.

And once it happens, Mann said, the Asian oysters could wind up harming the native ones. In a bad accident of nature, the two species' sperm and eggs could essentially kill each other off.

"It doesn't appear as if it's going to coexist nicely," Mann said.

Now, a number of environmental groups and government agencies have lined up against approval for the Asian oyster. The EPA called it "environmentally unsatisfactory." New York, New Jersey and Delaware wrote a joint letter. The Natural Resources Defense Council said "what we need is not a new oyster" but more work to help the old one.

The Corps of Engineers was supposed to settle questions about the risks of the Asian oyster, with a 4 1/2-year, $15 million study.

But a draft report released in October found that "no specific level of risk" could be attached to the possibility that oyster farms might lead to an escape. Then, to compound the confusion, a curious resident spotted a large math error in one of the Corps' calculations: One key figure was off by a factor of 100,000.

"The research that's been done has been a little disappointing," said L. Preston Bryant Jr., the Virginia secretary of natural resources and another of the officials who will decide the oyster's fate. "After five years and $15 million or so, we still don't know if non-native [oyster] introduction would be successful, or if sterile non-native aquaculture would lead to a de facto introduction" of Asian oysters in the wild, Bryant said.

Despite that, Bryant said, he's leaning toward supporting Asian oysters in farms. He said he'd been persuaded by the success of Virginia's pilot program, which had never reported an oyster escape in seven years.

"Given that, why would we recommend backing away from that which has been successful?" Bryant said.

In Maryland, Natural Resources Secretary John R. Griffin is skeptical about the Asian oyster, a subordinate said this week.

That could make Anninos the deciding vote.

And he hasn't decided.

"My answer right now is I am neutral, and I'm not quite sure which way I'm going to lean," he said last week.

If the two states disagree, it is possible that they could issue separate rulings. But officials say that would only muddy the debate that their choice was supposed to clear up.

The Great Copy Machine Epidemic

A friend, Kenny Luna, is working to create a day of action in schools with "The Great Copy Machine Epidemic of 2008"...and he's hoping you can help get schools in your area involved...Here's a link to his announcement on TreeHugger as well to their website...

If you’re a regular visitor here or at other green blogs, then you’re sure to have heard of Kenny Luna. Kenny teaches science at Robert Moses Middle School in North Babylon, N.Y...

Last year, Kenny and his grade 8 science students tried get Oprah to back their plan to see every kid (Pre-k - 12) in the US get a compact fluorescent light bulb to help raise awareness of and fight global warming. According to their calculations, if 50 million kids in the US replaced one incandescent in their home with a CFL, the US as a whole could realize $2.3 billion in energy savings, not to mention eliminate many tons of carbon emissions. this would fight global warming by reducing carbon emissions from power plants, and help put America on the path to environmental sustainability.

CFL light bulbs are 75% more efficient than incandescent light bulbs. This means less energy is needed and less harmful greenhouse gases are emitted!

His video "A Bright Idea..!" is a permanent part of this blog and can be found on the right sidebar next to this posting...Their mission was to get Oprah to give away something more practical than a bunch of cars that the recipients can’t afford to pay the taxes and insurance on. Kenny and his students wanted Oprah to use her super media powers to make this a reality... He succeeded in giving every child in North Babylon one thanks to Home Depot..!

Last year on Friday May 4 while I was the Co-President of the the Parents Association of Elizabeth Blackwell Middle School 210 in conjuction with Kenny's plan - we arranged for a visit by Ms. Kasey Jacobs a Program Coordinator at the Citizens Campaign for the Environment.

Kasey presented the original slide show of Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth"... Kasey had gone to Tennessee to train with Al Gore to show the slide show....She put on a fabulous presentation of the material...The kids were fascinated and had lots of question..

Kasey is committed to educating the public on the climate crisis, so please consider scheduling a CCE presentation on the climate crisis in your commutnity. And, for more information about global warming and how to reduce your carbon footprint, visit them online at
www.citizenscampaign.org/campaigns/global_warming.htm.

We also had Chris Neidl, the IT/Development Associate and Education and Outreach Coordinator for Solar One, who with his team brought 100 CFL bulbs to the presentation at the school. The PA distributed the 100 bulbs free of charge to all participants...

So we did our little bit to help solve the global warming problem...my thanks go out to Ruth Ann Farmer, Edwin Natal, Lali Estrada, Judy Chetri, Claudia Gleim, Maria Ferrer and Nadege Trenard for their helping to make this a successful event for all involved...

What's the Crisis?

The Great Copy Machine Epidemic

With confirmed cases in New York and Florida, and with rumors coming out of California, Texas, and Maine about possible outbreaks there, it’s clear that what experts are calling the Great Copy Machine Epidemic has struck schools across America. The symptoms include the tendency of school photocopy machines to chew up trees at an amazing rate, and furthering the use of enormous amounts of energy to create the paper on which they print, contributing to global warming.

Of course, the students and faculty on the crisis team at the Robert Moses Middle School where symptoms of the disease were first observed are working feverishly to uncover the cause. And they’re asking schools across America to join them in a national day of action to help stop global warming on April 17th by putting their school photocopier under quarantine for the day, and asking teachers and students not to make or use any photocopies in class.

Now that may help cure the problem but it won’t uncover precisely what disease is striking the machines. Fortunately there’s a great, fun way that you can help do just that by putting together a crisis team in your school to creatively demonstrate what you believe is making your photocopier sick. Then taking a photograph and emailing it to copy crisis headquarters for further analysis by the deadline of April 19th to help solve the crisis.

