FUSF Green

Hospitals will take meat off menus in bid to cut carbon

Juliette Jowit

The Guardian, Monday 26 January 2009

Meat-free menus are to be promoted in hospitals as part of a strategy
to cut global warming emissions across the National Health Service.

The plan to offer patients menus that would have no meat option is
part of a strategy to be published tomorrow that will cover proposals
ranging from more phone-in GP surgeries to closing outpatient
departments and instead asking surgeons to visit people at their
local doctor's surgery.

Some suggestions are likely to be controversial with patients'
groups, especially attempts to curb meat eating and car use. Plans to
reuse more equipment could raise concern about infection with
superbugs such as MRSA.

Dr David Pencheon, director of the NHS sustainable development unit,
said the amount of NHS emissions meant it had to act to make cuts,
and the changes would save money, which could be spent on better
services for patients.

Julliete Jowit on proposals, including restricting meat in meals, to
cut NHS carbon emissions Link to this audio
"This is not just about doing things more efficiently, it's about
doing things differently, because efficiency is not going to get us
to big cuts," said Pencheon. "What will healthcare look like in 2030-
2040 in a very low carbon society? It will not look anything like it
looks now."

Last year the NHS published what it believes is the biggest public
sector analysis of carbon dioxide, the biggest greenhouse gas, which
showed the organisation' s emissions in 2004 were 18.6m tonnes and
rising. This accounts for more than 3% of all emissions in England,
and if the NHS was a country it would have been ranked as the 81st
biggest polluter in the world that year, between Estonia and Bahrain.

One-fifth of the emissions were from transport, one-fifth from
buildings, and the remainder from procurement, including drugs,
medical equipment and food.

On Tuesday, Pencheon and the NHS chief executive, David Nicholson,
will publish the strategy - Saving Carbon, Improving Health - which
will set targets to cut the organisation' s carbon footprint, and
proposals to meet them. It follows a government pledge last year to
cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050.

The plans cover all aspects of patients' care, from building design
to transport, waste, food, water and energy use.

Among the most talked-about is likely to be the suggestion that
hospitals could cut carbon emissions from food and drink by offering
fewer meat and dairy products. Last year, the United Nations climate
chief, Rajendra Pachauri, provoked a global debate when he said
having a meat-free day every week was the biggest single contribution
people could make to curbing climate change in their personal lives,
because of the chemicals sprayed on feed crops and the methane
emitted by cattle and sheep. Last week, the German federal
environment agency went further, advising people to eat meat only on
special occasions. Pencheon said the move would cut the relatively
high carbon emissions from rearing animals and poultry, and improve
health. Last year the NHS served 129m main meals, costing £312m,
according to Department of Health figures. "We should not expect to
see meat on every menu," said Pencheon. "We'd like higher levels of
fresh food, and probably higher levels of fresh fruit and veg, and
more investment in a local economy."

Other proposals that will impact directly on patients include urging
people to drink less bottled water, more phone-in surgeries by GPs,
greater sterilisation and reuse of equipment, and encouraging
patients, visitors and staff to leave their car at home.

Many ideas are already being pioneered by one or a few trusts but
will be spread more widely, including automatic lights and taps,
renewable energy such as biomass and wind turbines, and green travel
plans - such as facilities for cycling or new bus routes and bus
stations at hospitals. A blueprint for low-carbon buildings is also
being considered, and longer term the NHS could develop its own
energy grid supplied by renewables on its land.

Staff will also be encouraged to work from home more often,
incentives could be introduced for workers to use smaller-engined
cars for business mileage, departments could be given their own
energy bills with the offer that employees can keep a share of cost
savings they make, and hospital pharmacies could hold lower stocks
and courier in specialist drugs on demand to cut waste.

The NHS will also use its massive purchasing power - £20bn a year -
to persuade suppliers to cut emissions, and pharmaceutical companies
will be asked to make drugs with a longer shelf-life to reduce the
amount of out-of-date stocks.

Longer term, to make bigger cuts, the NHS will have to make more
radical changes, in particular giving more healthcare in or closer to
patients' homes, said Pencheon. One idea being examined was for
surgeons to travel to GP surgeries for follow-up consultations, to
reduce the need for many patients to travel to outpatients
departments, said Pencheon.

"If you're going to get me radical I say the default place for health
is in the home, and the person who delivers it is yourself: that's
the ultimate low-carbon health service," he said.

The report will argue that reducing carbon emissions will cut bills
for equipment, medicines, energy, water and waste services, and
improve health - in the short-term for example by encouraging people
to walk, in the long-term by helping to reduce the impacts of climate
change.

"Unless we all take effective action now, millions of people around
the world will suffer hunger, water shortages and coastal flooding as
the climate changes," it says.

