12 ways to get rid of slugs naturally

Get rid of slugs (and snails) without the use of pesticides that harm beneficial creatures and pollute our waterways.

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Ceasefire urged in Coalition's climate and energy wars

Vietnam’s first Goldman Prize winner pushes for energy conservation

Khanh Nguy Thi is an environmental pioneer in Vietnam. She has led her NGO, the Hanoi-based Green Innovation and Development Centre, or GreenID, to the forefront of policy discussions surrounding clean energy development in the country. Her efforts to reduce Vietnam’s reliance on coal-fired power plants has resulted in both real policy changes and international renown in the form of the 2018 Goldman Environmental Prize. Khanh spoke with Mongabay by phone from her home in Hanoi and shared more about her work. Mongabay: When did you first get involved in working on the environment? Khanh: I’ve worked on environmental issues for quite a long time. I was involved in coordinating an integrated community development project in 2003, and in that we focused on women’s health and environmental issues in the community. At that time I was more focused on water and sanitation. Then I moved to work with an NGO working on the environment, water and river protection for five years. Since 2011, when I founded GreenID, I’ve been more focused on energy and environmental governance. Khanh Nguy Thi. Photo courtesy Goldman Environmental Prize. Why did you choose to focus on these issues? I saw that there was little, or even no, effort from civil society on the energy sector. It had some NGOs working on hydropower, working on water, but when I had a chance to look at the energy sector I saw that there was a big gap for civil society to be involved, and it has a…

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Canada's Government Buys Controversial Oil Pipeline, To Ensure It Gets Expanded

The weirdest trash found on beaches last year

The world's oceans are vast, but even they have become filled with the detritus of human consumerism. A depressing report from the Ocean Conservancy reveals all the strange and foreign objects that have washed up along coastlines and been picked up by volunteers in the past year.

The data comes via the International Coastal Cleanup, which the Ocean Conservancy has organized since 1986. It began in Texas, but now mobilizes hundreds of thousands of volunteers in more than 100 countries to remove trash from local beaches, waterways, and parks. Volunteers log their finds in an online database, which helps to paint a more comprehensive picture of what people are throwing away.

The following infographics reveal interesting lifestyle habits that should prompt introspection. Many of these items are unnecessary, or their purposes could be served by reusable goods. Others could be redesigned for better reuse, recycling, or biodegradability. Some are indicative of a serious need to upgrade infrastructure, such as sewers.

They offer a clear and distressing reminder that all rivers lead to the sea. Just because something has disappeared from sight does not mean that it's gone. Be careful with the things you buy, and be careful with how you dispose of them. In the words of Gary Knell, writing for National Geographic in 2017:

"The ocean is powerful, but not invincible. It is rich, but not inexhaustible. For humans to thrive in the coming centuries, we will have to be smarter about how we approach the 70 percent of our planet the ocean covers."

Click the right arrow to view the first infographic.

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How the fossil fuel industry drums up grassroots support

Over the past several months, scores of people showed up to public meetings in New Orleans in support of a proposed power plant. It turns out that as many as 100 of them were paid to be there.

The Lens, an investigative news site, recently reported that people were paid $60 to attend and $200 to speak. Entergy, the company behind the power plant, said that it hadn’t authorized the payments, but it did take some responsibility. After an internal investigation, the company said that it had contracted with a public affairs firm, the Hawthorne Group, which then subcontracted another group, Crowds on Demand, to hire the supporters. Grist called and emailed Entergy for a comment and has yet to get a response.

It’s a prime example of astroturfing, the practice of creating an image of grassroots support for a cause. And while this case may seem shocking, maybe it shouldn’t. Astroturfing in the U.S. dates back nearly a century, and energy companies have a history of getting involved in it through public affairs firms.

“The energy sector has always been relatively active in this,” says Edward Walker, a sociology professor at University of California, Los Angeles who wrote a book about how public affairs consultants drum up grassroots support. He traces the roots of astroturfing back to the 1930s with Campaigns, Inc., the world’s first political consulting firm, which also worked for oil companies.

In the 1970s and 1980s, the number of public affairs consulting firms ballooned, Walker says. “Corporate America was really back on its heels during that period,” he explains, “and started to figure, well, we need to be doing a lot of the same things that the social movements and activist groups and labor unions have been doing.”

Astroturfing is supposed to stay hidden. But some companies have been exposed doing it. In 2009, Greenpeace obtained a memo detailing the American Petroleum Institute’s plans to recruit “Energy Citizens” for rallies opposing legislation to cut carbon dioxide emissions and promote cleaner energy. A few days later, Grist got a list of 21 planned “Energy Citizen” events and found that most were planned by lobbyists, many of whom worked for API or its local affiliates.

That same year, the lobbying group Bonner & Associates forged letters against American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, also known as the Waxman-Markey climate bill, which would have established a national cap-and-trade program. At least twelve letters were sent to Democrats in the House of Representatives, appearing to be signed by a number of groups, including a local chapter of the NAACP. In one, the firm assumed the identity of Creciendo Juntos, a nonprofit network that tackles issues in Charlottesville’s Latinx community, and sent it to House Representative Tom Perriello. It turned out the lobbying firm had been working for the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, an industry-backed outfit working with Hawthorne Group — yup, the same one tied up in the recent New Orleans case — which contracted Bonner & Associates.

The cap-and-trade bill was passed by the House but eventually died in the Senate.

Climate Investigations Center director Kert Davies thinks astroturfing happens more often than people realize. “I would assume the best of it we never see,” he says. “That’s what it’s intended to be: invisible. So there’s probably a lot happening, or that has happened, to people that they’ve never known about.”

About 40 percent of Fortune 500 companies were clients of at least one of these so-called “grassroots lobbying” firms when Walker crunched the numbers back in 2007, he says. “The practices are incredibly widespread. That’s not to say that everyone’s doing astroturfing.” Sometimes corporations work with firms to mobilize their employees or shareholders — it’s not necessarily about generating the illusion of public support.

In the New Orleans case, The Lens couldn’t find any laws preventing the pro-power plant campaign. But the practice sure looks unethical, Davies says, according to the industry’s own code of ethics. The Public Relations Society of America’s code specifically rules out creating fake grassroots campaigns.

The New Orleans City Council approved Entergy’s plant in March, before reports revealed the astroturfing efforts. Community groups have pushed for an investigation and a re-hearing on the decision. The council has also decided to hire a third-party to investigate and has ordered the company to hand over documents that support their internal investigation.

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline How the fossil fuel industry drums up grassroots support on May 29, 2018.

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This Scottish "Baugruppen" could be the future of housing

Architect John Kinsley puts together a little project that addresses so many of the problems we face in our cities.

We have so many housing crises these days; there is an affordability crisis, a carbon crisis, an energy crisis (they are different things), and a rapidly approaching aging population crisis. We even have a density crisis, where cities prohibit multi-family housing in residential areas. Among architects, we have a commitment crisis; that's why six out of ten American architecture firms are ignoring the 2030 challenge.

