Complete list of press releases

Vice President Gore today described the broad parameters of a major new federal investment strategy to address global warming, air pollution, and energy use. Environmental Defense praised the proposal and reiterated its willingness to work with any Presidential candidate to develop ways to reduce harmful emissions.

“The environment and economy are intimately intertwined,” said Fred Krupp, executive director of Environmental Defense. “A market-based investment strategy, which rewards actual emissions reductions, could spur just the sort of environmental and technological revolution that could break our dependence on fuels that are too expensive and too dirty.” Environmental Defense urged that all political leaders — whether they are members of Congress, or Presidential hopefuls — develop bold initiatives to curb global -warming pollution.

According to scientists, the 1990’s, likely the hottest decade of the past thousand years, capped decades of shrinking glaciers, thinning Arctic ice, intensifying rainstorms, and rising seas. Given the risks entailed by these changes, Environmental Defense believes that the time has come for America to exert its economic prowess with actions to solve global warming, and that government policy must catalyze this effort.

“We owe our children a safe and healthy future. Global warming puts all that at risk,” said Dr. Michael Oppenheimer, Environmental Defense chief scientist. “These incentives can begin the job of protecting the planet but, as this proposal recognizes, enforceable standards will be needed to complete it.”

A growing worldwide citizens’ network called for wide-reaching ECA reforms in the Jakarta Declaration, drafted after more than 50 of the groups met last month in Indonesia, where they encountered first-hand evidence of the environmental and social harms caused by ECA-funded projects, including three highly polluting pulp and paper mills in Sumatra, which have sparked mass public protests because of the pollution they have caused downstream. The text of the full declaration can be found at http://www.environmentaldefense.org on the web.

“The social and environmental damage and human rights violations that often result from ECA-funded projects must stop. The ECAs should no longer be able to operate in total secrecy,” said Doug Norlen of the Pacific Environment and Resources Center (PERC).

“In Indonesia and elsewhere, ECA financing for major arms transactions, for obsolete technologies that are rejected or illegal in their home countries, and for economically unproductive investments is a scandal of global proportions,” said Titi Soentoro of the Indonesian environmental coalition Bioforum.

Environmental Defense, a leading national nonprofit organization based in New York, represents more than 300,000 members. Since 1967 we have linked science, economics, and law to create innovative, equitable, and cost-effective solutions to the most urgent environmental problems.

Friends of the Earth is a national, non-profit advocacy organization dedicated to protecting the planet from environmental degradation; preserving biological, cultural, and ethnic diversity; and empowering citizens to have an influential voice in decisions affecting the quality of their environment — and their lives.

The Export Credit Agency reforms called for by the international citizens groups include:

1. Transparency: public accesss to information and consultation with civil society and affected people in ongoing or future ECA-funded projects, in developing new procedures and standards, and in the negotiation on common environmental and social standards.

2. Binding common environmental and social guidelines and standards no lower and no less rigorous than existing international procedures and standards for public international finance such as those of the World Bank Group and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Development Assistance Committee.

3. The adoption of explicit human rights criteria guiding the operation of ECAs.

4. The adoption of binding criteria and guidelines to end the ECA’s abetting of corruption. According to Transparency International, a respected watchdog organization, the continued lack of action by ECAs to address this issue is bringing some ECA practices “close to complicity with a criminal offense.”

5. ECAs must cease financing non-productive investments. The massive ECA support for military purchases and white elephant projects, such as nuclear power plants, that would be rejected by OECD bilateral aid agencies and multilateral development agencies such as the World Bank must end.

6. The cancellation of ECA debt for the poorest countries, most of which has been incurred for economically unproductive purposes.

A report for Cleveland and Cuyahoga County released today by Environmental Defense and the Clean Air Conservancy gives the area a “D” grade for smog. The report can be found here. The grade reflects:

• Bad Air Quality. Smog levels in and around Cuyahoga County hover just below existing federal health standards and do not meet proposed stricter standards. Smog (technically known as ground-level ozone) can lead to increased likelihood of asthma attacks and other respiratory problems. In addition to smog, the county ranks among the worst 3% of US counties for cancer and non-cancer risks due to hazardous air pollutants from automobiles and industrial sources.

