" I heard it through the AgLine"

January 22, 2010

 

 

·        How we live: Our changing cultural landscape

·        Top scientists to review Calif. water problems

·        Organic groups seek to stop GM sugarbeets

·        Past decade warmest ever, NASA data shows

·        Iowa hort student develops ‘branded’ apples

 

 

How we live: Our changing cultural landscape

 

(SFGate.com) – At the turn of the millennium, "carbon footprint" wasn't a household term, "paper or plastic" hadn't become a moral dilemma, and reduce, reuse and recycle didn't yet come to mind as the three R's. But in the past decade, we've moved toward more sustainable living and begun thinking more seriously about how our lifestyle affects the environment.

 

State and local governments responded by adopting green-building policies, making composting easier and relaxing or eliminating rules for installing solar and gray-water systems. There are tax credits and other incentives for energy- and water-saving improvements, and more companies are producing less-toxic or nontoxic products for the home and garden.

 

We're also rethinking our landscape, replacing the traditional lawn with drought-tolerant plants or food gardens, restoring native plants to attract pollinators and capturing rainwater. Here are some of the decade's notable developments in the home and garden field.

 

1. Sustainable home: Your neighbor's off-the-grid straw-bale home might have raised eyebrows 10 years ago, but energy- and resource-conscious living is now mainstream, and the options have never been greater. Reduce, reuse and recycle is the mantra. The challenge for consumers: navigating choices and avoiding those who greenwash - make deceptive claims - about their products.

 

2. Urban homesteading: Whether motivated by environmental politics, the DIY culture or the Slow Food movement, more people are turning backyards over to chickens and bees, harvesting rainwater and preserving homegrown crops. Organizations such as Oakland's Institute of Urban Homesteading have popped up to teach classes on topics such as urban agriculture and traditional kitchen skills.

 

3. Food gardens: Worries over food safety and quality, a desire to eat closer to home and the economic climate have all been cited as reasons people are getting their hands dirty. Food-gardening classes and community gardens have mushroomed and school gardens have become de rigueur. The dwindling genetic diversity of food crops spurred greater interest in heirlooms and seed-saving - preserving the best of the year's crop to use in the garden the following year.

 

4. Composting: Composting programs have operated since the 1990s, but interest has really taken off in the past decade. Waste agencies added food scraps, a significant part of the waste stream, to the green-bin recycling routine and have embraced a larger message of conservation. Composting is now the foundation of the larger bay-friendly gardening message, as amended soil is healthier and absorbs storm water before it gets into the bay. In October, San Francisco's Mandatory Recycling and Composting Ordinance went into effect.

 

5. Greener products: From laundry detergent to termite treatment, less toxic or nontoxic products are now widely available. In response to concerns about off-gassing, paint makers rolled out lines of low or no VOC (volatile organic compounds) paints and finishes to reduce indoor pollution. New microbe-based treatments help gardeners manage pests and diseases.

 

6. Rethinking the lawn: In drought-prone California, lawns are the height of conspicuous water consumption and fertilizer use, not to mention a huge time suck. Landscaping alternatives such as food or meadow gardens, low-maintenance, drought-tolerant substitutes such as sedges and other slow-growing grasses have become increasingly popular options.

 

7. Native plants return: For decades, land development, invasive and nonnative plants have been crowding out California's indigenous plants, which provide food and habitat for the state's wildlife and pollinators. Concerns about the disappearance of honeybees prompts groups such as San Francisco's Pollinator Partnership to encourage restoration of native plants to strengthen the ecosystem. As a result, people have developed a different relationship with their gardens, says Executive Director Laurie Davies Adams. "You don't want just plants, you want visitors," she says. "You want to see butterflies and bees."

 

8. DIY craft culture: A renewed appreciation for what's handmade rather than mass-produced introduces millions of people to the joy and power of making their own things. Maker Faires blending technology, innovation, art and craft pop up around the country. Suddenly knitting beer-can hats is hip again.

 

9. Living outdoors: Indoor-outdoor living is nothing new in temperate California, but new weather-resistant products, lighting options, water features, heaters and other accessories have upped the look and comfort level of outdoor rooms.

 

10. Online design: Web sites such as Designer Pages and Decorati make it easier for designers and clients to connect. As popular decor magazines fold, design blogs like Remodelista pick up the slack, offering ideas, advice and inspiration.

 

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Top scientists to review Calif. water problems

 

(The Sacramento Bee) – An elite science panel's work to clarify California's water problems has become, instead, the latest front in a battle over the Delta's endangered species.

 

Experts on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta say political meddling prompted the review by the National Academy of Sciences. It risks becoming a "sideshow," they say, that could delay real solutions to California's water woes.

 

Water agencies, on the other hand, say the review is essential to ensure California is on the right path because the economic stakes are so high.

 

The panel appointed by the academy, the nation's most esteemed science body, meets for five days starting Sunday at the University of California, Davis. It is charged with examining rules adopted by federal wildlife agencies to protect imperiled Delta fish species.

