How Cool is Your School?
- The Sierra Club has released the results of its fourth annual Coolest Schools survey, which compares the sustainability, conservation and energy-efficiency efforts of U.S. colleges and universities nationwide.
Students traditionally have evaluated colleges according to three criteria: academic quality, location, and what kind of social life they can expect. While those considerations are no less important today than they ever were, an increasing number of students have added a fourth criterion to the list: schools with outstanding green credentials.
In fact, two-thirds of university applicants now say that a school's environmental record would influence whether they would choose to enroll, according to a survey by the Princeton Review, a company that helps students prepare for exams.
In conducting the survey, the Sierra Club sent an 11-page questionnaire to 900 U.S. colleges and universities, with questions in 10 categories: Energy Supply, Efficiency, Food, Academics, Purchasing, Transportation, Waste Management, Administration, Financial Investments, and Other Initiatives.
Individual questions were weighted according to their relative importance, but each category was worth 10 points for a possible total score of 100. The Sierra Club received responses from 162 schools and ranked them according to their total scores.
The 10 top-ranked schools this year are:
Green Mountain College in Poultney, Vermont - 88.6 points
Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania - 86.1 points
Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington - 85.9 points
University of Washington in Seattle, Washington - 84.7 points
Stanford University in Stanford, California - 84.6 points
University of California, Irvine in Irvine, California - 84.4 points
Northland College in Ashland, Wisconsin - 83.2 points
Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts - 82.8 points
College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine - 82.5 points
Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts - 82.4 points
Along with ranking the schools according to their Coolest Schools survey scores, the Sierra Club also provides information about a number of related topics, from what K-12 schools are doing to advance sustainability to how coal-country colleges are embracing clean energy to how things are improving in China.
According to participating schools, the annual Coolest Schools survey not only offers students and their parents an easy way to compare colleges on the basis of environmental credentials, it also encourages U.S. colleges and universities to improve.
In one survey response reported by the Sierra Club, David Prytherch, sustainability coordinator at Miami University in Ohio, wrote that the annual survey "reminds us of what we've accomplished and how much is yet to be done. It helps encourage continued innovation, knowing that others are watching."
Also Read:
Teach Your Children Well: Does U.S. Environmental Education Make the Grade?
California Approves New Environmental Curriculum for K-12 Students
School Lunches: How to Make Cafeteria Food Better for Kids and the Environment
How School Lunch Packaging Waste Adds Up
How Cool is Your School? originally appeared on About.com Environmental Issues on Friday, August 27th, 2010 at 12:50:34. Permalink | Comment | Email this
Canada First Nation to Declare BPA a Toxic Substance
- Canada is taking an historic step by becoming the first nation to add the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) to its official register of toxic substances.
BPA is the primary component in hard, clear polycarbonate plastics that are used in thousands of everyday consumer products such as baby bottles, CDs and DVDs, and the linings of food and beverage cans. Numerous studies have shown that BPA can cause or contribute to health problems ranging from heart disease and diabetes in adults to impaired brain and hormone development in children.
BPA is so pervasive, and present in so many products people use every day, that the chemical leaches into our food and water, and even permeates our skin. A report last week by Statistics Canada showed that 91 percent of people tested had BPA in their urine, with the highest concentrations found in children. Those results are consistent with previous studies conducted in the United States.
In 2009, when the Canadian government first proposed listing BPA as a toxic substance, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) demanded a formal review of the proposal, accused the Canadian government of pandering to "emotional zealots," and said that any designation of BPA as toxic would not be "based on the best available data and scientific knowledge." Canadian minister Jim Prentice rejected ACC demands, saying that the organization had failed to "bring forth any new scientific data or information" to support its request for a board of review.
Canada had already banned the sale of baby bottles that contain BPA in 2008, and while the new action would make it the world's first nation to list BPA as a toxic substance Canada is not alone in its concern about the chemical's possible adverse health effects.
In May, France approved a ban on manufacturing, importing, exporting or selling baby bottles made with plastics that contain BPA. Denmark has banned the use of BPA in any materials that come into contact with food and beverages, and Sweden is considering a similar ban. Several U.S. states have banned baby bottles and other children's products that contain BPA, and U.S. government agencies continue to study and review the overall safety of using BPA in consumer products.
On the other hand, Germany declined to take action to ban or reduce consumer exposure to BPA after the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment cited two studies that found the chemical was no hazardous to human health.
The controversy over BPA is bound to continue for some time, as more studies are conducted and new information comes to light about the potential or proven health effects of exposure to the chemical. Meanwhile, consumers in most countries are left without definitive answers and must decide for themselves whether they want to do as much as they can to reduce their exposure to BPA.
Also Read:
8 Ways to Reduce Your Exposure to BPA
EPA to Assess Environmental Impacts of BPA
What are the Potential Health Effects of BPA?
