SICK WATER?

More Like Another Sick UNEP Whitewash

Having just downloaded the new ‘bells and whistle’ report by UNEP titled Sick Water? two of the moderators  were about to discuss the main points raised in the report, but were dismayed to find a headline that appeared on the Joint Statement page:

The statistics are stark: Globally, two million tons of sewage, industrial and agricultural waste is discharged into the world’s waterways and at least 1.8 million children under five years-old die every year from water related disease, or one every 20 seconds.

Signed by Achim Steiner, Executive Director, UNEP AND  Anna Tibaijuka, Executive Director, UN-HABITAT

The problem?

The report says only ‘two million tons of sewage, industrial and agricultural waste are discharged in the world’s waterways’ [by the world’s 6.81 billion population with  a combined GDP of  $61 trillion.]

That’s less than 290 g per person, or just over 1 kg per family of four, per year!

We know that two million tons of sewage, and industrial waste are released DAILY into Hong Kong’s Victoria harbor alone!

[Note: Hong Kong Population is just over 1 percent of the world population, and there are 365 days in a year!]

Here’s another statistic:

An estimated one billion (one thousand million) metric tons of sewage, industrial and agricultural waste are dumped into India’s Ganges River every day of the year!

How could any other figure provided by the report be reliable?

Do the UNEP staff really know what they are talking about, or is it just another one of those amazing UN whitewashes?

For our initial assessment of the report see photo below:

Photo of sewage/industrial waste  dumped in a waterway. Source: UNEP Report Sick Water?

UNEP must clarify why they made such a huge error, otherwise their report is not worth the billions of tons of sewage and waste that are being dumped in the world’s waterways each and every day of the year.

Related Links:

• UNEP Issues Some CO2 Reduction Snakeoil!
• British Govt Makes Another Straw Man

The Deadly Dozen, the Dirty Dozen, the Dozen Dozen

UNEP wants to add to its so-called “dirty dozen” deadly chemicals another nine highly toxic compounds

Thanks to the ‘experts,’ the chemical threats to our living environment have been ‘rationalized,’ the danger downsized, and the list of “chemicals considered potentially dangerous,” which are overtly used in industrial farming and other commercial applications, neatly itemized, first into a [dirty] dozen and then some…

Experts mull global ban on commercial chemicals

Mon May 4, 2009
By Robert Evans

GENEVA (Reuters) – Experts and officials from some 150 countries started talks on Monday on banning production of nine chemicals considered potentially dangerous but still used in farming and for other commercial purposes.

If agreement is reached at the week-long meeting, under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the nine will join a list of 12 other so-called persistent organic pollutants, or POPS, long targeted for elimination.

“The risks posed by such chemicals are profound, and these toxic substances leave chemical footprints around the globe,” said UNEP executive director Achim Steiner, who will be watching over the Geneva gathering.

The newly-targeted chemicals include products—known normally under their scientific names—that are widely used for pesticides and are also used in the manufacture of flame retardants and similar items.

The original 12 POPS—dubbed the “dirty dozen” and widely blamed for damaging human nervous systems, causing cancer and disrupting the development of young children—were listed under a 2001 international pact called the Stockholm Convention.

But as these have been removed from production lines, focus has switched to extending the banned list to other highly toxic chemicals that take many years, often decades, to degrade into less dangerous forms.

SPECIAL RISKS

Among the new ones to be considered this week are Alpha hexachlorocyclohexane, Hexabromidyphenyl ether, Chlordecone, Hexabromobiphenyl, Lindane, Pentachlorobenzene and Perfluorooctane, according to UNEP.

UNEP says these, like the “dirty dozen,” pose special risks to young people, farmers, pregnant women and the unborn, and to remote communities like those in the Arctic where Inuit women and polar bears have been found to have large POP doses in their own bodies.

The pollutant chemicals can evaporate and travel long distances through air and water to regions far from their original source and accumulate in the fatty tissues of both humans and animals.

A thaw in the Arctic linked to global warming may allow some of the chemicals, long-trapped under sea ice, to evaporate into the atmosphere and spread further around the polar region, an expert said on Monday.