• Failure to address pollution from large industrial facilities. In Cuyahoga County, twelve facilities are allegedly violating federal air rules, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

• Lack of ozone monitoring. Cuyahoga County’s three ozone monitors are generally insufficient to provide information on particular pollution “hotspots.” Furthermore, none of the monitors are actually within the industrial zone of Cleveland.

Despite the poor grade, improvements at the Cleveland Health Department have resulted in more experienced and better-trained staff and reduced the backlog of expired permits. The Health Department also has pushed all city agencies to cut polluting activities on Ozone Action Days.

“Reforms at the Health Department have improved the agency’s effectiveness,” stated Kevin Snape, the Clean Air Conservancy’s executive director. “Now the agency has to get more aggressive about enforcing permits and communicating with and listening to the public.”

“Recent increases in the amount of driving and the popularity of less efficient vehicles such as SUVs have marked the end of a slow improvement in ozone levels,” said Carol Andress, economic specialist for Environmental Defense. “Local authorities need to do more to reduce emissions by encouraging residents to drive less and use cleaner cars.”

The report points out that local authorities need to improve monitoring for ozone and particulate matter. “People should know how the factory near their house is affecting the air they breathe. By increasing the number of air quality monitors, we can learn more about the pollution levels throughout the county,” said Snape.

Two days before Canadian, Mexican and US environmental ministers are to meet in Texas, 11 US national and border-region environmental groups sent a letter to US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) head Carol Browner asking her to help ensure that Mexican officials institute a mandatory toxic chemical pollution inventory.

Under the US and Canadian toxic chemical right-to-know programs, businesses and governments are required by law to report toxic chemical releases and overall waste generated. Mexico’s current toxic chemical reporting program is voluntary, so the information available to the public on toxic releases from the country’s facilities is minimal — only 5 percent of reporting facilities submitted this information. Mexico is obligated under NAFTA and other international agreements, however, to provide the public with far greater information on pollution than is currently available.

“Unlike the case in the US and Canada, the public in Mexico has been kept in the dark about pollution from Mexican industry and governmental facilities. Moreover, because pollution does not respect international boundaries, the US public has a right-to-know and to help address toxic chemical pollution originating in Mexico (and vice versa),” the letter says.

“Toxic chemical releases in the US have been reduced by nearly 50 percent in a decade, largely as a result of the US right-to-know program. We need to bring some ‘sunshine’ to the toxic releases originating in Mexico, so similar progress can be made,” said Environmental Defense executive director Fred Krupp, one of the letter’s signatories. “Because the upcoming Mexican elections will introduce new uncertainties, it is critical for the current Mexican government to put a mandatory pollutant release and transfer registry in place this year,” he said.

Environmental Defense scientists said today that an assessment of national climate change impacts released by the US government finds serious consequences in store for the New York region, including flooding or droughts, increased air pollution and heat-related mortalities. The findings will be released Monday, June 12, for public comment. The report examines possible effects on every region of the US and on sectors particularly affected by climate changes, including coastal areas and marine resources, forests, public health, water, and agriculture.

The detailed analysis of these findings will be released at Columbia University on Monday, June 19th. More information can be found at http://metroeast_climate.ciesin.columbia.edu on the web.

“The New York region of the future could be in hot water if the US doesn’t take action to cut greenhouse gas emissions now,” said Dr. Michael Oppenheimer, Environmental Defense chief scientist. “Climate change can lead to wider variations in rain and snowfall, along with warmer temperatures year round, and droughts that could affect New York’s water supply. Furthermore, climate induced sea-level rise increases the risk of flooding that destroys property and submerges beaches.”

“Hotter temperatures can lead to more heat-related mortality, higher levels of ground-level ozone that causes acute respiratory distress and chronic damage to the lungs, and an increased risk from mosquito-borne infectious diseases, such as malaria,” said Dr. Janine Bloomfield, an Environmental Defense senior scientist.