© John Kinsley Architect

That is why the 26BS project in the Portobello district of Edinburgh is so interesting. It's a brilliant response to all of these challenges, starting with perhaps the most important: the architect's commitment and initiative. Edinburgh architect John Kingsley put the entire project together, starting with finding the land. He tells Judy Diamond of Homes and Interiors Scotland: “I used to walk past this vacant lot every day around the corner from my house, and I’d always think what a great site it would make...The site already had permission for a four-storey residential building, so that was our starting point.”

© John Kinsley Architect

He then put together a Baugruppen, or building group; this is a form of cooperative we have admired before on TreeHugger and MNN that is very common in Germany and other parts of Europe. Basically, people get together to build themselves a building, often with architects taking the initiative. Unlike co-housing they do not have big common areas, and it doesn't involve so much personal commitment; it's really just a method of developing a building.(Learn more about Baugruppen from Mike Eliason here) According to the Sunday Times,

“I think there’s a perception of a community build being a hippy thing, but it’s important to understand that it’s not co-housing,” says Kinsley’s wife, Jenny, a sculptor and garden designer. “Although ownership is still communal just now, the idea is that the flats will transfer into individual ownership as soon as possible. So if someone had to sell up, it would be just like selling any other flat.”

© John Kinsley Architect

Addressing Affordability

The big benefit to Baugruppen is that the owners are the developers, so there is no profit margin and important decisions are made by the end users, so you might get good windows instead of the granite countertops that developers use to entice buyers. As Kinsley notes:

People deserve beautifully designed and carefully built homes and neighbourhoods which promote social well-being, economic resilience and environmental sustainability. The conventional mass housebuilder form of procurement unfortunately prioritises over all these aspirations the delivery of a profit to the developer.

The downside is that there is no profit margin, so if there are cost overruns the members of the baugruppen have to eat them. In this case, the owners had to dine on Brexit-driven currency changes (they bought German windows priced in Euros) and foundation problems.

© John Kinsley Architect

Addressing Density and design

The site, a former movie theatre, was squished between an existing tenement and a single family house, so was designed to provide a sophisticated transition between height and front plane. The owners really wanted to fit in; "Three of the four families involved are current Portobello residents and feel strongly about the building contributing to the local sense of place in Bath Street."

© John Kinsley Architect

Addressing Carbon

The building is constructed from Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT), one of our favourite materials because it sequesters carbon; Kinsley writes on his website that " the growth of timber for the frame absorbed 114 tonnes of carbon emissions – an average UK resident’s emissions for approximately 12 years." There are other benefits- it goes together really quickly (the basic structure was assembled by three joiners in nine days) and just looks so much better than gypsum board inside.

Addressing Energy

It's built to Passivhaus standard of energy efficiency, with high-quality triple glazed windows and lots of insulation, so there is no central heating required. "all remaining electricity will either be generated via photovoltaic panels on site or procured from 100% renewable energy – the building will be completely fossil fuel free."

Addressing change

The basic plan is common in Edinburgh: a classic "tenement" form with a single central stair. Each unit was delivered as a shell; according to the Times,

The superior strength and spanning capability of the CLT panels meant that, aside from the internal central stairwell (the ‘core’), there was no need for internal load-bearing walls, allowing each family to design their own personalised layout with stud walls and different combinations of rooms. This clever design essentially future-proofed the flats, as the layout can be easily changed later. Each flat was finished to an empty shell, families bought their own kitchens and floor finishes and paid the builder for installation.

© John Kinsley Architect/ Top floor plan

Kinsley's own unit is a demonstration of the flexibility of the plan- his sons occupy two bedrooms and a bath that have their own access to the stairwell, and could, in fact, be subdivided into a separate apartment. “It’s the same on all four levels. We’re here for the long haul but it gives us flexibility to change things in the years to come.”

There is so much to admire here. I love the idea of architects taking the initiative to put something like this together; the idea of people working together to get exactly what they want and need instead of having to take what some developer gives them; the use of our favourite building material and of course, the Passivhaus standard of energy efficiency. Imagine what people could do if this kind of thing was legal in Seattle or Toronto, what a difference it could make in peoples' lives.

© the group, still talking to each other/ John Kinsley

Because in the end, we don't need fancy technologies and moonshots to solve our problems; just people working together, building carbon and energy efficient buildings in walkable communities. John Kinsley shows how it's done.

Read more about how you can organize what Kinsley calls "Collective Custom Build", "a totally different procurement model where the future residents, alongside a professional design and construction team, jointly act as developer themselves".

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Geneticists: It’s time to mix the Sumatran rhino subspecies

RBS cuts lending to new coal and Arctic oil projects

Enchanted Indigo Is a Compact Veronica for the Sunny Garden

Virtues: Enchanted Indigo veronica has a shorter, more compact size than other veronicas, making it a good choice for the front of the flower garden. It has spiky flowers in a deep, dark shade of purple-blue and it can thrive …

Read Article

The post Enchanted Indigo Is a Compact Veronica for the Sunny Garden appeared first on Horticulture.

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Dozens of fashion brands ditch mohair wool

Spurred by a horrific video from PETA, an increasing number of retailers are jumping on the cruelty-free bandwagon.

Some of the world's biggest fashion retailers have vowed to stop selling clothes made with mohair wool. Over 80 retailers, including H&M, Zara, Gap, TopShop, UNIQLO, Banana Republic, and Anthropologie, made this announcement in response to a video that PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) released on May 1 that depicts abusive treatment of angora goats on industrial farms in South Africa.

Angora goats are prized for their soft, silky wool, known as mohair. Like regular wool, it is known for its insulating properties, while remaining cool in summer; but angora is considered to be more luxurious than most wools, ranked alongside cashmere and silk. PETA says that 50 percent of the world's mohair wool comes from twelve farms in South Africa.

The video, which was captured on secret camera and has a warning for viewers, ruins that perception of luxury, revealing an industry that's horrifically violent and cruel. PETA describes it:

"Some shearers lifted the goats up off the floor by the tail, likely breaking it at the spine. When one goat struggled, the shearer sat on her. After shearing, workers threw the animals across the wooden floor and hauled them around by their legs...

The coats of some of the goats were matted with feces. To clean off the mohair before shearing, one farmer dumped rams into tanks of cleaning solution and shoved their heads underwater, which he admitted would poison them if they swallowed it."

In the video, goats are dragged across the floor, even flung across the room. The shearing process is painful to the animals, with workers cutting chunks of skin along with the wool. Some farmers said even teats get cut off accidentally sometimes. The problem, PETA explains, is that shearers are paid by volume, not by the hour, which drives them to work quickly. On one farm goats' throats are cut with a dull knife before their necks broken, and in a slaughterhouse they are shocked with electricity, hung upside down, then cut across the throat.

The images are gruesome, and it is understandable that no fashion retailer would want anything to do with such a supply chain. H&M spokeswoman Helena Johanssen told the Washington Post:

“The supply chain for mohair production is challenging to control — a credible standard does not exist — therefore we have decided to ban mohair fibre from our assortment by 2020 at the latest."

The video comes five years after PETA released similarly harrowing footage of workers at an angora rabbit farm in China ripping chunks of fur from live animals. Following that, many of the same fashion retailers pledged to stop selling angora fur, or, like Gucci, go entirely fur-free.