Agreement at the Geneva meeting, which ends on May 8, could mark a major step toward creating a healthier and more sustainable green economy for the world, said Steiner, while lifting a health threat to millions of people.
(Editing by Jon Hemming)
© Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved

UNEP Issues Some CO2 Reduction Snakeoil!

submitted by a reader

Caution: For external use only! Avoid eye contact. Keep out of children’s reach. Apply sparingly!

UNEP: Twelve Steps to Help You Kick the CO2 Habit

The misleading title is meant to serve as an improvement on the waste recycling one-liners. Those eye-catching headlines invariably encourage consumers to recycle waste, without providing any information as to the full impact of the recycling process on the environment; mysteriously, they often fail to carry any good advice, for example, on how to cut down on the consumption in the first place.

The most glaring UNEP deception is probably the propagation of the myth of self-empowered individuals, the notion that we are in charge and free to do what we choose to do. In other words, it’s not the exponential growth economy that is deciding our lifestyles, social behavior and consumption habits; it is our fault to become addicted to CO2 in the first place!

In reality, however, our lives are ruled by a powerful discourse that prevents us from opting out of consumer lifestyles. The political economy ensures there are no alternatives to the prevailing malignant system. The media and advertising industry influence each and every decision we make. The system builds the roads, parking lots and airports, and it then demands we use them. We have no say on how things should be done. The only “choice” available to us is restricted to the type of vehicle we occupy the roads with to spend the daily installments of our mandatory solitary confinement, a choice we couldn’t make without the help of the advertising industry, of course.

Without a change in the system of economy, we don’t stand a surviving chance as a species!

Tell me again, how will you help kick my CO2 habit, when the economic system is producing the pollution for me?

UNEP Clumsy Scaremongering Diminishes the Seriousness of Environmental Threats

The most egregious misrepresentation made by UNEP in their report must be their recommendation to use a non-electric toothbrush as a major means of halving your carbon footprint. The per person CO2 emissions in the US is about 21.89 metric tons each year (Source: EIA 2005). The average electric toothbrush has a 6.5-Watt power rating—it uses 6.5 joules of electricity per second—that means, taking into account the losses from electricity generation, it produces a total of about 80 mg of CO2 per day, or 29 grams per year, if you brushed your teeth for about a minute every day! How or why the UNEP believes such small amounts of CO2 could make a dent in the overall pollution inventory is unfathomable [even with an inefficient charger they don’t get close to the UNEP figures, or cutting your carbon footprint by half!]

[Note: One metric ton is equal to 1,000 kilograms (kg); 1,000,000 grams (g); 1,000,000,000 milligram (mg).]

As for the electric alarm clocks, those that operate in the range of 20-40 Watts, are responsible for producing about 250-500 mg (a quarter to one half of a gram) of CO2 per day.

Of course, most electronic alarm clocks run on batteries, using an AAA battery (1.5V, 1.2Ah) which is replaced about once a year. While manufacturing batteries creates chemical pollution and carelessly discarded ones constitute an environmental hazard, the batteries are not known as a major source of carbon dioxide pollution!

Just exactly which one of the above figures can you influence and by how much? (Source: EIA 2005)

Below is a list of the UNEP snakeoil remedies:

• Use a wind-up alarm clock rather than an electric one.
• Dry clothes on a washing line rather than in a tumble dryer.
• Pack lighter suitcases. It says that world savings would be 2 million tonnes a year if every airline passenger cut the weight of baggage to below 20 kg and bought duty free goods on arrival. [Emphasis were added!]
• Use a non-electric toothbrush.
• Heat bread rolls in a toaster rather than in the oven for 15 minutes.
• Take a train rather than a car for a daily commute of 8 km.
• The average British household could cut 2 tonnes of CO2 annually with more efficient insulation, heating and lighting.
• Reduce winter heating: cutting the temperature by a couple of degrees saves 6 percent in energy bills.
• Avoid “carbon binges”: a return flight across the Atlantic is equivalent to running a car for a year for each passenger.

How very revealing! It almost tells you which corporations wrote the “Kick the CO2 Habit.”

Conclusion:

FEWW Moderators have carefully considered UNEP recommendations and, taking into account all of the circumstances, believe the net results of all energy saving on the national scale in the target countries would only be significant if

• All airline flights were grounded
• All automobile journeys were halted
• All non-essential commercial activities were ended
• All unnecessary industrial production were stopped
• All wasteful consumer practices were eradicated
  

Heunep