Taking on the Army Opponents of the Army's planned expansion of the Pinon Canyon maneuver site opened a new front Wednesday, filing a lawsuit to stop construction of a military base that would be just half the size of Park Meadows Mall. The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Denver, keys off a plan for a 16-barrack base on the western edge of the existing training site, including a medical and dental clinic and battalion and brigade headquarters. Construction was to start this spring, in response to Fort Carson's expansion by 8,500 soldiers, according to the Army's environmental impact statement. Ultimately, the Army wants to expand the Pinon Canyon tank training area from its current 368 square miles to 1,000 square miles. The site is run by Fort Carson, located two hours to the north. The suit argues that the construction and bringing additional soldiers to the site are part of the larger expansion plan that includes tripling the land area of the military site. Therefore, the environmental impact statement must look at the entire plan, the filing says. The suit also demands that the new environmental impact statement look at alternative sites for the giant tank and aircraft training site the Army wants. The suit demands a halt to construction of the base until the Army does a full EIS on the expansion....
Everyone gets something in new wilderness bill Representatives of Idaho’s ranching and conservationist communities praised a bill Tuesday that would create a wilderness in southwest Idaho’s Owyhee canyonlands, while opening other lands to motorized recreation and grazing. Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, introduced the bill, which comes after nearly a decade of debate over land-use in the rugged Owyhee region. The bill would create an 807-square-mile wilderness while opening up 300 square miles of previously off-limit areas to motorized recreation, livestock grazing and other activities. It also would provide ranchers with cash and federal land in exchange for giving up private land and giving up grazing rights on some public land, and it would offer federal protection to 316 miles of wild and scenic rivers in the Owyhees. Chad Gibson, speaking for the Owyhee Cattle Association, said the measure could end decades of debate over public lands use in the area. ‘‘This legislation clearly will not resolve all conflict but does offer a positive path forward,’’ said Gibson, a retired rangeland scientist and extension agent. Besides the wilderness and land swap, the bill would create a science review and research center to provide independent and peer-reviewed expertise on government decisions, Gibson said. Consensus-based land management agreements such as the Owyhee Initiative will slow development and allow the area to maintain its rugged Western heritage, he said....
Pine beetle outbreaks turn forests into carbon source An outbreak of mountain pine beetles in British Columbia is doing more than destroying millions of trees: By 2020, the beetles will have done so much damage that the forest is expected to release more carbon dioxide than it absorbs, according to new research. The study, led by Werner Kurz of the Canadian Forest Service, estimates that over 21 years trees killed by the beetle outbreak could release 990 megatons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere — roughly equivalent to five years of emissions from Canada's transportation sector. The outbreak has affected about 33 million acres, or about 51,562 square miles, of lodgepole pines. Bark beetles also have killed huge swaths of pines in the western United States, including about 2,300 square miles of trees in Colorado. "When trees are killed, they no longer are able to take carbon from the atmosphere. Then when dead trees start to decompose, that releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere," Kurz said. That could exacerbate global warming that contributed to the outbreaks in the first place. Warmer temperatures have allowed beetles to survive farther north and at higher elevations....
Experts fear nation's waterways need rescuing—from us Federal agencies, states, tribes and concerned citizens are spending millions of dollars and thousands of hours on waterway restoration projects to reverse decades of poor management and combat the mounting threats of population and climate change. Nationally, there are more than 37,000 river restoration projects underway, costing more than $1 billion annually, according to a study released this month by Colorado College. The Bureau of Land Management has spent close to $15 million in the last couple of years on its Restore New Mexico program, which includes oilfield restoration as well as work on the rivers and streams that flow through BLM land. The U.S. Forest Service spent about $500,000 on watershed work in New Mexico and Arizona last year and plans to spend just as much this year, said Penny Luehring, watershed improvement program manager for the agency's southwest region. Just weeks ago, the agency and its partners finished planting willow trees along the Centerfire Creek in western New Mexico as part of a comprehensive plan that included removing cattle and building culverts for a road that crosses the creek....
Proposed oil, gas leases in southern Colorado net protests Proposed oil and gas leases on more than 140,000 acres in a national forest in southern Colorado, including roadless areas, generated several protests Wednesday. About 19,000 acres of the total 175,430 acres set for auction May 8 are on land classified as roadless under a 2001 ban on road-building in parts of national forests. Opposition to opening those lands to development and fears of harm to air and water quality and wildlife were cited in several of the challenges. Conservation groups note that the Rio Grande National Forest is the headwaters of the Rio Grande and fear that one accidental spill could affect an entire watershed. "My biggest concern is that I lived through the Summitville fiasco," said David Colville, whose family has ranched for four generations near Del Norte. "I want some really strict environmental controls if they do come in." The defunct Summitville gold mine, abandoned after its operators declared bankruptcy, was made a federal Superfund site in 1994. Toxic metals from the site killed all life in 17 miles of the Alamosa River system....