Switching to petroleum-based synthetics, however, isn't a straightforward solution. Wikipedia informs that "fake fur is made from several materials including blends of acrylic and modacrylic polymers derived from coal, air, water, petroleum and limestone" -- in other words, plastic, which we know to be enormously harmful to wildlife. It does not biodegrade and, when laundered, releases plastic microfibres into the environment that animals ingest. So, while using synthetics might help captive animals, it ends up harming wild ones.

Is there a better solution? I don't know, but I do not think that angora wool is inherently harmful as a textile, IF -- and this is a big 'if' -- the animals are cared for respectfully and kindly by farmers. That greater degree of care would have to be reflected in the price tag, returning mohair to the category of true luxury, rather than a fabric of the fast fashion giants. At the time of publishing this article, H&M Canada's website shows no less than 40 items that contain mohair, some of which cost as little as $14.99. At that price, what kind of animal husbandry does a shopper expect?

The takeaway message is the same as always from these ethical fashion stories: We MUST start asking where and how our clothes are made. If you're unhappy with production standards, tell the company. Take a stance! If you are uncomfortable purchasing synthetics, seek out non-animal-origin natural fabrics or buy second-hand items. Fight against the insidious fast-fashion mentality by buying high-quality clothes and caring for them properly to ensure they last.

One final note: Keep in mind that production ethics go beyond the animals used for wool, down, fur, and leather. There are millions of humans who also suffer horrific conditions in the factories that produce clothes for fast fashion retailers, and yet videos about their suffering tend not to result in broad policy changes for these companies. Perhaps it's because haggard humans are less adorable than angora goats? More likely, it's because the industry relies on humans working for slave-like wages more than it does on fur trim and mohair sweaters; it can afford to do without those.

As conscientious consumers, however, we have a responsibility to those humans, as well as to the animals. Buy fairtrade, ethically- and/or domestically-produced clothing whenever possible. Buy from retailers that promise full transparency, such as Everlane and Patagonia.

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Revealed: industrial-scale beef farming comes to the UK

United By Blue embarks on 21 state, waterway clean-up road trip

Earlier this year, I wrote about United By Blue—a sustainable outdoor apparel retailer which is committed to cleaning up a fund of trash for every item it sells. Not long after, we put the word out about summer job opportunities on an upcoming clean up road trip.

Those positions have now been filled, but United By Blue [UBB] is preparing to depart on their 21 state jaunt through the United States, on which they'll be hosting clean ups in communities across the country—and they are going to need your help. Already, more than 10,000 volunteers have participated in UBB clean ups since the brand was conceived, but as they pick up the scale of their efforts, they're going to need to pick up the scale of their volunteer recruiting too.

The goal is not just to initiate one-off clean ups, but rather to strengthen relationships between community groups and build a sustained movement dedicated to caring for our waterways. To that end, UBB will be partnering with local retailers and conservation groups—and will also be seeking to embolden other retailers to hold similar events wherever they are.

Check out the full list of tour locations and dates below, and then sign up to participate here. And in response to the (almost) inevitable comments that this is addressing the symptom, not the cause, I can attest that having become a UBB customer, they're shipping does a pretty darned good job of staying plastic-free.

Blue Movement 2018 Road Trip, Tour Dates and Locations

Richmond, VA
June 1, 2018

Fayetteville, WV
June 4, 2018

Louisville, KY
June 9, 2018

Cleveland, TN
June 9, 2018

Birmingham, AL
June 12, 2018

Jackson, MS
June 15, 2018

New Orleans, LA
June 18, 2018

The Village, OK
June 22, 2018

Ruidoso, NM
June 26, 2018

Flagstaff, AZ
June 29, 2018

Las Vegas, NV
July 1, 2018

Boise, ID
July 11, 2018

Jackson, WY
July 14, 2018

Big Sky, MT
July 16, 2018

Fargo, ND
July 21, 2018

Sioux Falls, SD
July 23, 2018

Omaha, NE
July 26, 2018

W Des Moines, IA
July 28, 2018

Lawrence, KA
July 31, 2018

Urbana, Il
August 3, 2018

Bloomington, IN
August 6, 2018

Bluemovement Road Trip Promo from United By Blue on Vimeo.

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Photo: Peregrine versus mockingbird

Our photo of the day proves the moxie of mockingbirds.

Mother bears might be the poster animal for protective parents, but there are plenty of birds that fill the role as well. For instance, consider the mockingbird. Photographer DeeDee Gollwitzer takes remarkable photos of birds of prey, and this one is no exception. She writes:

It's hard to believe the threat of the fastest, leanest, top predator of the skies did not stop this Mockingbird from chasing this female Peregrine Falcon from her nest site! This is a first for me!

The moral of the story? Don't mess with a mama mockingbird.

Would you like to see your nature photo featured as the TreeHugger photo of the day? Join TreeHugger’s Reader Photo Pool on Flickr and add your pictures to the group.

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Canadian government to buy pipeline project from Kinder Morgan for $4.5bn

Dutch support soy transport mega-project, posing major risk to Amazon

Grain silos in Miritituba on the Tapajós River, where soy and other commodities from Mato Grosso state are transferred from trucks onto ships for the trip downriver to the Atlantic coast for export. The Dutch, with their history of infrastructure development, are big backers of the development of Brazil’s Northern Corridor. Image by Karlijn Kuijpers This story is the result of an investigation conducted by Platform Investico, a Dutch collective of investigative journalists. “Brazil and the Netherlands share a special history,” said Brigit Gijsbers, director of maritime affairs from the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Environment, at the start of a speech given in the city of Belém near the mouth of the Amazon River. “For centuries, it was shipping that connected us. Pernambuco, Bahia, Recife and Rio de Janeiro were popular ports of call on the way to the East Indies,” she added in a veiled reference to a time when the Dutch West India Company shipped slaves from Angola to Brazil to work on sugar plantations. It was September 2015, and Gijsbers was in Belém with reps from 13 Dutch companies who wanted to profit from the construction of the Northern Corridor, a mega-infrastructure transportation initiative intended to move soy and other commodities from landlocked Mato Grosso state down the Tapajós and Amazon rivers, to Atlantic ports for export. The Corridor project would require a vast, newly built network of paved roads, railroads, harbors and hydroelectric dams that would need to be hacked through the heart of the…

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Market Value

I’m going to apologize in advance for what is little more than a rant.  I’ll get back to a more direct presentation of images next time. A few weeks ago I received an e-mail from someone expressing an interest in licensing one or more of my images.  I get requests of this sort from time […]

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Lightning strikes and flooding risk as storms continue to hit UK

What does it mean to 'live well'?

The UK's Living Well Index identities four key factors that indicate satisfaction with one's life.

Everyone has their own idea of what it means to live well, but last year a group of social scientists in the UK set out to determine which behaviors and activities are most commonly indicative of a life well-lived. The resulting Living Well Index was revised and published this month for 2018, and it outlines four key factors.

The list is interesting because it deviates from the usual 'shelter, food, employment' list that you might expect to read. It goes beyond survival, digging deeper into the things that actually make us humans feel content with our lives.

1. Sleep quality

The evidence for sleep is starting to roll in, or rather, it's being taken more seriously than it has been for the past several decades. From the report: "The quality of a person's sleep still has the strongest association with wellbeing." Those people who felt rested after sleep "all the time" had a wellbeing score that was 0.93 points higher (all else equal) on a 0-10 scale. Conversely, those who "never" felt rested after sleep reported a wellbeing score 0.51 points lower, controlling for other factors. Sounds like you should prioritize getting to bed on time and not punish yourself for needing a mid-afternoon nap!