 

The panel's recommendations, expected in two phases over 2 1/2 years, carry no legal weight. But they could be the impetus for new regulation, lawsuits, or both.

 

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., asked for the review in response to requests from San Joaquin Valley farmers, including Stewart Resnick, owner of agriculture giant Paramount Farms. Resnick's Sept. 4 letter to Feinstein asserts that "sloppy science" contributed to the new water and species protections.

 

Resnick and other major water users in the San Joaquin Valley criticize the fish protections, imposed under the Endangered Species Act. They have sued and mounted public relations battles to avoid giving up water to help fish.

 

Several scientists who are experts on the Delta, however, charge that the review was prompted by political pressure from water users rather than a quest for truth.

 

Jeffrey Mount, a geology professor at UC Davis and nationally known expert on the Delta, believes the academy was asked to get involved simply because "people of great influence" don't like the rules.

 

"It's not a wise use of the National Academy of Sciences, in my opinion," said Mount, who served on a prior academy panel that examined Klamath River issues. "It will become a sideshow. We are setting a bad precedent that will stretch well beyond the Delta."

 

Holly Doremus, professor of environmental law at the University of California, Berkeley, said many critics fail to understand that perfect science is not in the Endangered Species Act's mandate. It does not, for example, require the government to guarantee that its rules will save the fish.

 

"Lots of people are uncomfortable with uncertain science," said Doremus, who served on two prior academy panels. "The water users really want to know that when they're giving up water, the fish will be saved. And that's an assurance that just can't be provided."

 

The academy panel can recommend science-based solutions that can't be attained under the law, an outcome that could complicate California's work on its water problems, Mount and Doremus said.

 

The rules, called biological opinions, are adopted by federal wildlife agencies, which set limits on reservoir operations and Delta water diversions to protect five species of native fish: steelhead, two runs of salmon, sturgeon and Delta smelt.

 

Experts appointed to the academy panel will review decades of science to determine whether the Delta fish protections are justified.

 

From fish behavior to urban water pollution and reservoir function, the panel must decide whether the rules are the best choices for the Delta estuary.

 

Their review will cost an estimated $1.5 million, only half of which has been appropriated by Congress so far.

 

The Delta's state and federal water diversion projects serve 25 million Californians and 2 million acres of farmland. This water demand has contributed to a steep ecological decline, pushing numerous fish species toward extinction.

 

Water cutbacks triggered by the fish protections and drought last year idled nearly 300,000 acres of San Joaquin Valley farmland, a major blow to a region stressed by the poor economy.

 

"I think it's just time for a really good, thorough look," said Bill Phillimore, executive vice president of Paramount Farms. "If you're taking actions that have a significant economic effect on employment numbers and people's lives, you ought to make very certain that you're right."

 

 Mount and other experts on the Delta, however, said the fish protections are rigorously tested science. They have already been reviewed by five independent science panels over the past 14 months.

 

The academy review, they said, is likely to be redundant or could produce irrelevant information that derails ongoing efforts to solve California's water problems.

 

"I would just describe this as sort of unfortunate meddling," said Bruce Herbold, a biologist at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency who has studied the Delta for two decades. "It strikes me as desperately hoping somebody will come up with some other conclusion."

 

Of particular concern is the Bay Delta Conservation Plan, an effort to obtain Endangered Species Act approval for huge habitat and plumbing projects in the Delta.

 

The academy review won't be done until 2012, a year after expected completion of the plan. This could cause the plan to be scrapped or redrawn, Mount and Herbold warned.

 

Feinstein, in an e-mailed response to questions from The Bee, said the review will complement the Bay Delta Conservation Plan, not disrupt it.

 

"I see no reason why anyone should be afraid of a scientific review by this highly respected body," she said. "I believe it is the key to making better and more informed decisions in the Delta."

 

Water interests have attacked the biological opinions as flawed and filed multiple lawsuits to overturn them.

 

The Coalition for a Sustainable Delta, a nonprofit that represents San Joaquin Valley irrigation districts, filed separate federal lawsuits against the smelt and salmon protections. A majority of the coalition's officers work for Resnick's Paramount Farms.

 

"The science is so critical here that we have to ensure we get it right," said Michael Boccadoro, spokesman for the coalition. "Bringing in the highest science body in the nation to do that review is probably long overdue."

 

In his letter to Feinstein, Resnick provided a list of questions, prepared by Phillimore, for the National Academy of Sciences to consider. Its official charge is little changed from that list.

 

But most of these questions, Mount and Herbold noted, have already been asked and answered in previous independent science reviews.

 

For example, water agencies bitterly oppose an order for more freshwater outflow through the Delta in the fall to benefit smelt. This rule also limits Delta water exports.

 

Two separate independent science panels have affirmed the importance of fall flows for Delta smelt. Yet the academy panel will take up fall flows again at Feinstein's request.

 

"I really don't know what we're going to get from this (academy review) that's likely to be spectacularly different from what we've got now," Mount said.

