Thursday, 26 Aug 2004

Methinks They Doth Not Protest at All

Well-Known Green Groups Opt Out of GOP Convention Protests

Scan the protests planned to take place outside the GOP convention in New York City next week and you're unlikely to see any signs of Greenpeace. Or Friends of the Earth, or the League of Conservation Voters, or most any other well-known environmental group. With the GOP expected to spin any rowdy or violent behavior as orchestrated by the "radical" Democratic Party, and various anarchist groups expected to give the GOP exactly what they want, green groups are opting out of the circus. Read about why showy protests are so 1999 in Muckraker -- today on the Grist Magazine website.

Don't Ask, Don't Shell

Nigeria Hits Shell With $1.5 Billion Pollution Claim

The Nigerian parliament has hit Shell with a $1.5 billion claim after the Ijaw tribe of the Niger Delta demanded compensation for health and economic hardship caused by the company's polluting operations. The oil giant admits to 262 oil spill incidents in Nigeria in 2002, and that same year it identified 548 sites in the country that needed "remedial" action to prevent contamination. And Shell's reputation as a polluter and violator of human rights in the country goes back even further, with the nadir having come in 1995, when the company failed to intervene as Nigeria's military dictatorship executed activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, who had led locals in the fight against Shell's destructive drilling practices. It's unclear whether the parliament's resolution carries the force of law. Shell is, as one might imagine, rather desperate to rehabilitate its public image in Nigeria.

Dismission: Impossible

New U.S. Government Report Acknowledges Human-Caused Climate Change

President Bush famously dismissed a 2002 U.S. government report that acknowledged the human causes of climate change as something "put out by the bureaucracy." Well, it looks like the bureaucracy's at it again: A new administration report to Congress indicates that human production of heat-trapping greenhouse gases is likely behind the rapid climate change of the past three decades. According to James R. Mahoney, director of government climate research, the report reflects "the best possible scientific information" on climate change. The White House, which has regularly followed the lead of industry groups in emphasizing the uncertainty of climate science, may have difficulty dismissing this report, as it is signed by the secretaries of energy and commerce and Bush's top science adviser, but you never know.

Sunflower Power

Scientists Create Hydrogen Fuel from Sunflower Oil

British scientists have discovered a way to power cars with sunflower oil. While biodiesel cars that directly burn cooking oil are fairly common, researcher Valerie Dupont and her colleagues have something else in mind, as they reported this week at an American Chemical Society conference. They've figured out a way to use catalysts to extract pure hydrogen from a combination of air, water vapor, and sunflower oil. Hydrogen is frequently hailed as the clean fuel of the future, but most current methods of creating hydrogen burn the very fossil fuels responsible for pollution and greenhouse gases. Dupont's process could eventually use any vegetable oil and be miniaturized to the point that the converter could transform oil to hydrogen on the fly, in the car itself. Another researcher at the same conference claimed she was working on a process that could convert pure water directly to hydrogen using a catalyst and solar energy. For now, both veggie oil and water catalysts are prohibitively expensive, but still, maybe this whole hydrogen thing will work out after all.

DMBM

Dave Matthews Band Tour Bus Dumps Doo-Doo on Boat Passengers

An alleged environmental infraction by a Dave Matthews Band tour bus left passengers on a Chicago River sightseeing tour boat with a bad taste in their mouths -- literally. While on a bridge over the river, the driver apparently emptied the bus's waste tank with the intent of sending its contents -- up to 800 pounds of raw human waste -- into the water below. Unfortunately, the tour boat got in the way. The drenched, nauseated, and totally grossed-out boat passengers were promptly ferried back to shore and reimbursed for their tickets. Surveillance cameras helped to identify the bus as one leased by DMB, a group whose progressive, green reputation (they even have a Ben and Jerry's flavor) may be tarnished by this brown episode. Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan has filed suit against the band and driver for violation of state water pollution and public nuisance laws. Said Holly Agra, co-owner of the tour boat, "We don't want this sticking on us for the rest of our careers." Ahem.