2. Sex life satisfaction

The second most important factor for living well is the quality of one's sex life. The researchers found that people in the Young Family category (with children between 0 and 5) had "well-above-average levels of sex life satisfaction." Baby Boomers, by contrast, revealed less satisfaction with their sex lives – "a factor that is strongly negatively associated with age."

3. A sense of having enough time

The third most influential factor in people's perception of wellbeing is feeling like there's sufficient time to accomplish all that needs to happen:

"Those who strongly agreed they had ‘enough time to do everything’ were 8.1 points better off than those who strongly disagreed with this, all else equal... The extent to which people feel that they have enough time to do everything is heavily correlated with age. Three-quarters of the over-65s agreed that they had ‘enough time to do everything’ – a share that dropped to 55 per cent for those aged 55-64, and just 38 per cent for younger adults."

This proves that running around like a maniac, trying to squeeze it all in, isn't good for us; however, if you inhabit the Young Family stage, like I do, it is difficult to imagine anything else.

4. Social eating

Finally, we are better off eating with others, and the more often we do it, the happier and more satisfied we are with our lives. The researchers found that "someone who ‘never’ sits down to eat alone had a living well score 7.9 points higher than someone reporting that they ‘always’ ate their sit-down meals alone."

It's not entirely clear why this makes such a difference to humans, but one professor of psychology, Robin Dunbar, who worked on the Living Well Index, links it to a primal human instinct for companionship:

"The kinds of things that you do around the table with other people are very good at triggering the endorphin system, which is part of the brain’s pain-management system. Endorphins are opioids, they are chemically related to morphine – they are produced by the brain and give you an opiate high. That’s what you get when you do all this social stuff, including patting, cuddling and stroking. It is central to the way primates in general bond in their social groups and relationships.”

After mulling over these four factors, I think they can be summed up in a single phrase: "Slow down!" As soon as humans are able to embrace a slower speed of life, all of these factors fall into place. There's time to sleep, to enjoy great sex, to share a meal with friends, and not do any of it in a mad rush. We could all benefit from allowing the Living Well Index to shape our decisions about how to be.

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Tracking the Three-Legged Snow Leopard

Nature Conservancy scientists are collaring snow leopards in western Mongolia to help limit livestock predation and protect these rare cats.

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Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right | Dana Nuccitelli

Humpback whale trapped in netting off Bondi beach

A 10-metre humpback whale trapped off in netting off Bondi beach in Sydney may have to wait until Wednesday morning to be freed after darkness hampered rescue efforts.

Whale watchers were able to free the mammal of some of the netting but a rescue team from National Parks New South Wales was unable to fully release the whale before night fell.

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Passengers on a whale-watching cruise spotted the mammal about 2pm and spent several hours trying to help. A crew member, Jonas Liebschner, told the Sydney Morning Herald that the whale “was able to move more freely than before” after some of the netting was cut.

The rescue team took over but a spokeswoman told Guardian Australia that it had quickly become unsafe to fully disentangle the whale in darkness.

“The team, before it got dark, was undertaking a visual assessment of the animal by helicopter,” she said. “It is not safe to perform the disentanglement operation by nighttime. It was already too late in the day.”

She said the parks service was mobilising a specialist crew to attempt a disentanglement in the morning if they could locate the whale.

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National parks are more than natural | Letters

EU publishes single-use plastics ban law and the straw wars heat up

You've almost certainly heard noise about banning plastic straws, but have you heard of "Straw Wars"?

That's what the local media is calling a war of words between UK Environment Secretary Michael Gove and Frans Timmermans, First Vice President of the European Commission, over who can ban single-use plastics first: the "slow moving" behemoth European Union or the United Kingdom, which is making its own laws in anticipation of the pending "Brexit" from the EU.

Yesterday, the EU Commission fired the first volley by publishing draft legislation targeting the ten worst single-use plastic (SUP) waste offenders, as well as plastic fishing gear. Together, these represent 70% of the SUP items counted in a survey of marine litter on European beaches.

This is an exciting front in the war on plastics, for which the call to arms is going out across the globe. While many locations are acting to ban plastic bags or plastic straws, the EU Commission's proposed restrictions are wide-ranging. They ban single-use plastics in all the cases for which a reasonable substitute is already available, which includes:

• Cotton bud sticks (with exception for medical purposes),
• Cutlery (forks, knives, spoons, chopsticks),
• Plates,
• Straws (with exception for medical purposes),
• Beverage stirrers,
• Sticks and mechanisms to support balloons (with certain exceptions).

The regulation doesn't stop there either. For SUP items that don't have available replacements, various measures will reduce the waste and discourage inappropriate disposal, as well as ensuring that the costs of such wastes fall on the producers of the single-use plastic items, in line with the EU's strong "polluter pays" principle. Consumption reduction targets will be required for plastic food containers and drinking cups and EU member states will be obligated to collect (and recycle) 90% of SUP drink bottles by 2025.

Special labels will advise consumers of the plastics in sanitary napkins, wet wipes, and balloons. Awareness-raising measures will inform citizens of the urgency of reducing plastic litter, and remind them of the available re-use and waste management options.

The EU Commission is optimistic that the EU Parliament and Council will prioritize this draft and turn it into law before the European elections a year from now.

In the press conference announcing the proposed regulations, Timmermans called out Gove by name and invited others to join in "a race to the top" in #PlasticsStrategy. Timmermans really threw down the gauntlet with the challenge:

"Let's see who does best at this."

The backers of this legislation also recognize that the winner of this race will be a leader in supplying solutions to the rest of the globe as other countries come to realize that action must be taken to prevent plastics from strangling our oceans, and will be saving future generations money that would otherwise be spent on cleaning up the mess. That's certainly a prize worth striving for.

So the race is on and all are invited: May the best country win!

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Postcard from the Pacific: In new film, ocean is the star

A new film showcases the relationship that the people of New Caledonia have with nature.

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Kootenay tiny home puts a lounge in its bump out

This bump out adds extra space for a cozy sitting area.

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Global Forest Watch offering mapping and data visualization fellowships

Global Forest Watch and the World Resources Institute have launched a new fellowship for individuals working to reduce deforestation within 23 countries in South America, Central Africa, and Southeast Asia. Global Forest Watch (GFW)’s online forest mapping platform provides anyone with an internet connection access to frequently updated satellite imagery, enabling users to monitor forest change in a particular country, nature reserve, or other area. GFW’s interactive map and other spatial data products allow the user to view and assess forest change over different time periods and at scales ranging from a 30m x 30m pixel to the whole globe. Epiphytes decorate the branch of a canopy emergent tree in the tropical broadleaf forest of Madre de Dios, Peru. Photo credit: Sue Palminteri Through the fellowship program, the GFW team aims to bring its online forest change monitoring technology to scientists, journalists, conservationists, law enforcement officers, lawyers, and indigenous leaders willing to train and share their knowledge with others. The fellowship consists of a five-month series of online training sessions and peer-to-peer interactions from July through December 2018 and provides a US $6,000 stipend. It aims to help participants build their technical skills, network with both their peers and GFW staff, and begin implementing a data-focused project. The five fellows selected in this first round will also attend a fully-funded, intensive three-day tech “camp” to be held in September 2018 in Washington, D.C., where they can sharpen their skills in using GFW and other open-source mapping tools. The camp will…

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Subtropical Storm Alberto Closes In On Florida; Warnings Of Floods, Tornadoes

"There is a high risk of flash flooding across the Florida Panhandle, much of Alabama and western Georgia through tonight," the National Hurricane Center said.