"As one of the world's largest organisations, the NHS has a national
and international imperative to act in order to make a real
difference and to set an important example."

One Farm. More Pollution Than Houston, TX

9.24.2008 8:35 AM

Report Details Pollution from Factory Farms

By Dan Shapley

NOTE: In the sentence beginning, "A single farm...", the figure should read "1.6 MILLION tons of manure..."

Factory farms can produce more raw waste than large U.S. cities, threatening not only water quality but air quality, both the number of factory farms and animals fed in confined feeding lots has more than tripled in 20 years, and yet the Environmental Protection Agency is trying to roll back already weak pollution regulations.

That's the gist of a new Government Accountability Report on factory farming out today, and the interpretation the Democratic Senators who requested it.

There were 12,000 concentrated animal feeding operations -- CAFOs, or more simply "factory farms" -- holding 890 million animals in the United States in 2002, up from 3,600 farms raising 257 million animals in 1982.

A single farm, raising 140,000 head of cattle, can produce 1.6 tons of manure every year, more than is produced by Houston, Texas.

This waste can infiltrate nearby streams, rivers and lakes, contaminating it with bacteria or excessive nutrients that could render the water unswimmable, undrinkable and inhospitable to wildlife. The waste releases gases to the air -- including ammonia, hydrogen suflide and fine dust -- that can cause respiratory illness or other health problems.

Yet, the report concludes, the EPA lacks data it needs to effectively regulate these farms, even as it has proposed lifting pollution reporting requirements for air pollutants from factory farms and proposed limiting its authority to penalize factory farm water polluters.

“This GAO study confirms that the Bush Administration’s plan to exempt industrial sized animal feeding operations from emissions reporting requirements is nothing more than a favor to Big Agribusiness at the expense of the public health and communities living near these facilities,” said Rep. John Dingell, one of the senators that requested the GAO study.

In May, the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production concluded a two-year study that detailed how cheap feed had led Americans to eat more meat than any other nation on Earth. It urged new regulations to rein in the growth of factory farms, lest they sap fresh water, pollute the environment, continue contributing to global warming (livestock is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions).

The recent spate of E. coli-tainted beef health scares can also be traced to concentrated animal feeding, an unnatural corn-based diet and the factory slaughtering process.

For concerned consumers, look for grass-fed, free-range meats, cut down on meat consumption and seek out local farmers that can assure you about the safety of their practices.

Report urges huge changes to factory-farming practices

By Rick Weiss

The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — Factory farming takes a big toll on human health and the environment, is undermining rural America's economic stability and fails to provide the humane treatment of livestock, concludes an independent, 2 1/2-year analysis that calls for major changes in the way corporate agriculture produces meat, milk and eggs.

The report, sponsored by the Pew Charitable Trusts and Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and released Tuesday, finds that the "economies of scale" long used to justify factory-farming practices are largely an illusion, perpetuated by a failure to account for associated costs.

Among those costs are human illnesses caused by drug-resistant bacteria associated with the rampant use of antibiotics on feedlots and the degradation of land, water and air quality caused by animal waste too intensely concentrated to be neutralized by natural processes.

Tough recommendations

Several observers said the report, by a 15-member commission of experts with varying backgrounds, is remarkable for the number of tough recommendations that survived the research and review process.

In the end, even industry representatives on the Pew Commission on Industrial Farm Animal Production agreed to such recommendations as a ban on the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in farm animals, a phaseout of all intensive confinement systems that prevent the free movement of farm animals and more vigorous enforcement of antitrust laws in the increasingly consolidated agricultural arena.

The report, "Putting Meat on the Table: Industrial Farm Production in America," comes at a time food, agriculture and animal-welfare issues are prominent concerns.

Food prices are rising faster than they have for decades. Concerns about global climate change brought new attention to the fact that modern agriculture is responsible for about 20 percent of the nation's greenhouse-gas production. And recent meat recalls, punctuated by the release of undercover footage of cows being abused at a California slaughterhouse, struck a chord.

The report acknowledges that the decades-long trend toward reliance on "concentrated animal feeding operations" brought some benefits, including cheaper food.

But the system also brought unintended consequences. With thousands of animals kept in close quarters, diseases spread quickly. To prevent some of those outbreaks — and, more often, simply to spur faster growth — factory farms routinely treat animals with antibiotics, speeding the development of drug-resistant bacteria and in some cases rendering important medicines less effective in people.

It appears that the vast majority of U.S. antibiotic use is for animals, the commission noted, adding that because of the lack of oversight by the Food and Drug Administration and other agencies, even regulators can only estimate how many drugs are being given to animals.

The commission urges stronger reporting requirements for companies and a phaseout and then ban on antibiotics in farm animals except as treatments for disease, a policy initiated in some European countries.

