Makeup Blog Post

I was thinking about our discussion last class when we talked about the "blind trust" that government agencies like the EPA and the FDA create and how many times these agencies are made to push lobbyist ideas. I was reading an article about hydraulic fracturing over the weekend that showed that the EPA had finally created the first set of rules that will require companies to trap the gas emissions at the well head. The EPA has now acknowledged that Fracking has extensive ability to pollute the air and will require companies to contain the pollution. Water has been proven to be effected by gas emissions however, the EPA has yet to create regulations requiring companies to protect water reserves. As I got further into the article, the EPA said it was not going to impose the regulations on the more than 3,000 pumps until 2015. The EPA swore that they were not persuaded by lobbyist but that it was unfair to implement the regulation this year because it is in the height of investment and start-up and it would hinder the potential business.
The article hit right on our conversation of how these agencies push policies that are generally aimed at supporting economic gain and political agendas.

Service Learning Project Idea: Food Awareness and Farmers Market

I had an idea to spread food awareness in Lake Tahoe through schools and community events eventually working to organize and run a farmers market. The community awareness would mainly focus on the dangers of processed and GMO foods and how we have access to local growers in the Grass valley and Carson Valley regions. SNC would be a great platform for seminars and classes that could teach people of all ages about food sustainability and healthy diets. Once I was able to gain community support for organic farm grown foods, I would work with SNC to start a Farmer's Market on the quad, during the summer months. My vision is to start in July and end in October. Farmers from the Carson valley and Grass Valley regions would be allowed to sell their harvest for profits in exchange for a small fee that would be assessed at that time and would go to continuing awareness and maintaining the Farmer's Market. This would also be a great place for people to sell local arts, and crafts, play music and bring the community together for a sustainable cause.

Research

I was unable to attend the presentation last class, but I have started researching and I have a few key sources. I have decided to narrow my topic down to hydraulic fracturing and the effect it has on groundwater. I was inspired by "Tapped" and since fracking has to do with potential pollution of drinking water I thought I could research how the EPA plans to regulate these hydraulic fracturing sites, what effect it will have on groundwater, and the possible ways to stop the expansion of onshore drilling and hydraulic fracturing.

Tapped

In 2007 the bottled water business was estimated to be an $11.5 billion business. Major corporations like Pepsi and Nestle have targeted small rural towns and are taking there water then selling it back at 1,900 times the cost of tap water. Nestle is the largest food processing company in the world, the scary thing is that they are now selling our water because it is more profitable then other beverage choices. Water is not only a vital resource, but a scarce resource and since the only goal is profit these large companies will inevitably deplete the remaining fresh water sources.

Another scary fact about bottled water is the health effects plastic bottles have, and the risks of being exposed to plastic bottle plants. Plastic is made in a similar way to producing oil and contains PET which is in the Benzine family and is known to cause cancer. There are several cases of death and illness from bottled water and the production of plastic bottles.

People need to become educated about bottled water. Many people think they are making the right decision by buying bottled water because it is healthier than soft drinks but the effects are still detrimental. The people supplying high priced tap water to us are the ones that also sell the soft drinks, all they see are dollar signs because it costs virtually nothing to get it and they make 1,900 times the return.40% of bottled water is tap water, and unlike municipal tap water the FDA is not required to test the water for quality. Municipal drinking water is checked by the EPA who is required to test it daily up to 300 times a month.

This documentary really made me think about cutting down on plastic containers when ever possible. Fortunately, I was raised in Lake Tahoe and I have always been able to drink pristine tap water, but that is not the case in many parts of the US and the world. Finding an alternative to bottle water such as filters and higher monitoring of the tap water we already have access to are imperative to taking a stand against Pepsi and Nestle. I really enjoyed this film and I believe more people need to see it.

Proposal for Final Paper

Oil Supply shock and the prospects of Hydraulic Fracturing

With the price of imported oil at $125 a barrel and an average of $4 a gallon in the US, 16% higher than last year’s prices, the US is looking for alternative crude oil supplies here on US soil. While oil prices are rising, the condition of worldwide economies and political powers are declining causing even greater uncertainty. In Europe the economy of the 17-member European Union is struggling to survive as country’s look to austerity measures that will hopefully prevent default on their sovereign debts. Amongst this issue is the contagion that has spread to other economies worldwide and the political issues surrounding OPEC oil members that are having a negative supply shock on oil.

The shift in global economic power from the west, to the south and the east is driving price and worldwide demand way up. Citizens of the emerging world are, by definition, less well off and, at the margin, tend to consume more of things such as fuel and food. The very shift in the balance of global growth continues to point to growth in the demand for oil. According to Stephen King, “If current global demand trends continue, China alone will be attempting to consume the equivalent of all of today’s global oil output by 2035. That, alone, should be enough to underpin oil prices. Meanwhile, as Saudi Arabia has become ever more generous towards its own population in the light of uprisings elsewhere in the Middle East and north Africa, so it will be less willing to allow oil prices to fall too far: it needs permanently higher oil prices simply to allow its fiscal numbers to add up.”

In 2005 the Bush Administration passed a law that allowed drillers to evade the safe water-drilling act and fracturing became an economic resource with very loose regulations. Today US crude oil imports have fallen to their lowest level in decades, rising fuel prices, driven by tensions with Iran, have become a big political issue in the US and raised concerns that the economic recovery could be derailed. A boom in onshore “tight oil” production using hydraulic fracturing is curbing high import prices. Hydraulic fracturing involves horizontal drilling, extends wells thousands of feet laterally underground, and hydraulic fracturing, injecting water, sand and chemicals at high pressure to crack the rock, have made production economically attractive in reservoirs that were previously uncommercial. Much of the drilling is taking place in North Carolina and Ohio and though it has some economic benefits the environmental and health impacts from high-volume, horizontal hydraulic fracturing in other states are shocking and well documented, with a significant number of spills, blowouts, leaking wells, and other accidents and releases of contaminants. The dangerous part of hydraulic fracturing is that as the earth is cracked it releases dangerous gases such as methane that effects both air and water quality in perverse ways.