“The infrastructure that keeps the New York region going, Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark Airports, the train, subway and automobile tunnels are all at serious flood risk in a greenhouse future,” said Bloomfield.

Environmental Defense scientists said today that an assessment by the US government on the potential national impacts of climate change paints a troubling picture for many in the US agricultural community. The assessment will be released Monday, June 12, for public comment. It examines possible effects on every region of the US and on sectors particularly affected by climate changes, including coastal areas and marine resources, forests, public health, water, and agriculture.

The report finds that warmer temperatures, increased precipitation, higher concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), and appropriate farmer adaptations could result in higher crop yields for the US as a whole. Yet the report also notes that extreme events like heat waves, droughts and floods could dramatically undercut crop yields. These events, combined with increases in average temperature, could occur more often, last longer, and inflict greater damage on crops than today. The assessment also examines the impacts of increased pests, diseases and weeds under warmer conditions and higher CO2 concentrations.

“Because climate change can affect different regions in different ways, the geographical distribution of food production areas will likely change, potentially causing the disruption of rural communities. Northern areas, for example, could gain from a longer growing season, while southern areas might be at risk from higher temperatures and less rainfall,” said Dr. Janine Bloomfield, an Environmental Defense senior scientist.

“The climate is already changing,” said Dr. Michael Oppenheimer, Environmental Defense chief scientist. “Because greenhouse gases remain in the atmosphere for decades, our past emissions mean additional warming is inevitable. The time for reductions in emissions from farms, factories, power plants, and cars is now.”

Farmers can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by using farming practices that can benefit their farms and save money. Such practices include storing carbon in the soil through the use of cover crops, precision agriculture and conservation tillage, and using methane-recovery systems for liquid manure, such as digesters or covered lagoons, to reduce methane emissions.

In a perspective piece published in this week’s Science magazine, Environmental Defense scientists said that the creation of an international forest carbon market as part of the Kyoto Protocol’s international effort to control climate change could create a powerful incentive for developing nations to protect the world’s great forests, such as the Amazon in Brazil.

International negotiators currently are considering whether to include forest conservation as an eligible greenhouse gas reducing activity under the Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement on climate change. As they grow, forests absorb carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas (GHG) that contributes to global warming. Deforestation results in emissions of carbon dioxide and other GHGs. Scientists estimate that tropical deforestation is responsible for approximately 15 to 30 percent of human induced GHG emissions.

“International negotiators should see this new information on carbon and climate as an opportunity to alter the way the global markets value forests,” said Environmental Defense economist, Robert Bonnie, a co-author of the piece. “In the past, forests have usually only been assigned economic value if they were cut down, either for wood or to clear land for other uses. Including forest conservation in the Kyoto Protocol will make it easier to protect our planet’s dwindling forests and slow climate change.”

In response to global efforts to address climate change, a market has begun to emerge for preserving forests as a way to store carbon and thereby prevent GHG emissions. For example, American Electric Power, PacifiCorp, and BP-Amoco have invested nearly $10 million to protect 600,000 hectares of forestland in Bolivia. International negotiators have not yet decided whether investments in forest conservation will be recognized under the Kyoto Protocol.

“While reductions in domestic fossil fuel use must be the focus of policies to slow climate change, forest conservation can supplement these reductions,” said Environmental Defense chief scientist Michael Oppenheimer.

“An environmentally and economically sound forest preservation market must have an accounting system with clear rules that will ensure additional trees are actually conserved and that logging is not simply shifted from one area to another,” Bonnie said. “The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s report on land use change by the world’s leading experts on carbon sequestration, released in May, suggests that mechanisms can be developed to ensure the integrity of carbon credits generated through forest conservation.”

The World Bank Board of Executive Directors voted today to provide over $300 million in taxpayer supported loans to build a massive oil and pipeline project in Chad and Cameroon, Africa. The project, which represents large environmental and social risks, is being promoted by a consortium led by ExxonMobil and Chevron. The Board voted in favor of the project despite repeated requests for a funding delay by African groups representing communities the project is supposed to benefit as well as churches in both countries.