(Image credit: NOAA/NWS, Esri, HERE, Garmin, Earthstar Geographics)

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Land-clearing wipes out $1.bn taxpayer-funded emissions gains

New Sill Plate and Joists

It was one of those weeks when the responsibilities of homeownership left us pining for the carefree life of an apartment or condo denizen. And I’m gonna have to resort to all caps to tell you why.

I spent the last few days replacing a rotten sill plate, the horizontal piece of wood that lies between the foundation and the floor joists. Said job leads to the following all caps admonition: PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, DO NOT POUR A CONCRETE PATIO ABOVE THE LEVEL OF YOUR FOUNDATION! When that patio cracks and fails, please do not pour another one on top of it. If you attach a deck to your house please hire a professional to make sure that it’s attached with carefully considered and properly installed flashing. Do not allow dirt to pile up against your house. Remember that water has a tendency to move in unexpected ways while simultaneously feeding an army of termites. Out of sight and out of mind, the wood in your house will rot out while you enjoy the high life of barbecues and cheap beers on your crappy concrete patio.

Speaking of professionals, if you live in Southern California be aware that all the well trained tradesfolk are working on Barbara Streisand’s Malibu mansion and are not interested in your tiny bungalow at least until the next, overdue, economic meltdown arrives. The professional I contacted for the sill replacement told me that he was busy for months and proceeded to tell me to do it myself, which is why I found myself wielding two car jacks and a sawzall for the past few days. He also suggested sistering the joists which took up another day that I could have spent doing the things that normally take up the time of glamorous urban homesteading bloggers in the big city such as pondering avocado toast recipes or dehydrating loquats.

After much all caps thinking, I came to the conclusion that we need a kind of time traveling Dr. Who character whose sold mission would be to stop misguided remodeling projects in the past. He’d spend a lot of time in the 1960s and 70s halting bad patio pours, stopping popcorn ceiling applications, preventing stuccoing, and outlawing drop ceiling material.

I’m sure you, my dear Root Simple readers have a few bad remodeling anecdotes to share . . .

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Dutch government appeals against court ruling over emissions cuts

Flash Flood Tears Through Maryland Town For Second Time In Two Years

Less than two years after what had been called a "once in a 1,000 years" flood in 2016, Ellicott City, Md., sees its historic downtown ravaged anew. One man remains missing.

(Image credit: Katherine Frey/The Washington Post/Getty Images)

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The John Hope Gateway is a pioneer in modern wood construction

Arriving early at the West Gate of the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, I stared through the gate at some amazing wood and glass and wondered who did this marvelous mix of wood and glass? I found that the John Hope Gateway was designed by Cullinan Studio in 2009; today we take this kind of wood construction for granted, but back then it was really cutting edge. Ted Cullinan has also been one of my favourite architects, ever since he visited the School of Architecture in Toronto when I was a student; I was profoundly influenced by his wonderful house. Cullinan has always been of the best practicing sustainable design; Jonathan Glancey of the Guardian once wrote that "Cullinan is proof that an architect can be "green" without being tweedy, embarrassingly "right-on", or plain archaic."

But touring the building, I found that it was about much more than just wood construction; "The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh looked to the John Hope Gateway to put across its messages about environmental sustainability, not just in its exhibitions but also through the building itself."

Careful orientation, good daylighting, natural ventilation and high insulation levels all contribute to the building’s energy efficiency – and strong and durable materials will guarantee a long life for the Gateway.

On the website they note:

Using natural, local materials to construct the Gateway has also reduced its carbon footprint. Timber – Scottish wherever possible – was an obvious choice and is used extensively for both structures and finishes, including the structured veneered lumber of the mullions and transoms of the glazing, the helical stair and major items of furniture. Even the restaurant table tops have been made from trees previously felled in the Garden.

The cross-laminated timber glulam roof floats over the whole building as a single horizontal plane on pencil-thin steel columns – the most slender that we could devise. A series of coffered timber bays give an individual identity to open plan spaces below. The curved glass wall looks onto the zigzag beds of the new biodiversity garden.

I do not know when the copy for their website was written, but I did not see a bit of Cross-Laminated Timber in the building; perhaps CLT is becoming the generic term for engineered wood, which is unfortunate. There is Glulam and there is CLT, doing different things.

But there was marvelous glue-laminated wood (where all the grain goes in the same direction) with wonderful connection details, those dramatic circles of bolts.

Stair in John Hope Gateway/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

And the stair, built up of some kind of laminated veneer, is a wooden wonder.

A close look at laminations.

The building is definitely a product of its time, describing the sustainability features:

Wind turbine at John Hope Gateway/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

Perhaps most obvious is the wind turbine mounted on the green sedum roof – but there are also other renewable energy systems, such as a biomass-fuelled boiler, solar collectors for hot water and photovoltaic panels.

I suppose if you are in a Botanic Garden you have a lot of accessible biomass to burn, but vertical access wind turbines surrounded by trees are not going to spin much. One can complain about sedum roofs not doing much either but hey, this was ten years ago. But other than that, such an inspiring building, a model of sustainable design, a pioneer in modern wood. See much better photos at Cullinan Studio.

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Mirador Garden: steel and succulents in Austin, TX (#gbfling2018)

I usually approach gardens that are completely new to me the same way I do thrillers or suspense movies: I try not to find out too much in advance so I can go into the experience without any preconceived ideas. I find that to be more enjoyable than seeing everything through somebody else's lens.

At the recent Garden Bloggers Fling in Austin, Texas we were given brief descriptions of each garden. I skimmed through them the night before to get a general sense but didn't read them carefully until afterwards. I might have missed a few things mentioned in the blurbs but I was able to let each garden "speak" to me on its own terms.

However, in my posts about the gardens we visited in Austin, I'll give you as much information beforehand as I can. That should help you better understand what you see in the photos.

The Mirador Garden was designed by Curt Arnette of Sitio Design. We visited Curt's own garden after the Fling; I'll have a separate post in a few weeks.

In the homeowner's words, Mirador Garden "was designed around low-water plants, and it was inspired by my travels. The fig arbor was influenced by one I saw in New Zealand. The steel-panel retaining walls out front were inspired by the botanical gardens in Sydney, Australia." (She's referring to the Jamie Durie-designed succulent garden at the Royal Botanic Gardens.)

The Corten retaining walls was the first thing I saw as I got off the bus, and I knew this garden would be special:

Read more »

© 2018 Gerhard Bock, https://ift.tt/1l5MlEA. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission of the copyright holder.

