Not your typical ‘greenie’

Image by B_brother via Flickr

52? A granny? You're never too old to hug a tree

Sarah Sum-Campbell

05:55 AM Jun 05, 2009

SIMON Tay would be proud of our new housekeeper. Just as his wife and child were instrumental in influencing the Singapore Institute of International Affairs chairman to be a better environmentalist, Madam Lee is also going on a green drive to convince those in her social circle to save the earth, by first saving her household.

Mdm Lee does not fit into the typical profile of a greenie. She is 52, a Singaporean, a proud mother and grandmother, and quite illiterate.

Yet she was converted into a "greenie" in just about three hours. As our housekeeper, she is entrusted with food and household shopping. When asked explicitly to avoid buying any products made or produced in China, especially vegetables, she was keen to know the reasons.

We told her about experiments done by my group of friends which proved that vegetables from China could sit in the fridge for a month and still remain green, thereby proving the exorbitant amount of chemicals sprayed on to enable such abnormal sustainability. We also explained the consequences on the environment and on our health. She said that she was very convinced, and wondered why no one had ever told her all that.

She went on to enquire about the lack of bleach and certain brands of cleaning products, toys and clothes in our home. We told her about toxic paints used in China-made toys, lethal infant formula, and so on. The fact that she has little children at home helped strengthen her resolve to keep the diet and air at home healthy.

Saving the Earth is everyone's business. If we collectively boycott products which are harmful to our health and damage our environment, companies which make their livelihoods out of these cheap nasty goods will be forced to change their ways. With higher demand for pesticide-free/organic/green/environmentally-friendly products, their prices will drop, attracting more consumers.

So often it is the older generation of Singaporeans, especially those with little or no formal education, who control the purse strings of not just their households, but those of their children, too. Many look after their grandchildren, supervise foreign domestic workers, go marketing and prepare food at home, determine what household products to use, and which mode of transport/brand of car to utilise. Yet so often we dismiss them as being unable or unwilling to help save the Earth.

Perhaps we should be focusing our environmental education efforts on them, and not just the young and impressionable future generations.

From TODAY, Voices – Friday, 05-Jun-2009; see the source article here.

Related articles by Zemanta

• China passes food safety law after melamine scandal (ctv.ca)
• China says food safety situation still grim (ctv.ca)
• Grading Green (northbynorthwestern.com)
• China's Food Policies: A Nightmare on Elm Street (friendseat.com)
• Hexane, a neurotoxic chemical used in producing baby food (isiria.wordpress.com)
• China and Singapore to build eco city (guardian.co.uk)
• Birgitta Lauren: How Safe Are Infant Formulas? (huffingtonpost.com)
• Chinese Milk Poisons Thousands of Children (ripplesinthetide.blogspot.com)

Sea rise from Antarctic ice melt overestimated: study

AFP - Friday, May 15

The shore of Deception Island in Antarctica, in 2008. While a collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet will have devastating impacts on global sea levels, a study published Thursday found the anticipated impact has been seriously overestimated.

CHICAGO (AFP) - - While a collapse of the West Antarctic ice sheet will have devastating impacts on global sea levels, a study published Thursday found the anticipated impact has been seriously overestimated.

Using new measures of the ice sheet's geometry, British and Dutch researchers predict its collapse would cause sea levels to rise by 3.2 meters (11 feet) rather than previous estimates of five to seven meters.

However, the study published in the journal Science found that even a one meter rise in sea levels would be significant enough to weaken the Earth's gravity field in the southern hemisphere and affect the Earth's rotation.

That rotational shift would cause water to pile up in the northern oceans and could result in dramatic regional differences in sea levels, with the largest rise on the east and west coast of the United States.

"The pattern of sea level rise is independent of how fast or how much of the (Western Antarctic Ice Sheet) WAIS collapses," said lead author Jonathan Bamber of the University of Bristol in England.

"Even if the WAIS contributed only a meter of sea level rise over many years, sea levels along North America's shorelines would still increase 25 percent more than the global average."

Antarctica holds about nine times the volume of ice as Greenland and is considered a sleeping giant when it comes to sea levels.

The western ice sheet is of particular concern because enormous sections sit in inland basins on bedrock that is entirely below sea level.

Vast floating ice shelves currently limit ice loss to the ocean but scientists fear the sheet could collapse if the floating ice shelves break free.

The study authors based their predictions on the assumption that only ice on the downward sloping and inland-facing side of the basins would be lost while ice grounded on bedrock that is above sea level or slopes upward would survive.

Researchers do not know how quickly the shelf would collapse. But if such a large amount of ice melted steadily over 500 years it would raise sea levels by about 6.5 millimeters per year.

That's about twice the current rate due to all sources.

"Though smaller than past predictions, the scale of the fully manifested instability is enormous," cautioned Erik Ivins of the California Institute of Technology in an accompanying article.

"The total mass gained by the oceans ... would be roughly equal to the mass showered to Earth by the impact of about 2000 Halley-sized comets."

Further complicating the situation is the fact that Greenland seems to be losing as much or more ice than Antarctica, even though it doesn't have the same unstable configuration.

"Greenland needs only half the mass loss rate of Antarctica to have an equivalent effect on polar motion due to its less polar position," he wrote.

Even "more ominous" are the current accelerations of ice flow into the Amundsen Sea Embayment in Antarctica, he wrote.

"Should the ice sheet grounding line migrate farther inland, ice resting on bedrock well below sea level could become unstable."

From Yahoo! News; see the source article here.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Ice sheet melt threat reassessed (news.bbc.co.uk)
• Study Halves Prediction of Rising Seas (nytimes.com)
• Scientists' Breakthrough On Rising Sea Levels (news.sky.com)
• Sea level rise from Antarctic ice sheet collapse overestimated, scientists say (cbc.ca)
• Antarctic ice sheet could melt - again (guardian.co.uk)
• Ice shelf collapse could shift axis of Earth, study says (ctv.ca)
• Antarctic ice melt more widespread than first thought: scientists (cbc.ca)
• Coral Fossils Reveal Sea Levels Rising Fast (time.com)
• Scientists say Antarctic glaciers slipping seaward (ctv.ca)

‘Humans are too clever’

04:02 PM May 08, 2009

MM LEE: I read an analysis ... This man said, for thousands of years of agricultural societies, the only source of energy was the sun which limits what they can grow, what animals can feed on the grass, what population you can sustain. Then came the industrial revolution ... (driven by) fire and coal. Coal is stored solar energy. Then they found oil; also stored solar energy.

Now ... they got this experiment to make two atoms collide and see whether they can generate power like the sun. So man is trying to generate mini suns, that can go on forever. But when you switch it on the whole thing burns up. So man has not found a way ...

And if we do find out what’s the way, will that solve it? I don’t think so. We’ve become too clever by far. If we find a solution to energy, the world will be overpopulated ... In 50 years, we are expecting 9.5 billion people from 6.3 billion now. You find a new energy source, we’ll become 80 billion people in the next century. Then what?

So I think sooner or later, the human being must come to terms with the fact that this planet called earth can only sustain so much. You go beyond that, you destroy your habitat.

MODERATOR TOMMY KOH: Haven’t they learnt that already?

MM LEE: If we’ve learnt that, why are we still doing these stupid things?

From TODAY – Friday, 08-May-2009

Related articles by Zemanta

• Beyond Fossil Fuels: David Mills on Solar Power (sciam.com)
• Cruel irony: Do renewable power plants threaten their surrounding environment? (sciam.com)
• Solar Power May Be Eco-Friendly. But Some in California Call It a Blight (time.com)