With concerns over oil prices continuing to rise, hydraulic fracturing is going to become more widespread and the environmental hazards more dangerous.

Questions

1. Definition of Social Sustainability?

- Social Sustainability is made up of four key components: Environment, Society, Economy, and Politics. In order to have social sustainability we must invest equally in all of these components, creating a balance and a sustainable system.

2. In your own words what is social justice?

- Social Justice is the idea of creating a society that is based around equality for everyone, and that values human rights and allows for freedom of thought.

3. What is the biggest lesson you've learned from this class so far this semester?

- Economy and Politics tend to have the greatest effect on the other two components of sustainability, which has lead to an unsustainable system that facilitates environmental racism and a disproportionate number of environmental hazards on minority classes and lower income communities.

4. What question(s) would like us to answer next semester?

- I want to talk more about the political economies that have created unsustainable societies, and how to combat these powerful organizations and governments in order to reach social justice and social sustainability.

Chapter 5 Process of Struggle

Grassroots environmental justice struggles build community organizations and regional networks, that at the time are only fighting for their community and the injustice that is involved in their central location. However, the key to grassroots environmental justice struggles, is how these minority groups and communities become involved in the decision making process, that directly affects their lives. All of the cases in the book show how a system has been established in which economy and politics, outweigh environment and society. It wasn't until people in small communities stood up and made a change in their area, which lead to another group organizing and making a change, which lead to all members of the system(minorities, politicians, and businesses) getting a say in decision making, that we got to an environmental justice movement. Today environmental justice is at the forefront of a system that once devalued human interests for profits and political power. By reading these precedent cases and learning how groups and organizations have made a change in the past, other communities can learn what to do in the case of an environmental hazard.

Chapter 4 Buttonwillow

The Buttonwillow case was a good example of the ongoing struggle to stop environmental racism. This case showed how a community who was once getting stepped on and was not part of the decision making that directly affects them, can come together and begin questioning the status quo and create a voice for themselves. One of the major lessons from this case was to recognize how much power large companies like Laidlaw have because of they have more economic resources than the people of the small rural communities. This case also showed that although the LAC was not able to stop the expansion of the dump it was not a complete failure because the people of Buttonwillow came together to realize and then exercise their collective power, giving the Latino's a say in what was going on.. Many people, before this struggle began, had no idea of the expansion plan let alone any say in what or what not to be implemented in their community. Through this struggle they also built new friendships, new coalitions, and have gained new skills that they will be able to use again in the next struggle.

Chapter 3 Environmental Racism

National patterns of siting waste facilities and other harmful facilities in low-income areas has given the claim for environmental racism some substance. Even here on the north shore of Lake Tahoe, we have seen how economic factors and race have played huge roles in decisions to jeopardize the environment and the residents. In Kings Beach there are sewage pipes that have broken in the past and leaked human waste into lake water. They built these sewage lines in Kings Beach because there are more low income residents and a majority hispanic demographic compared to the high-income, white majority towns that border Kings Beach on the west(Tahoe City) and Eastern side (Incline Village). Another example from Kings Beach, was when Waste Management was going to build a facility on a plot of land that is currently a wetland. The local governments saw an economic benefit from allowing thousands of pounds of garbage to be processed and moved and thought Kings Beach would not fight this idea. Luckily for our sake and the extremely fragile environment of Lake Tahoe there are people in this area that fought them off ensuring this facility was not approved, but again this provides evidence of how environmental racism can be occurring in your back yard and even in places like Lake Tahoe where the environment is so pristine, political forces and economic gains can out weigh the harms to society and the environment.

Ch. 2 The Political Economy of Environmental Racism

Chapter 2 explained how communities that become vulnerable to environmental racism tend to have a particular social, economic, and political history that leads to their situations. Chapter 2 gave an example of a small town in Pennsylvania called Chester. Chester was a small town with a population of 39,000. Though only 6.2% of Delaware County, where Chester is located, is African American 65% of Chester is African American. Chester was historically an industrial town, and today is one of the most economically depressed communities in Pennsylvania. The social conditions in Chester are also very poor, it has one of the worst school districts in the state, and crime rates are the highest in the state.

Due to its lack of jobs and poor living situations the government was looking for anything to come to Chester to provide jobs. Their desperate situation lead the Political powers in Chester to allow the area to become a toxic wasteland. Political and economic investment in waste management can explain why many decisions have been made that in turn have harmful effects on social and environmental factors. This was the case in Chester, a Republican powerhouse had control over almost all decision making in Chester and his irresponsible social responsibility eventually lead to uprise, formation of organizations, and a legal matter.

Identifying the causes of environmental hazards and reasons for neglecting potential issues, mainly economic factors or political influence, can help us to prevent profits from getting in the way of progress towards sustainable societies.

Chapter 1 Environmental Justice Movement

Chapter 1 provided evidence of environmental racism and social movements that lead to the Environmental Justice movement. Throughout history there has been a national pattern of disproportionate environmental hazards effecting minority groups, lower income, lower class, and colored communities. In class we identified several socially constructed forms of oppression that have lead to this, they include but are not limited to: racism, sexism, ageism, spirituality, class, and "green washing". Undoubtedly, the three most significant forms are race, class, and gender. We also identified sustainability evolves around three key factors environment, society, and economy, economy being the dominating factor which explains many hazardous decisions that have effected society and environment in many negative ways.