The concerns of the Chadian and Cameroonian groups are shared by a broad coalition of international environmental, human rights and religious organizations. In view of the corruption and human rights abuses in both countries, the organizations fear the project lacks adequate environmental protections and that project revenues will fail to reach the impoverished communities affected by it.

“Today’s vote represents a serious challenge to reform efforts initiated by World Bank President James Wolfensohn,” said Korinna Horta, Environmental Defense senior economist. “This project will demonstrate whether the Bank’s commitments to consulting civil society, fighting corruption and promoting sustainable development are serious. The credibility of the institution is clearly on the line.”

The oil companies sought World Bank participation in the project to protect them from the risks of developing in the two countries. The Bank’s funding approval requires an independent monitor to oversee the project and help prevent environmental and human rights abuses. “The requirement for an independent monitoring group is encouraging,” said Horta. “However the World Bank must assure that it can function in a transparent manner and that local people can provide input to its findings without fear of retribution.”

Citing serious concerns about corruption and the environment and human rights, civil society organizations in Chad and Cameroon, including the countries’ Catholic Bishops and Protestant organizations, have repeated their call to postpone the World Bank’s decision on financing the controversial Chad and Cameroon oil and pipeline project. According to these organizations, the project lacks adequate safeguards to ensure that oil revenues will be used for poverty alleviation, environmental protection and in respecting the rights of local people. This assessment is confirmed by Harvard University Law School’s 1999 evaluation of Chadian legislation.

Despite the massive risks of the project the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors is scheduled to vote Tuesday on whether to provide $365 million in taxpayer-supported loans for the project, which is to be built by a consortium led by ExxonMobil and Chevron.

Both Chad and Cameroon have a history of instability, civil war, severe human rights abuses and rampant corruption. “Without democratic reforms, oil revenues can only add further fuel to the fire,” said Environmental Defense senior economist Korinna Horta, who has worked for a decade with Cameroonian citizen groups to protect that country’s forests. “In addition, the project threatens the fragile environment of both countries and risks further impoverishment of local people whose livelihoods depend directly on the fields, forests, rivers and coastal areas which will be affected by hundreds of oil wells and an 800 mile long pipeline.”

“The Bank should immediately establish an independent international monitoring group to review the social and environmental risks of the project as well as the oil companies’ legal responsibilities. A decision on financing the project should be postponed until the results of such a review are available,” said attorney Delphine Djiraibe, director of the Chadian Association for the Defense and Promotion of Human Rights. “The review is all the more important as we continue to receive reports of threats made by military and administrative officials loyal to Chad’s President that local people who voice criticism of the oil project will be executed.”

About one hundred Kemp’s ridley turtle hatchlings are expected to be released tomorrow along the Padre Island National Seashore to help the world’s most critically endangered sea turtle species recover. The release is scheduled for 7:00 am on the beach just inside the entrance of the National Seashore. For a more immediate update, please call the Turtle Hotline at 361-949-7163.

The one-inch hatchlings, carefully protected by US Geological Survey biologists and volunteers during their 50-day incubation, will crawl to the sea where they will spend most of their lives, returning to the shore only to mate and nest.

But the fate of these turtles is far from secure. Just 50 years ago, 40,000 Kemp’s ridleys laid eggs in a single day at nearby Tamaulipas, Mexico. By 1985, egg poaching and accidental capture by fishermen took a toll-only 700 nests were found. Now, Kemp’s ridleys are making a comeback, thanks to protection of nesting beaches and shrimpers’ use of turtle excluder devices.

“Unfortunately, turtle deaths are still high,” said Environmental Defense fisheries biologist Pamela Baker. Last year, 95 Kemp’s ridleys were stranded on Texas’ shores, and so far this year, 42 have been found. Most turtles wash ashore during the shrimping season, and scientists believe the shrimp industry is the leading cause of human-related turtle deaths.