Can Peanut Butter and Jelly Save the World?

Eating plant-based meals conserves natural resources and slows global warming

From Larry West

Looking for small ways to make a big difference for the environment? Why not start by making yourself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich?

As members of the PB&J Campaign (no, I’m not kidding) like to say, “You don’t have to change your whole diet to change the world. Just start with lunch.”

Eating a plant-based lunch (such as a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a bean burrito, vegetarian chili, or a hearty salad) instead of an animal-based lunch (such as a hamburger, a tuna or grilled cheese sandwich, fish and chips, or chicken nuggets) will save water, preserve land and slow global warming.

How Eating a PB&J Sandwich Slows Global Warming
Every time you eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or other plant-based meal instead of an animal-based lunch, such as a hamburger, you save the equivalent of almost 3.5 pounds of greenhouse gas emissions, including 2.5 pounds of carbon dioxide.

That’s about 40 percent of the carbon you would save by driving a hybrid vehicle for the day instead of a standard sedan.

How Eating a PB&J Sandwich Saves Water
Growing plants for food takes a lot less water than raising animals. As a result, every time you substitute a peanut butter and jelly sandwich or some other plant-based meal for an animal-based meal such as a hamburger, you save about 280 gallons of water. Eat three PB&J sandwiches a month instead of animal-based meals and you can save as much water as you would by switching to a low-flow showerhead.

How Eating a PB&J Sandwich Saves Land
Raising animals for food takes a lot of space. For example, animal products require 6 to 17 times as much land as soy to produce the same amount of protein. Eating a plant-based lunch like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich instead of a hamburger, ham sandwich, or another animal-based meal saves anywhere from 12 to 50 square feet of land from deforestation, overgrazing, and pesticide and fertilizer pollution.

How Eating One PB&J Sandwich Helps the Environment
By eating lower on the food chain—plants instead of animals—you also consume fewer resources. Why? Because, basically, everything you eat comes from plants. You either eat plants directly—in the form of fruits, vegetables and plant products such as peanut butter—or indirectly after animals have converted plants into meat, milk, eggs, butter and cheese.

The problem is that animals are not very efficient as living food factories that convert plants into food for humans. Animals use most of the plants they eat to produce the energy they need to walk around and keep breathing. To stay alive long enough to become part of your lunch or dinner menu, every cow, pig and chicken has to eat much more protein, carbohydrates and other nutrients than it will yield once the ax finally falls. As a result, it takes several pounds of plants to produce one pound of beef, pork, chicken, eggs or milk.

Inevitably, that means it also takes a lot more land, water and fuel to produce one pound of meat, milk or eggs than it does to produce one pound of edible plants. Not only do the animals need food, water and room to roam, but growing the plants to feed the animals that will, in turn, become food for you requires even more land and water as well as fuel for farm machinery and irrigation pumps.

To help provide some context, the PB&J Campaign says the water required to produce the beef in one hamburger could grow enough peanuts for 17 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. And the land required to put that same beef patty on your bun could produce enough peanuts for 19 PB&J lunches.

How You and Your Diet Can Make a Difference
Basically, this all comes down to your power as a consumer. Every time you choose a hamburger, omelet or grilled cheese sandwich over a plant-based meal, you’re telling your local restaurants and supermarkets to buy more meat, eggs and dairy products. By choosing more plant-based meals, you’re asking for less meat and a more efficient use of resources. Either way, your unspoken but unmistakable messages are received by your local merchants and conveyed to wholesalers and farmers.

Want to do more? Share this information with your friends, coworkers and family members and urge them to take action. Urge your school or office cafeteria, or the local restaurants you frequent, to offer more plant-based dishes. Organize a weekly PB&J lunch (or other plant-based meals) at work, home or school and calculate the positive environmental contribution you’ve made.

A Successful FTN Event

On January 30th 35 FUSF members plus local citizens gathered in the FUSF sanctuary to participate in the Focust the Nation global warming teach in. Introductory speeches were made by State Representative James Vallee, Massachusetts Climate Action executive Rob Garrity, and FUSFs own Ted McIntyre and Sue Fouracre. Unfortunately FTN's webcast of The 2% Solution was not a success because the FTN web servers were overloaded. Too many people attempted to log into web cast, and the servers were not up to the task.

! Streaming broadcast of the 2% solution is now available free here !:  http://www.earthdaytv.net/   

We had a highly concerned and interested group assembled, however, and nobody left the gathering. There were lively discussions about global warming, and brainstorming as to what us local citizens could do about it. Most of the attendees spoke up at least once. One of the ideas considered was that the assembled group should meet again for followup discussions (and hopefully actions). Reverend Carol Rosine, also in attendance, said that the group could use FUSF as a meeting place. A sign up sheet was passed around. The FUSF Green Committee will contact those who signed up.