 

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Organic groups seek to stop GM sugarbeets

 

(OregonLive.com) – A group of activists that includes organic seed farmers in Oregon's Willamette Valley asked a federal judge this week to bar planting of genetically engineered sugarbeets and sugarbeet seeds this spring, saying the plants could contaminate organic crops.

 

Oregon doesn't grow many sugarbeets, which supply half of the nation's sugar. But the Willamette Valley is nearly the sole supplier of U.S. sugarbeet seeds, and the Monsanto seeds are the first genetically engineered crop to be widely planted in the valley.

 

Organic seed farmers worry that wind-borne pollen from the sugarbeet plants, modified to resist Monsanto's popular herbicide Roundup, will spread and contaminate organic seed crops. Organic certification doesn't allow genetic modifications.

 

In September, a Northern California District Court judge backed that argument, ruling that the U.S. Department of Agriculture improperly approved Monsanto's sugarbeets for commercial use without adequately considering their potential environmental effects.

 

The activists include Earthjustice, the Center for Food Safety and Frank Morton, an organic seed farmer in the Willamette Valley.

 

On Wednesday, they asked the court for a moratorium on all planting, production and use of the genetically modified seeds and beets the government adequately addresses the environmental concerns, including preparing an environmental impact statement.

 

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Past decade warmest ever, NASA data shows

 

(The New York Times) – WASHINGTON — The decade ending in 2009 was the warmest on record, new surface temperature figures released Thursday by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration show.

 

The agency also found that 2009 was the second warmest year since 1880, when modern temperature measurement began. The warmest year was 2005. The other hottest recorded years have all occurred since 1998, NASA said.

 

James E. Hansen, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said that global temperatures varied because of changes in ocean heating and cooling cycles. “When we average temperature over 5 or 10 years to minimize that variability,” said Dr. Hansen, one of the world’s leading climatologists, “we find global warming is continuing unabated.”

 

A separate preliminary analysis from another NASA office, the National Climatic Data Center, found that 2009 tied with 2006 as the fifth warmest year on record, based on measurements taken on land and at sea. The data center report, published earlier this week, also cited the years 2000 to 2009 as the warmest decade ever measured. The new temperature figures provide evidence in the scientific discussion of global warming but are not likely to be the last word on whether the planet’s temperature is on a consistent upward path.

 

Dr. Hansen, who has been an outspoken figure in the climate debate for years, has often been attacked by skeptics of global warming for what they charge is selective use of temperature data. The question of whether the planet is heating and how quickly was at the heart of the so-called “climategate” controversy that arose last fall when hundreds of e-mail messages from the climate study unit at the University of East Anglia in England were released without authorization.

 

Critics seized on the messages as evidence that, in their view, climate scientists were manipulating data and colluding to keep contrary opinion out of scientific journals. But climate scientists and political leaders affirmed what they called a broad-based consensus that the planet was growing warmer, and on a consistent basis, although with measurable year-to-year variations.

 

The NASA data released Thursday showed an upward temperature trend of about 0.36 degrees Fahrenheit (0.2 degrees Celsius) per decade over the past 30 years. Average global temperatures have risen by about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit (0.8 degrees Celsius) since 1880.

 

“That’s the important number to keep in mind,” said Gavin Schmidt, a climatologist at Goddard. “The difference between the second and sixth warmest years is trivial because the known uncertainty in the temperature measurement is larger than some of the differences between the warmest years.”

 

Policy makers at the United Nations climate change summit conference in Copenhagen last month agreed on a goal of trying to keep the rise in average global temperatures to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, or 2 degrees Celsius, to try to forestall the worst effects of global warming.

 

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Iowa hort student develops ‘branded’ apples

 

(AgPR) AMES, Iowa — Apples imprinted with messages or logos could be a specialty product for Iowa’s apple growers, according to Iowa State University horticultural research.

 

Brandon Carpenter, a junior majoring in horticulture, conducted the project with the supervision of Gail Nonnecke, university professor of horticulture. Carpenter will present the results to apple growers at the Iowa Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association annual conference, which is scheduled for Jan. 29 and 30.

 

Placing food-grade stickers on apples blocks sunlight to form the message while the rest of the apple’s skin turns red with light exposure. Bags cover the apples prior to applying the stickers to limit light to the fruit and to reduce damage from disease or insects.

 

Carpenter began the project last spring by covering 95 developing apples with double-layered paper bags made especially for producing apples. He was allowed to use apple trees located at Iowa State’s Horticulture Research Station near Ames where he worked as an intern.

 

Later in the growing season, he placed stickers on 35 of the apples. At harvest, about half of the apples were judged good enough to be sold.

 

“This may seem like a low percentage, but I believe I learned enough to reduce losses in the future. I also believe this would be a feasible practice in Iowa orchards,” he said.

 

Nonnecke said apple imprinting could provide a specialty product for orchardists to enhance the marketing of fruit baskets and gift boxes.

 

“The practices are easy to adopt to Iowa apple cultivars,” she said. “Fruit growers interested in producing imprinted apples should experiment to find the best procedures for their orchard.”

 

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