Ex-EPA Chief Is Ruled Not Liable for 9/11 Safety Claims Christine Todd Whitman, the former head of the Environmental Protection Agency, cannot be held liable for assuring residents near the burning detritus of the World Trade Center after the 2001 attacks that the air was safe to breathe, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday. Because Whitman did not intend to cause harm, a panel of judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit said, her message did not "shock the conscience" to the degree necessary to waive her immunity as a federal official. The residents, students and office workers say Whitman should be forced to pay damages to properly clean homes and schools and create a fund to monitor health. They are considering an appeal, their lawyer said. "These residents, workers and students continue to get sicker and sicker, and that's what makes this decision so tragic," said Joel Kupferman, co-counsel for the plaintiffs....Until the law is changed, you will play hell trying to make a federal "official" responsible for their actions.
Some Wild Donkeys Fitted with Reflective Collars Donkey fans are fitting a herd of wild burros with reflective collars in an attempt to reduce the number of creatures being hit on a busy road. About 50 burros live near Reche Canyon Road, 10 miles south of San Bernardino, Calif. The rural road connects the cities of Colton and Moreno Valley and has seen traffic increase in recent years, the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday. The feral burros (small donkeys thought to have been introduced to the area at least 50 years ago) are part of a larger herd of 400 or so living nearby. Animal control officers said between 2003 and 2006, there were 37 accidents involving burros, with 17 of the animals killed. One woman died when her car hit a burro in 2005. To try to save the animals, a handful of residents including Kim Terry, 55, and Rhonda Leavitt, 50, are making reflective collars for the donkeys. Terry rounds the animals up. Using an old sewing machine, Rhonda makes the collars by stitching reflective tape to old belts. "They don't care what they look like," Leavitt said. "And the belts reflect like you wouldn't believe."....
The Environmentalists' Real Agenda Ideologies: Once in a while the truth accidentally tumbles out on global warming activists' real agenda. That's exactly what happened at the U.N., when Bolivia's leader called for ending capitalism to save the planet. Delivering the keynote address at the United Nations forum on Indigenous People on Monday, Bolivia's President Evo Morales told the adoring crowd that "if we want to save our planet earth, to save life, to save mankind, we have a duty to put an end to the capitalist system." Morales elaborated on that by calling for an end to "unbridled industrial development, extraction of natural resources, excessive consumption of goods and accumulation of waste." More conveniently, he also demanded that trillions of dollars from the West be diverted to places like Bolivia, "to repair the earth." Seldom has the environmentalist agenda to end the capitalist system been laid out so plainly. But in reality, it's capitalism — combined with the framework that enables it to flourish, like rule of law and property rights — that has lifted billions of people out of poverty and improved the environment. Contrary to Morales' assertions, the most capitalist countries are also the cleanest....
Paper Grocery Bags Require More Energy Than Plastic Bags Whole Foods Market won't offer plastic shopping bags at their stores after Earth Day this year. It is a savvy move for the upscale natural foods retailer, who estimates that by the end of the year the policy will have averted use of 100 million new plastic grocery bags at their 270 stores. It won't save the company any money-since the paper and multi-use bags that will replace plastic bags at their stores cost more to manufacture, stock and handle-but it is a savvy public relations move that will likely help to soothe the guilty environmental consciences of devoted Whole Foods shoppers who, like most Americans, believe paper bags are environmentally superior to plastic bags. Unfortunately, the reality is that paper isn't better than plastic. One hundred million new plastic grocery bags require the total energy equivalent of approximately 8300 barrels of oil for extraction of the raw materials, through manufacturing, transport, use and curbside collection of the bags. Of that, 30 percent is oil and 23 percent is natural gas actually used in the bag-the rest is fuel used along the way. That sounds like a lot until you consider that the same number of paper grocery bags use five times that much total energy. A paper grocery bag isn't just made out of trees. Manufacturing 100 million paper bags with one-third post-consumer recycled content requires petroleum energy inputs equivalent to approximately 15,100 barrels of oil plus additional inputs from other energy sources including hydroelectric power, nuclear energy and wood waste. Making sound environmental choices is hard, especially when the product is "free," like bags at most grocery stores. When the cashier rings up a purchase and bags it in a paper bag, the consumer doesn't see that it took at least a gallon of water to produce that bag (more than 20 times the amount used to make a plastic bag), that it weighed 10 times more on the delivery truck and took up seven times as much space as a plastic bag in transit to the store, and will ultimately result in between tens and hundreds of times more greenhouse gas emissions than a plastic bag....