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Invisible scum on sea cuts CO2 exchange with air 'by up to 50%'

{crafts} Seed Paper Flowers For Eco-friendly Party Decorations

Add vibrant pops of color to your walls and decorate in an eco-friendly way with this tutorial for seed paper flowers. Whether it's for a baby or bridal shower, birthday, wedding or anniversary party, you can see the full effect of fresh florals for a fraction of the cost. Plus, these paper flowers won't wilt or die on you!

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EU challenges UK to 'race to the top' on plastics reduction

Brussels has challenged the UK’s environment secretary, Michael Gove, to try to outdo it in an environmental “race to the top” as it proposed a ban on plastic straws, cutlery, plates, cotton buds and balloon sticks.

Frans Timmermans, the European commission’s first vice-president, directly addressed Gove, a fervent Brexiter, as he unveiled details of the planned prohibition, along with measures designed to reduce the use of plastic takeaway containers and drinking cups.

Timmermans, who has repeatedly clashed with Gove on Twitter in recent months, told reporters: “Worldwide this is the most ambitious and comprehensive legal proposal addressing marine litter. We can lead the way. We have to lead the way for our environment, for our health, but also to turn this into a competitive advantage for Europe.

“What I hope for after today is a race to the top, and I invite all those who said the EU is too slow – whether they are Michael Gove or others – to join us in this race to the top. Lets see who does best at this.”

This year Gove and Timmermans publicly goaded each other over their rival claims to be the most advanced in clamping down on plastic waste. Gove, who announced in February a consultation on banning plastic straws in the UK, suggested at the time that the measure might not be possible owing to EU legislation.

Timmermans responded on Twitter that Brussels, having announced its own plastic strategy in January, including a potential ban, was “one step ahead of you”.

On Monday Timmermans published draft legislation that he hopes will be agreed by the member states and European parliament by the time of the European elections next May.

The plastics ban will not come into force until after Brexit, meaning it will not be among the bulk of legislation to be automatically transposed into UK law.

Asked whether the proposed ban proved that the EU rather than the UK was the true pioneer, Timmermans said: “Who cares as long as the environment wins? Who cares as long as we take plastic out of the ocean. If this is a big victory for Michael Gove, I will applaud him. But let’s see who gets there first.”

The UK still remains ahead of the game at least in banning plastic microbeads from cosmetics and personal care products, something Timmermans admitted the EU should urgently address.

It can take as long as two years for EU directives to be transposed into national laws once they have been agreed and officially published.

Timmermans, a Dutch former foreign minister, said Brussels was feeling “emboldened” to prioritise action against plastic waste due to a change in public sentiment across Europe, in part arising from what he described at David Attenborough’s “masterpiece”, Blue Planet.

As well as banning a number of popular single-use plastic products, the EU wants to reduce the use of other others where there are as yet no readily available alternatives. Producers of takeaway containers, plastic drinking bottles and cups will be forced to contribute to cleaning up their collection and waste treatment.

There will be new labelling requirements to inform consumers about the environmental impact of wet wipes and how to dispose of them properly. The EU is holding open the possibility of a plastics tax linked to each producer’s record on encouraging recycling.

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Use real sunscreen this summer, not chicken oil, diaper cream, or carrots

We love natural skincare products, but when it comes to sun safety, choose a sunscreen that's approved by the EWG.

The FDA announced last week that it is cracking down on sunscreen fraud. Numerous companies in the United States have been marketing sunscreen pills, which are dietary supplements claiming to "prevent sunburn, reduce early skin aging caused by the sun, or protect from the risks of skin cancer." Popping a sunscreen pill does sound wonderfully convenient, but the FDA insists it doesn't work like that in real life: "There’s no pill or capsule that can replace your sunscreen."

The announcement goes on to acknowledge new health concerns. It says that times have changed and many people now use sunscreen on a daily basis:

"When sunscreens first came on the market, they were used only occasionally at the beach. Now, people are encouraged to use them liberally whenever they are out in the sun. So our exposure to sunscreens has greatly increased. At the same time, there’s also growing interest in how the active ingredients in sunscreens may be absorbed through the skin. When sunscreens first came on the U.S. market, sunscreen active ingredients were not thought to penetrate the skin. We now have evidence that it’s possible for some sunscreen active ingredients to be absorbed through the skin."

In light of this, the FDA says it is working with the sunscreen industry to conduct more in-depth research into chemical safety. (Unfortunately there was no mention of the environmental impact of sunscreen ingredients, but that's something you can read about here.)

If you're a committed TreeHugger, then there's a chance you already have a healthy skepticism for much of what the FDA says, considering its notorious lack of regulation of cosmetic and skincare ingredients. I certainly take their recommendations with a grain of salt, preferring to read ingredient lists carefully and do my own research. Still, it's good to know that the organization is listening to shoppers' concerns and responding to them -- how effectively, we have yet to see.

As a pale-skinned redhead living in a beach town with pale-skinned redheaded children, I do have to take sunscreen seriously. It doesn't take much to convince me that relying on coconut or sesame oils, chicken oil, carrot slushies, and diaper cream seems like a profoundly bad idea for staving off a sunburn. (See LifeHacker for a list of curious sunscreen substitutes.) I prefer to rely on non-homemade concoctions that have been tested by the EWG, published annually in its safe sunscreen guide.

The EWG's top picks for kids' sunscreens can be viewed here, and there is an additional list of 216 Beach & Sport sunscreens that meet its safety criteria. One interesting detail:

"Parents should know that the FDA does not set any criteria or additional requirements for sunscreen and body care products marketed to children. EWG has not identified any systematic differences between the types of products marketed to children and the general population."

In other words, don't pay through the nose for a product simply labeled 'kid-friendly' when a regular one will do! And remember, sunscreen should always be a last resort for sun protection. Regardless of how clean and green a product is, or whether it's laden with FDA-approved chemicals (for now!), your safest bet is to cover up, stay in the shade, and time your beach visits not to coincide with the peak of day.

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Why do the Scots have such terrible bathrooms?

They were better in 1904 than they are today.

In 1912 Sir Fitzroy Donald Maclean began restoring Duart Castle on the Isle of Mull, and installed a modern bathroom. The remarkable thing about it is how little Scottish bathrooms have changed since then; about the only difference is that today, bathtubs are shorter and less comfortable.

Bathroom in Hill House/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

Much the same thing can be said about the bathroom designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh at the Hill House, completed in 1904. It had a long comfy tub, a wall mount sink with two taps, and even an elaborate towel warming radiator. It also had a separate stall shower with the toilet in a separate water closet. These are both obviously bathrooms of the very rich, but in most of North America, these features have trickled down, so to speak.

A few years ago, when I contributed to the Guardian, I asked Why the modern bathroom is a wasteful, unhealthy design. It was hugely popular, getting hundreds of comments and thousands of links. Having just returned from 10 days in Scotland, I have a new insight into why it was such a success; I have complained for years about how bad North American washrooms are, but I was just shocked at how badly designed and outfitted they were in Scotland. They seem to have gone backward, not forward.

First, there is the question of the sinks and the fact that so many, including brand new bathrooms, still have separate hot and cold water supply taps. Historically, there is some logic to them; people used to use washstands with basins without drains, cold water came first, so it made sense to plug the basin and fill it with water.