In his introductory comments, Rob Garrity said, "Our political leaders lead best when the people tell them where to go." Hopefully the Green Committee and our event attendees can add their voices to a growing number of citizens who will tell our elected representatives to lead us to a solution for global warming. The seriousness and urgency of global warming is generally not understood by our politicians nor by the general public. It is up to us to make sure that our nation wakes up and becomes informed. The damage has already started, folks and its accelerating. Let's go.

 

Focus the Nation Event at FUSF

Its almost here.

http://www.focusthenation.org/index.php

FUSF will be participating in the nationwide FOCUS the NATION teach-in on Wednesday January 30th at 7:30 pm.  Come to our event at the sanctuary, 262 Chestnut St., Franklin, MA. We are expecting some important guest from our local government. This is your chance to tell them how you feel about the issue of global warming, as well as become better informed yourself and make this event newsworthy. We will be tuning in to the national webcast and see the film, The 2% Solution.

Some Light in an Otherwise Black Future

I have not changed my opinion that we as a nation will not wake up to the serious nature of global warming. We will not take meaningful action before we have destroyed the planet. Prove me wrong folks. I am begging you.

I am pleased to report, however, that there is positive action taking place at a local level. Massachusetts is just one small step away from adopting the Green Communities Act of 2007! This bill has passed in both the Massachusetts House and Senate. It is in conference committee, which is the last step before it is signed into law by the Governor.

Here's an abridged summary of the bill's major features:

(click link  below to read the rest of the story !)

Nothing to See Here Folks... Move Along.

A while back I heard about an issue that had something to do with global temperatures. They were rising, or something like that. But I checked my thermometer today and it said 18 degrees F.  Brrrr! I guess I heard wrong.

They gave that fella Al Gore a Nobel prize for something bad he said about the weather. I guess its all better now. Anyway, I don't like people who talk about such things. They are pushy, impolite, and they don't know when they are not welcome.

The climate crisis will be the biggest challenge facing the next president. But the top Sunday Talk Show hosts don’t seem to think so.

Since January of 2007, they have asked 2938 Questions of the presidential candidates, but only 6 mentioned global warming. One of them was framed as a joke to belittle the issue, comparing it to the issue of UFOs. The only candidate who would have brought up global warming in a serious way, was Dennis Kucinich, who was barred from attending debates by the television networks.

Go here   http://www.whataretheywaitingfor.com/  to register your complaint. Make yourself heard. Write about global warming. Talk about global warming. Bring it up in politically incorrect situations. Be a pain in folks' pant seats when it comes to global warming and the politics of pollution.

from The North Pole is Melting, Scientific American September 21st, 2007 www.sciam.com:
The sea ice cover this year has reached a new record low," says Mark Serreze, senior research scientist at the U.S. National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. "It's not just that we beat the old record, we annihilated it."

As a result of atmospheric patterns that both warmed the air and reduced cloud cover as well as increased residual heat in newly exposed ocean waters, such melting helped open the fabled Northwest Passage for the first time [see photo] this summer and presaged tough times for polar bears and other Arctic animals that rely on sea ice to survive, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Such precipitous loss of ice cover far outpaces anything climate models or scientists have predicted.

Cape Wind Comes Back to Life

Copied from:  capewind.org

Biofuels: For SUVs or People?

Feed the Hungry or Power an SUV?

I vote to feed the hungry. We are seeing a sudden craze in this country surrounding ethanol and other biofuels. In the United States, the majority of it is being produced from corn. This is in fact as strange as it seems on the surface, but is this phenomenon a positive one or a harmful one?

Recently, with the demand for fossil oil reaching record highs, and the prices rising to match, folks have been looking for alternative fuels. This has expanded the market for ethanol, and ethanol factories have become more profitable recently. They are expanding rapidly to meet the demand. Farmers in the corn belt have found that they can make more money buy eliminating all of their crops except corn, and selling the corn to ethanol production facilities. This raises the question of whether this is the right way to plan our energy future, and how the production of food-based combustible fuels effects the environment.

On the surface, a gallon of ethanol burned in an SUV produces just about the same amount of greenhouse gas as a gallon of gasoline. But if we start to ask questions, we find that it takes energy to manufacture the fuel product and bring it to our door.  If the entire energy consumption for the production chain of corn based ethanol and the production of oil is figured in, we see that corn has a slight advantage. According to National Geographic Magazine ("Green Dreams", October 2007, pg 44). The amount of green house gas emitted to produce and use corn ethanol is 22% less per gallon than gasoline. If you also consider that a gallon of ethanol contains less energy than a gallon of gasoline, the savings is reduced. So overall,  corn-based ethanol production and usage produces slightly less pollution than gasoline. 

Continued!! click link below -->