Environmental Defense hopes to convince Texas Parks and Wildlife officials, in their current “shrimp regulation review initiative,” to protect sea turtles while benefiting shrimp. “By moving shrimp boats to deep water, away from the turtles’ shallow mating and nesting grounds, we can protect sea turtles and spawning white shrimp that share the turtle’s mating areas. The protection zone should extend from island beaches to five miles out to sea along the entire Texas coast,” said Baker.

Tomorrow, the season’s first group of young turtles are expected to be released by biologist on the National Seashore south of Corpus Christi. Environmental Defense will be on hand to help monitor the process and answer questions.

Environmental Defense today called on the House and Senate to strengthen pipeline safety in the United States. The group made its call as the Office of Pipeline Safety (OPS) announced it is seeking a $3 million fine against the Olympic Pipeline Company. OPS has charged the company with numerous safety violations found in the wake of an accident that killed three youths in Bellingham, Washington last year.

“Today’s action by the Office of Pipeline Safety, while welcome, is simply not enough to prevent future tragedies,” said Lois Epstein, an Environmental Defense senior engineer. “A complete overhaul of current pipeline law, regulatory standards, and the Office of Pipeline Safety is needed to prevent serious pipeline incidents.”

Two 10-year-old boys and an 18-year-old died after a pipeline operated by Olympic ruptured last June, spewing out 229,000 gallons of gasoline into a creek, which then ignited a fireball. “Unfortunately, this accident was not an isolated incident,” said Epstein. “According to the Department of Transportation’s Inspector General, OPS standards are inadequate and its inspectors are not trained to assess the industry’s inspection findings.”

In the 1990s, nearly 200 oil pipeline accidents were reported each year, and over 6 million gallons of oil were released annually, more than half the size of the Exxon Valdez spill. The biggest cause of releases from oil pipelines is external and internal corrosion.

Today’s proposed fine compares unfavorably to the $35 million fine the US Environmental Protection Agency levied against Koch Industries, Inc. in January of this year for multiple pipeline spills, and its February 1999 criminal penalty against Colonial Pipeline Company for a major spill into South Carolina’s Reedy River.

“The House and Senate need to address pipeline legislation this session. Strict liability for pipeline owners and operators following releases, significantly stronger state and community right-to-know provisions, directives and deadlines for tougher federal standards, pipeline employee whistleblower protections, and legal changes allowing citizen lawsuits against pipeline companies are all desperately needed. Strong protections are needed now to prevent more fatal accidents,” said Epstein.

The federal government today approved an agreement to control harmful smog in a number of the nation’s most polluted urban areas by no later than 2002. The agreement settles a case brought by Environmental Defense and five other groups that requires clean air plans to protect public health by setting firm deadlines for progress in controlling pollution.

Today’s settlement allows communities to craft solutions first by giving states additional time to correct deficiencies and adopt sound smog control plans. If states fail to create adequate air pollution cleanup plans by deadlines set in the Clean Air Act, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) becomes responsible for creating its own smog control plans for these areas.

“This settlement is an important public health victory,” said Environmental Defense transportation director Michael Replogle. “Now, the states must step up to the plate with real plans to protect our families, our children and our nation’s elderly from the dangerous effects of air pollution. State and local governments should help to quickly replace dirty old technologies with new and cleaner ones for transportation, energy, industry, and consumer products, and work to slow sprawl and the growth of dependence on motor vehicles.”

EPA and medical experts have shown that smog air pollution damages lung tissue, reduces lung function, and makes the lungs susceptible to other irritants. Smog not only affects people with impaired respiratory systems, such as asthmatics, but harms healthy adults and children as well. It is estimated that during the summer of 1997 smog pollution was associated with over 50,000 respiratory-related hospital admissions, over 150,000 emergency room visits, and over 6 million asthma attacks in the Eastern United States.