Sink in Botanical Gardens/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

But many of the sinks I have seen do not even have drain plugs, just two taps over a sink like this relatively new one at the Edinburgh Botanical Gardens. How am I supposed to wash my hands in that?

It turns out that it isn't just random stubbornness that leads to the separate taps; there was some concern that the tanks storing water used for heating and domestic hot water might not be entirely safe. According my new favourite website, The Privy Counsel, and to Tom Scott, quoted in Buzzfeed,

It goes back to how British houses were constructed after World War II. Most of them have a cold water storage tank in the attic – it feeds a hot water tank that's for central heating and hot water in the bathroom and kitchen. The water from the hot tank may not be entirely safe. That cold water storage tank in houses that weren't properly maintained might have been open to the elements, or silted up, or covered with iron rust or – in one particular case you can read about – have a couple of dead rats floating in it.

In the video Tom Scott admits to still being nervous about drinking water out of a mixing faucet, always letting the cold water run for a few seconds to ensure that it is not cross-contaminated with hot water. After all of my complaining about Legionnaires Disease growing in hot water tanks that are set too low, I am thinking that he might have a point.

Toilet under granite and drywall/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

Then there are the toilets; most North American toilets have accessible cisterns, although many people are picking up the trend toward concealed installations like Geberit makes. But I also saw a few like in our fancy AirBnB in Edinburgh where the cistern is buried behind drywall and granite. How much water is wasted when the flapper valve starts leaking, but it takes four trades to open up the thing to repair? How silly is this? And there has to be a brush beside every toilet in the country because they have long drops to small water surfaces. You have to do the dirty work because the toilet can't.

Going for the cute Edwardian look, but totally impractical/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

Finally, there are the showers; in the five places we stayed there was not a decent shower among them. They rarely had full enclosures so water tended to go everywhere; In one, going for the full Edwardian experience, we had to sit in the tub and try and not soak the room with the hand shower. It was cute, but practical? Not.

But this was the worst, in the fanciest and most expensive AirBnB we stayed in. They didn't have much space in their renovation, so put in this funny base that had a seat or a step in it. Except that the shower door cannot open out because it hits the granite toilet top. So you have to gingerly step up and around on that seat. The door doesn't stop water from getting all over the painted back wall; the telephone shower is so high that I could barely reach it. You had to be a gymnast to get out without slipping and killing yourself.

Ancient cistern still working at Portrait gallery/ Lloyd Alter/CC BY 2.0

Of course, this is all anecdotal, I have not done a thorough survey of all the bathrooms in Scotland, I am sure there are some talented designers doing safe, modern bathrooms. And I used some wonderful old ones, the best being in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery that is still original equipment in a glorious corner room with tall windows. But generally, the main reason I am happy to be home is to have access to a decent bathroom.

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Flash flooding in historic Maryland town leaves one person missing

One person was missing after flash flooding struck Ellicott City, a historic Maryland community which was devastated by floods only two years ago.

Further south, the center of Subtropical Storm Alberto was forecast to reach the northern US Gulf Coast on Monday afternoon or evening.

Howard County executive Allan Kittleman said a man was reported missing to police in Ellicott City at about 12.30am on Monday. He had not been seen since about 5.20pm on Sunday, when brown water was raging down Main Street.

Kittleman said the missing man was in his 40s and was not a resident of the historic district. He did not identify him further. He said emergency workers were “making every effort to locate that individual”.

Kittleman said the other priority for authorities was to assess the condition of buildings, which contain shops, restaurants and homes. The area remains blocked off, even to residents and business owners.

Officials said they were heartbroken to see the community so severely damaged by flooding again, less than two years after a devastating flood killed two people and caused millions in damages.

Flash floods sent cars floating down Main Street while first responders rescued dozens of people trapped in buildings swamped by water.

As the flood waters receded late on Sunday, officials were just beginning the grim task of assessing the destruction. Rescue crews were still going through the muddied, damaged downtown conducting safety checks.

Kittleman said the damage appeared to him to be worse than the flooding of July 2016.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami said in an advisory issued at 8am ET that the storm’s center was about 100 miles south-east of Destin, Florida, and moving north at 6mph. Maximum sustained winds were clocked at 65mph.

A tropical storm warning remained in effect for an area stretching from Florida’s Suwannee River to the border of Alabama and Mississippi.

A storm surge watch remains in effect for much of northern Florida, from the Suwannee to Navarre in the Panhandle. A storm surge watch means life-threatening inundations are possible from rising water moving inland from the coast. Destin and Panama City beach are within the watch area.

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The secret to career success? Put a bed in your office.

Is it not better for an employee to nap for a few minutes than to suffer unproductively for an entire day?

The most sleep-deprived segment of the British population, according to a 2013 study by the UK Sleep Council, is 45- to 54-year-olds. More than a third of the study participants reported sleeping only five to six hours a night. This is attributable to a number of factors, one of which is that people in early middle age may be at a point in their careers when they feel they have to put in longer hours. Perhaps they are managers, juggling numerous responsibilities, or trying to pack in the hours and savings prior to retirement.

Physical factors probably play a part, too. Writing for the Financial Times (paywall), Simon Kuper describes early middle age as having fewer deep-sleep waves and being afflicted by "more body pain and weaker bladders," causing people to wake more frequently throughout the night, all of which disrupts one's ability to have a good night's sleep. Many women at this age are also dealing with menopausal symptoms. So even if one gets to bed at a reasonable hour, one might still struggle to get a full seven or eight hours of quality sleep.

The result is a workforce that is significantly less productive than it could -- and should -- be, not to mention a workday that is painful to endure. No matter what your colleagues say (or maybe what you tell yourself), it's unhealthy and unsustainable to survive on less than six hours of sleep per night. Neurologist Ying-Hui Fu of the University of California, San Francisco, estimates that fewer than 1 percent of the population are natural 'short-sleepers', requiring under six hours a night. If you do happen to fall into this rare category, it can be fabulous for your productivity, but if you're forcing it in any way, it can have the opposite effect. Kuper writes:

"From my long-gone office days, I dimly remember middle-aged colleagues wandering around in the post-lunch phase having desultory chats. The modern equivalent would be pointlessly spinning through websites because you’re too tired to produce. Exhaustion is surely one reason why salaries of American male college graduates peak at the age of 49. In old-style factories, your career ended when your back went; in today’s offices, perhaps it is when your sleep goes."

Kuper, who works from home and relies on two 20-minute naps each day, offers a simple solution to this problem of middle-aged workplace fatigue: Install beds in offices -- good ones, not just "a couple of sticky mattresses intended to replace rather than supplement the bed at home." Allow workers to leave their desks, take the short naps they need throughout the day, and return refreshed and rejuvenated to their work.

Fortunately, it doesn't take much to make a big difference. As Melissa Breyer wrote last year, 15- to 20-minute-long naps are considered to be most beneficial. These "increase alertness and concentration, improve mood, fine-tune motor skills. During this brief period you’re only entering the first two stages of sleep (light sleep), which makes it much easier to wake up and return to your day." It's easy to waste 20 minutes on social media, so why not use that time in such a way that you return to your duties as a creative powerhouse?

