Environmental Glance
Many of our readers might find it difficult to appreciate the actual meaning of the figure, yet we can grasp what 200 times more Cesium-137 than the Chernobyl would mean. It would destroy the world environment and our civilization. This is not rocket science, nor does it connect to the pugilistic debate over nuclear power plants. This is an issue of human survival.
I asked top spent-fuel pools expert Mr. Robert Alvarez, former Senior Policy Advisor to the Secretary and Deputy Assistant Secretary for National Security and the Environment at the U.S. Department of Energy, for an explanation of the potential impact of the 11,421 rods.
I received an astounding response from Mr. Alvarez:
Monsanto’s Roundup, which is the most popular herbicide used today, has been found to ignite morphological changes in amphibians. The research, conducted using tadpoles, found that environmentally relevant concentrations of Roundup are enough to cause two species of amphibians to actually change shape. This is the first research to show that herbicides can have such an affect on animals.
A U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) team has found that a sharp jump in earthquakes in America’s heartland appears to be linked to oil and natural gas drilling operations.
Hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," has generated widespread media attention this year, but little has been reported on the ways in which fracking may have unique impacts on women.
As regulators weigh the benefits of drilling 40,000 gas wells across New York State, the Department of Environmental Conservation’s scant analysis of fracking’s potential costs overstates job benefits and omits state Transportation Department estimates of road maintenance costs exceeding $375 million.
Front Range farmers bidding for water to grow crops through the coming hot summer and possible drought face new competition from oil and gas drillers.
While New York regulators have spent four years mulling the environmental impacts of shale gas development, the potential human health impacts have been given short shrift, according to health advocates.