See Gore, See Spot Napoleon's retreat from Moscow is a legendary military disaster. While historians and military buffs note the toll the Russian winter took on La Grande Armee, few if any appreciate the role solar activity, or the lack of it, played in one of the great military reversals in history. Geophysicist Phil Chapman, the first Australian to become a NASA astronaut, and who served as mission specialist on the Apollo 14 lunar mission, writes in the Down Under newspaper the Australian that "the rout of Napoleon's Grand Army from Moscow was at least partly due to the lack of sunspots." This is more than a historical footnote. The same pattern of solar activity that doomed Napoleon is occurring as we speak. The sun goes through a series of 11-year cycles in which sunspots fluctuate in both number and intensity, greatly influencing Earth's climate and weather. The end of each cycle is called a solar minimum, where sunspot activity is at a low point. Activity usually picks up after that as each new cycle begins. As Chapman notes, the most recent minimum occurred in March 2007. Sunspot activity should have increased shortly after that but sunspot activity has remained at a virtual standstill. If you log on to www.spaceweather.com, you will see a current picture of the sun from the U.S. Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) with but a single tiny sunspot, dubbed number 992. The previous time a cycle was delayed like this, according to Chapman, was during what was called the Dalton Minimum, a particularly cold period that lasted several decades starting in 1790. "Northern winters became ferocious," he says....
Anthrax kills 2 Minnesota cows, vaccinations urged The Minnesota Board of Animal Health confirmed on Tuesday that two cows on a Becker County farm in west central Minnesota died last week of anthrax, the first anthrax cases there in 2008. The herd was not vaccinated for anthrax this year. The herd will remain under quarantine for 30 days from the day the last death occurred from anthrax. Anthrax is a naturally occurring disease caused by the bacterium Bacillus anthracis. All warm-blooded animals are susceptible to the disease but cattle, sheep, and goats are the most commonly affected species. In rare cases, humans can contract anthrax after handling or eating infected products. While anthrax cases so early in the year are unusual, the cows were on pasture in an area where cases had been detected in the past, according to the Board of Animal Health statement. Cases typically occur in areas where animals have previously died of anthrax. Anthrax is not spread by animal-to-animal contact....
Final feed rule made public The long-awaited final feed rule was made public this morning and it is scheduled to be published in Friday's edition of the Federal Register. The proposed rule was originally published Oct. 6, 2005. The final rule is now "on display" on the Food and Drug Administration's Web site. The rule will become effective one year from April 27. In an expansion of the 1997 feed rule, the updated version will cover fallen cattle, and it will prohibit the use of the entire carcass of cattle over 30 months of age unless the brain and spinal have been removed. The infective agents for BSE – bovine spongiform encephalopathy – are most prevalent in the brain and spinal cord tissues, scientists say. The new rule includes all cattle over 30 months "not inspected and passed for human consumption unless: 1) the cattle are shown to be less than 30 months of age, or 2) the brains and spinal cords were effectively removed or effectively excluded from animal feed use." Despite comments on the rule proposing it be broadened to include blood, FDA is not prohibiting the use of blood and blood products in animal feed "because we believe such a prohibition would do very little to reduce the risk of BSE transmission," the rule said....
Small Strongyles Developing Resistance to Ivermectin Researchers in Central Kentucky have suggested that small strongyles might be developing resistance to ivermectin (a commonly administered broad spectrum anti-parasitic drug). The scientists found that the number of parasite eggs in study horses' manure returned twice as quickly after treatment with ivermectin compared to when the drug was first marketed in the early 1980s. Previous studies have shown that small strongyles--a common intestinal parasite of horses--have developed a resistance to numerous drugs since the 1950s including phenothiazine, thiabendazole, pyrantel pamoate, and piperazine. Recent studies have also suggested that resistance to ivermectin and moxidectin was also developing. "The purpose of this study was to determine the current status of the efficacy of ivermectin against small strongyles in horses," explained Eugene Lyons, PhD, from the Gluck Equine Research Center in Kentucky. This study evaluated the activity of ivermectin by counting the number of strongyle eggs per gram of feces before and after treatment with ivermectin. All horses included in this study resided on a single farm located in Central Kentucky. "Our results showed that the fecal egg counts of small strongyles returned faster than expected--approximately twice as quickly," said Lyons. "This data suggests that a resistance to ivermectin is developing." This suspected ivermectin resistance has also been reported in other geographic areas, including countries outside of the United States....