I suspect Arianna Huffington would agree with Kuper's prescription. In her 2016 book, The Sleep Revolution, which I'm reading now, she writes that many workers skip sleep in the name of productivity, which ironically ends up benefiting nobody:

"Our loss of sleep, despite the extra hours we put in at work, adds up to more than eleven days of lost productivity per year per worker, or about $2,280. This results in a total annual cost of sleep deprivation to the U.S. economy of more than $63 billion, in the form of absenteeism and presentee-ism (when employees are present at work physically but not really mentally focused)... Almost a third of all UK employed reported feeling tired every morning [and] in Canada 26 percent of the workforce reported having called in sick because of sleep deprivation."

Kuper's idea hits the mark, but in order for this to work there also has to broader cultural acceptance of sleep as a respectable goal -- something that is no longer shunned, but rather regarded as a valuable lifestyle habit that's just as important as a healthy diet and exercise.

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Mining, erosion threaten Indian rhino haven

India’s Kaziranga National Park, which harbors the world’s largest population of greater one-horned rhinoceroses (Rhinoceros unicornis), is at a “high risk” of “permanently” losing its habitat connectivity with the larger Karbi Anglong landscape, part of the Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspot, due to rapacious quarrying and river erosion, a new report has warned. The Kaziranga National Park and Tiger Reserve (KNP/KTR) is located in the eastern state of Assam, sandwiched between the Brahmaputra River in the north and the verdant Karbi Anglong hills in the extreme south. Together they make up the 25,000-square-kilometer (9,650-square-mile) Kaziranga-Karbi Anglong Landscape. The expansive grasslands, swamps and open jungle of the park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, are home to more than 2,400 rhinos, 100 tigers and 1,100 elephants. During the fierce monsoons, when the Brahmaputra bursts its banks and floods Kaziranga’s grasslands, Karbi Anglong serves as a refuge for the wildlife that migrates over to the hills. Map of Kaziranga National Park. Image by Pradiptaray via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.5). This landscape connectivity, crucial for the survival of long-ranging species like Indian elephants (Elephas maximus indicus) and Bengal tigers (Panthera tigris tigris), is under threat from indiscriminate rock mining and quarrying, according to a report by India’s National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) seen by Mongabay-India. “Wild animals can get the sense of upcoming flood and they often move towards high land in the landscape during the flood,” said Bibhab Kumar Talukdar, secretary general and CEO of the NGO Aaranyak in Assam. “Though there are some highlands in Kaziranga, the Karbi…

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10 steps to reducing cancer risk

The World Cancer Research Fund has released its 'blueprint to beat cancer,' which includes key lifestyle changes to ensure lasting health.

Want to avoid getting cancer? The World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) says you should cut alcohol and processed meats from your diet. This advice comes from its newly published blueprint to beat cancer, which includes a 10-point plan for various lifestyle changes that can reduce your cancer risk by up to 40 percent.

The blueprint was created by reviewing "all published literature on the links between diet, physical activity and cancer, in studies involving 51 million people, 3.5 million of whom developed cancer" (via The Telegraph). The researchers emphasize that the understanding of what causes cancer has deepened significantly over the past decade. Dr. Giota Mitou, the WCRF's director of research funding, said,

"We have very strong evidence linking overweight and obesity to cancer which has grown over the past decade. So now we have 12 cancer sites linked to being overweight and obese -- this is five more than 10 years ago."

So, what's a person to do? Here is an overview of the 10-point plan.

1. Be a healthy weight. Keep your weight within the healthy range and avoid weight gain in adult life. The plan specifically urges people to cut down on sedentary screen time.

2. Be physically active. Be physically active as part of everyday life – walk more and sit less. Aim for 150 minutes a week of moderate intensity activity, or 75 minutes of vigorous activity per week.

3. Eat a diet rich in wholegrains, vegetables, fruit and beans. Make wholegrains, vegetables, fruit, and pulses (legumes) such as beans and lentils a major part of your usual daily diet.

4. Limit consumption of ‘fast foods’ and other processed foods high in fat, starches or sugars. Limiting these foods helps control calorie intake and maintain a healthy weight. Specifically, be wary of chocolates, pastries, chips, cookies, cake, ice cream, fries, burgers, and fried chicken.

5. Limit consumption of red and processed meat. Eat no more than 3 servings of red meat, such as beef, pork and lamb, each week. Eat little, if any, processed meat, which has been linked to bowel cancer.

6. Limit consumption of sugar-sweetened drinks. There is strong evidence that these contribute to weight gain. Drink mostly water and unsweetened drinks. Avoid sugary iced coffees and fruit juices.

7. Limit alcohol consumption. For cancer prevention, it’s best not to drink alcohol, but you can also reduce consumption by choosing smaller serving sizes, alternating with non-alcoholic beverages, diluting, and committing to alcohol-free days.

8. Do not use supplements for cancer prevention. Aim to meet nutritional needs through diet alone. Supplements should be reserved for people with certain conditions, such as the elderly who are housebound and cannot eat much, children under 5, new mothers, certain cancer survivors, and people not exposed to sunlight.

9. For mothers: breastfeed your baby, if you can. Breastfeeding is good for both mother and baby. It has been shown to lower the levels of cancer-related hormones in the body and to get rid of cells in the breast that have DNA damage.

10. After a cancer diagnosis: follow our recommendations, if you can. Check with your health professional what is right for you. These recommendations will benefit your health all around, also reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease.

Little daily lifestyle habits should be one's focal point, which means that the occasional indulgence does not hurt. Says Professor Linda Bauld, a prevention expert at Cancer Research UK:

"This report supports what we already know – the key to cutting cancer risk is through our way of life. Not smoking, keeping a healthy weight, eating and drinking healthily and getting more active all helps. A bacon butty [sandwich] or glass of wine every so often isn't anything to worry about, it's the things you do every day that matter most. Building small changes into your daily life, like choosing sugar-free drinks or walking more, can add up to a big difference for your health."

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Great White Sharks Have A Secret 'Cafe,' And They Led Scientists Right To It

These sharks have a hidden life that's becoming a lot less hidden, thanks to a scientific expedition that was years in the making.

(Image credit: Courtesy Stanford University — Block Lab Hopkins Marine Station)

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Biomass study finds people are wiping out wild mammals

Humans have had a massive impact on other forms of life, one that far outweighs how little biomass we represent, according to a recent study. “It is definitely striking, our disproportionate place on Earth,” Ron Milo, an environmental scientist at Israel’s Weizmann Institute of Science, told the Guardian newspaper. Milo and his colleagues mined previous studies for estimates of the total mass of carbon found in each group of organisms on Earth as a way to measure relative biomass. They published their results May 21 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. A spiny-tailed iguana in Panama. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay. Previous assessments aimed at uncovering the distribution of life have examined the number of species present. Others have looked at the weights of organisms minus the water that they contain, known as “dry weight.” But until now, no one had pulled together a biosphere-wide census of the distribution of biomass based on carbon, the element central to all living things, and it’s yielded new revelations into both the makeup of life on the planet and our role in shaping it. By far, the biomass heavyweights are the plants, housing some 450 gigatons of the 550 gigatons of carbon found in all life on Earth, the team found. They also calculated that humans hold just a hundredth of a percent of that carbon. But that tiny fraction does little to indicate how much we’ve shaped our environment. For example, by pulling animals into our orbit since…

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