The urban areas covered by the settlement to comply with EPA’s long-existing public health standard for smog are: metropolitan New York/Northern New Jersey/Long Island; the Greater Connecticut area (Hartford); metropolitan Philadelphia/Wilmington/Trenton; the metropolitan Baltimore and Washington, DC metropolitan areas; the Springfield, Massachusetts area; metropolitan Houston/Galveston/Brazoria, Texas; the metropolitan Chicago/Gary/Lake County area; and the Milwaukee/Racine metropolitan area. The settlement was filed with the federal district court for the District of Columbia.

The Supreme Court announced today that it would consider claims by some of the country’s largest polluters to reverse long-standing clean air policy. Since the creation of the modern Clean Air Act in 1970, limits on the amount of pollution in the ambient air have been determined by the adverse health effects it produces, such as asthma, bronchitis and other serious respiratory ailments. The Supreme Court announced today that it will determine whether costs, in addition to health effects, should govern the appropriate level of our nation’s health-based ambient air quality standards.

“For thirty years, it’s been a bedrock principle of the Clean Air Act that the amount of pollution allowed in the air should depend on how it affects the health of our children and the elderly when they breathe; medical science and public health have been paramount considerations,” said Environmental Defense senior attorney Vickie Patton. “A decision by the Court to change the long-standing clean air policy would tip the scales away from public health concerns and toward the economic concerns of major polluters.”

The Supreme Court’s decision to review this issue is part of the case involving the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) new clean air standards for smog and fine, sooty particles. On May 22, the Supreme Court decided to review a controversial lower court decision challenging the new air standards. Today’s announcement means that the Supreme Court will determine the acceptability of EPA’s new air quality standards as well as several major issues related to the criteria EPA considers in establishing the standards.

(26 May, 2000 — Seattle) Starbucks and the Alliance for Environmental Innovation today released the results of a partnership that began in August 1996 to reduce the environmental impacts of serving coffee in Starbucks retail locations.

Research was conducted on three initiatives: increasing the use of reusable in-store serveware in retail locations; increasing the use of carryout tumblers and commuter mugs; and developing a new disposable hot-cup as an environmentally preferable solution to double-cupping.

The partnership:

Verified the environmental and financial benefits of reusable cups and glasses;
Developed and tested a new, environmentally preferable hot cup;
Demonstrated customer interest in and preference for cups with environmental attributes;
Paved the way for other environmental initiatives at Starbucks.
Consumers interested in seeing a copy of the report can view a report summary or download the report (263k pdf, requires Adobe Acrobat).

The Alliance for Environmental Innovation (the Alliance) is a joint initiative of Environmental Defense and The Pew Charitable Trusts. The Alliance works cooperatively with businesses to reduce waste and build environmental considerations into business decisions. By bringing the expertise and perspective of environmental scientists and economists together with the business skills of leading companies, the Alliance creates environmental solutions that make business sense.

Starbucks Coffee Company is the leading retailer, roaster and brand of specialty coffee in the world. In addition to its more than 2,800 retail locations in North America, the United Kingdom, the Pacific Rim and the Middle East, Starbucks sells coffee and tea products through its specialty operations, including its online store at Starbucks.com. Additionally Starbucks produces and sells bottled Frappuccinoâ coffee drink and a line of superpremium ice creams through its joint venture partnerships and offers a line of innovative premium teas produced by its wholly owned subsidiary, Tazo Tea Company.

Environmental Defense today praised a White House proposal, due to be announced today, which is designed to set up a network of marine protected areas to preserve examples of ocean ecosystems off US shores.

Spills from animal waste lagoons have caused massive fish kills in North Carolina, Ohio, Maryland, and Virginia during the last several years. Animal waste disposal systems contaminate drinking water wells, pollute the air and degrade rivers and bays.

“We are pleased that President Clinton has taken an important step to protect the integrity of our oceans,” said Dr. Pete Emerson, an Environmental Defense senior economist. “Well-defined scientific criteria should be used to underlie this new network of marine protected areas, a system of ocean preserves that eventually could mirror the system of protected forests and parks on land.”

“Coastal and ocean waters are a national treasure. They belong to all Americans and deserve to be protected like our finest National Parks,” said Emerson.