First U.S. Bans of BPA Fall Short of Consumer Protection
Canada First Nation to Declare BPA a Toxic Substance originally appeared on About.com Environmental Issues on Thursday, August 26th, 2010 at 13:15:35. Permalink | Comment | Email this
How School Lunch Packaging Waste Adds Up
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Many of us depend on convenient school lunch throwaways to make morning prep time easier, and it can be difficult to resist those temptations in the supermarket, especially if the kids are shopping with us. But did you know that school lunch waste creates more than 18,000 pounds of garbage for the average elementary school?
As the new school year begins, learn more about the hazards of school lunch waste and about a recyclable solution that makes school lunches cool -- and environmentally responsible.
Photo courtesy of Getty Images How School Lunch Packaging Waste Adds Up originally appeared on About.com Environmental Issues on Wednesday, August 25th, 2010 at 14:15:44. Permalink | Comment | Email this
Lakeview Gusher of 1910 Bigger, Not Worse, Than BP Oil Spill
- When BP finally stopped the oil flowing from its ruptured underwater well in the Gulf of Mexico last month [July 2010], the government announced that the 4.9 million barrels (more than 205 million gallons) of oil the well had spilled over the previous three months made it the worst accidental oil spill in U.S. and world history.
Along with most other media, I reported that conclusion, but one of my readers (a man named Craig) quickly pointed out that the government and the media were all mistaken and had not looked far enough back in the history books to get the facts straight--and he was right.
The Lakeview gusher of 1910 spilled 9 million barrels of oil (that's 378 million gallons) onto a patch of scrubland in Kern County, California, between the towns of Taft and Maricopa, about 110 miles north of Los Angeles. Once it blew, the Lakeview gusher was unstoppable for 18 months.
The initial flow from the Lakeview gusher was 18,000 barrels a day, building to an uncontrolled crescendo of 100,000 barrels daily, and eventually producing only 30 barrels a day after the flood of California crude was finally stopped.
Ironically, the Lakeview gusher might never have happened if the crew on site had obeyed orders from bosses in Los Angeles. After months of unproductive drilling, Union Oil headquarters sent word to shut down the operation and abandon the well. But the crew, led by a foreman nicknamed Dry Hole Charlie, wouldn't give up. They ignored the orders and kept on drilling.
In mid-March 1910, 2,200 feet below the surface, the drilling tapped into a high-pressure reservoir and the well blew with such force that the eruption demolished the wooden derrick and created a crater so large that no one could get close enough to the well to try capping it. The well kept gushing until September 1911.
The Lakeview gusher didn't actually do much environmental damage. Black mist fell for miles around, and only the valiant work of oil workers and volunteers building dykes by hand prevented the oil from contaminating Buena Vista Lake to the east, but most of the oil soaked into the sagebrush studded soil or evaporated. And while 100 years later the area is still soaked with oil, the long-term environmental impact of the spill is generally considered minimal.
So while the Lakeview Gusher was larger in volume than the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the Gulf spill was a far bigger environmental and economic disaster.
Also See:
The 10 Worst Oil Spills in History
Lakeview Gusher Photo Gallery -- About.com: Geology
How Oil Spills Damage the Environment
Lakeview Gusher of 1910 Bigger, Not Worse, Than BP Oil Spill originally appeared on About.com Environmental Issues on Sunday, August 15th, 2010 at 22:48:28. Permalink | Comment | Email this
Gulf Spill Claiming More Wild Lives
- While the government is crowing about the amount of oil it says has vanished from the Gulf of Mexico in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon spill, the oil that remains is making things rough for the wildlife in the area.
The average daily number of oiled birds being collected dead or alive by rescue workers is now nearly double what is was before BP managed to plug the ruptured oil well, up to 71 from the previous 37, according to wildlife officials. Sea turtles have fared even worse: more oiled turtles have been recovered during the past 10 days than in the three months when the spill was still in progress.
The risk to wildlife from the BP spill is far greater than it might be in other areas, because the Gulf Coast is a breeding or nesting area for many species of birds, turtles and other wildlife. One of the saddest things rescue workers are seeing are fledgling birds, just beginning to test their wings, landing in oily patches where they end up covered in oil.
The area is also an important stop for hundreds of migratory species.
Before the well was capped, 56 percent of oiled birds were recovered alive, but that figure has fallen to 41 percent in recent days.
As of Friday, August 6 [2010], 1,794 oiled birds have been recovered alive compared to 1,642 that died. A total of 428 oiled sea turtles have been recovered, more than half of those in the past 10 days, and only 17 have died. There have been other turtle deaths related to the oil spill that were not a direct result of the animals being covered with oil.
Also Read:
How Oil Spills Damage the Environment
Gulf Spill Claiming More Wild Lives originally appeared on About.com Environmental Issues on Tuesday, August 10th, 2010 at 06:41:22. Permalink | Comment | Email this
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