The most creative entries that convey the message that the use of excess paper contributes to global warming will be chosen as finalists and posted on the site where everyone is invited to come and vote.

The winning school will win the title of “Copy Crisis Team of the Year” along with a $100 grant to plant a tree on school grounds that's being provided by teacher and crisis team coordinator Mr. Luna, who points out that “There is no better time than now to get schools involved in a positive way in the fight against global warming. Unfortunately, the world will not stand still if we sit by and do nothing.”

To get involved head over to www.greatcopyepidemic.com and find out how easy it is to get your school on-board.

Sewage concerns in Bay Park Revive Old Proposal by Jennifer Smith -- Newsday.com

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New York Times Blog Video: 4 Million Styrofoam Trays a Week by Sewell Chan...

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Or 850,000 a day. That’s how many pass through the lunch rooms of New York City public schools when classes are in session.

Parents Against Styrofoam in Schools, a grass-roots association arising out of Public School 154 in Windsor Terrace, Brooklyn, wants the Bloomberg administration to re-examine the extensive use of the trays. Styrofoam, or polystyrene, is a petroleum-based material that can take centuries to decompose. About 20 American municipalities have banned or restricted use of the packaging, including Suffolk County on Long Island. The anti-tray forces took their case to City Hall on Tuesday in a protest captured in this video:

The stunt was organized by Councilman Bill de Blasio, a Brooklyn Democrat. Eric A. Goldstein, a lawyer for the Natural Resources Defense Council said, “The D.O.E. is wasting taxpayer dollars and generating unnecessary pollution and waste every day it serves food on costly, throwaway polystyrene trays.”

Among the other places that have laws or restrictions on polystyrene food packaging are San Berkeley and Oakland in California and Portland, Ore. A similar ban is under consideration in San Francisco.

Dawn Walker, a City Hall spokeswoman, said of New York’s intentions: “At present the Department of Education is looking into the matter. We are committed to looking at alternatives.”

The landfills will get a little relief this week: The school year ended today, a half-day.

Related articles:

Brooklyn Daily Eagle De Blasio Asks Dept. Of Education To Stop Using Styrofoam Trays

CITY HALL — Council Member Bill de Blasio, D-Cobble Hill/Carroll Gardens, joined public school parents and students recently to ask the city’s Department of Education (DOE) to stop using styrofoam trays in the public schools.

Green Brooklyn: Stop Using Styrofoam Trays In Our Public Schools!

Lawmaker Floats Ban on Styrofoam - July 10, 2007 - The New York Sun by Elizabeth Solomont :

A state senator, Liz Krueger, has introduced a bill that would ban Styrofoam products in the food service industry.

The bill, which would apply to restaurants, fast-food chains, supermarkets, and other vendors, would require businesses to phase out Styrofoam products within one year.

City schools throw away 150 million Styrofoam meal trays a year.

'Picture Styrofoam, and you picture a product produced from petroleum that takes up to 500 years to fully disintegrate,' the senator said in a statement.

Star-Gazette.COM: NYC lawmaker wants to ban Styrofoam - ...

ALBANY - A Manhattan lawmaker Tuesday introduced legislation that would ban most Styrofoam products in the state within a year, citing environmental concerns.

Styrofoam is a brand name for products that are made with polystyrene, a liquid compound manufactured from petroleum. It can't be recycled and takes centuries to decompose.

According to bill sponsor Sen. Liz Krueger, D-Manhattan, Americans throw away about 1,400 tons of Styrofoam every day.

"Picture Styrofoam, and you picture a product produced from petroleum that takes up to 500 years to fully disintegrate," Krueger said. "We have a real problem with needlessly creating too much waste. If we have the ability to create affordable alternatives we should make that leap."

The bill would give supermarkets, restaurants and other food-service providers a year to find environmentally friendly alternatives to the Styrofoam products they use. The state Department of Environmental Conservation would be charged with coming up with a list of such products, which could include various biodegradable plastics. Under the bill, the cost of the alternatives recommended by the DEC would have to be within 15 percent of the cost of their Styrofoam counterparts.

But one industry official said Styrofoam serves a valuable purpose, especially in supermarket meat departments.

"We find that with raw food products, by using Styrofoam there is no leakage, and therefore no health hazard of cross-contamination (like salmonella in chicken) that might be present with other types of products," said Jim Rogers, head of the state Food Industry Alliance. He said he hadn't seen the bill and wouldn't comment on it directly.

While the packaging may keep steaks juicy, many environmentalists warn that styrene, a chemical abundant in Styrofoam that has been linked to cancer, can leach into food stored or reheated in a Styrofoam container.

One environmentalist said he thinks the bill has little chance of passing, but it does open up an important discussion.

"Styrofoam is garbage, from the cradle to the grave, and that's an inappropriate use of petroleum," said William Cooke of Citizens Campaign for the Environment. "We're at the point now where we have to critically look at our petroleum use, and you need the assistance of the manufacturer, the retailer and the consumer together. Styrofoam is the poster child for all this."

Styrofoam bans have already been enacted in Oakland, San Francisco, Portland, and about 100 other towns and cities across the country, but none are statewide, according to Krueger.

"Many municipalities have enacted various versions of this law, and some of the nations largest food-service providers have already moved in this direction as well, based not on new laws, but their own free will and conscience," she said.

There is no companion bill in the Assembly, meaning its chances of being enacted into law are slim.

Earth Day Celebration at MS210Q - "The Burning Truth of the Climate Crisis: Answering the Call to Action"...

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