banality

a trite or obvious remark

the condition or quality of being banal; triviality

some thing that is trite, obvious, or predictable; a commonplace

banal

obvious and dull

drearily commonplace and often predictable

repeated too often; overfamiliar through overuse

the evil of banality threatens us all

"Anyone who thinks the human race does not have a powerful impact on the environment and climate definitely has their head in the sand." - Bill Patzert

"Where will we turn if we destroy our planet's ability to sustain life?" - Vickere Murphy

"The ultra wealthy and Hollywood elite signing up for carbon-trading schemes to feel good about their extravagant lifestyles is morally equivalent to the nobility buying dispensations from the church in the Middle Ages." - John Newman

"I will be merciful only if you stop your evil thoughts and deeds." - Jeremiah 7:5

Over one hundred years ago Svante Arrhenius, a Swedish physical chemist and future Nobel laureate, first published his scientific paper on the greenhouse effect. Combining graceful prose and careful mathematics, the paper documents Arrhenius' experimental verification of the ability of what was called 'carbonic acid" – carbon dioxide – to trap heat near Earth's surface.

The United Nations sponsored intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has reconfirmed the basic accuracy of Svante Arrhenius' calculations. Before the industrial age and extensive use of fossil fuels the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was about 280 parts per million. Average readings at the 11,141 foot Mauna Loa Observatory, where carbon dioxide density peaks each northern winter hovered around 379 parts per million on March 19, 2004 compared with about 376 parts per million a year before. In early spring 2008 carbon dioxide levels 385 parts per million.

That year-to-year increase of about 3 parts per million is considerably higher than the average annual increase of 1.8 parts per million over the last decade and markedly more accelerated than the 1-part-per-million annual increase recorded a half-century ago, when observations were first made at Mauna Loa Observatory.

In 2007 world polluters pumped 24,126,416,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) into the environment. The United States and its territories were responsible for 5.8 billion metric tons, more than China (3.3 billion), Russia (1.4 billion) and India (1.2 billion) combined.

Yet, as evidence of ongoing global warming grows, we try ever harder to avoid the subject.

We "have to put food on the table," we are "in denial," we are too terrified to think about the future and, so protect ourselves through "psychic numbing," and besides, "there's so much else to worry about."

And, besides, perhaps the warming is caused by "sunspots" or a gradual increase in the heat given off by the sun as the fossil fuel industry claims.

"The influence of the sun on global warming is utterly negligible." - Tom Wigley, climate expert committing on an article in a fall issue of the journal Nature which studied patterns of solar activity over the past thousand years.

What is at work here is a fervid animosity to the possibility that our understanding of reality is somehow flawed.

One of oldest and deepest flaws of humanity is this lack of critical thinking.

Accepting what the mass media spin doctors and propagandists, pawns of American aristocracy, rely as "factual truth" without researching the reality for oneself is lazy, slothful behavior.

The destructive effects of this lack of critical thinking are reflected in the inhospitable reception initially given the work that earned Svante Arrhenius the Nobel Prize: a theory explaining the electrical conductivity of highly dilute solutions, or electrolysis.

When Svante Arrhenius, a doctoral candidate, presented his theory of electrolysis to his professor, the latter responded with a comment that most likely sounded like this: "Of what possible value is this!" Subsequently, many of his colleagues treated Svante Arrhenius with hostility, his work being too challenging to their parochial thinking.

We are now treating the scientific research on global warming the same way that Arrhenius and his theory of electrolysis were initially greeted: timorous disdain. For responding to the threat of climatic mayhem requires not only social change of the most fundamental category, but hospitality to the planetary imagination, an ability to passionately and vividly imagine planetary goings on that may not appear to have immediate effects in our lives: like increasing tropical deforestation, retreating glaciers, rising sea levels, the spread of disease bearing insects and more frequent extreme, hot and cold, weather events.

In 2002 the Antarctic Larsen B ice shelf broke up. Now Antarctic glaciers in the region are flowing at up to eight times their previous flow rate. The breakup of the Larsen B ice shelf left the glacial flow into Antarctica's Wendell Sea unimpeded.

One of the deadliest weather phenomena in the past century occurred in the summer of 2003 when there were more than 19,000 deaths attributed to the heat. It was the hottest summer in Europe in 500 years, according to an analysis of temperatures dating back to 1500. Record temperatures were recorded in most of the major cities of Europe with many readings of more than 100 degrees.

"When you consider Europe as a whole, it was by far the hottest summer," said Jurg Luterbacher, climatologist, a researcher at the University of Bern, Switzerland . Jurg said increased temperatures were not limited to summer in Europe; winters also have been warmer than the historical record. In the study, Luterbacher and his team analyzed the temperature history of Europe starting in 1500 to the present. For the earliest part of the half millennium, the temperatures are estimates based on proxy measures, such as tree rings and soil cores. After about 1750, he said, instrumented readings became generally available throughout Europe.

Scientists of the United States Geological Survey stated in a report published June 2004 that by using tree ring reconstructions of Colorado River flows they had determined that the lowest five year average flow of the Colorado River occurred between 1590 and 1594. The average yearly flow at that time was determined to be 8.84 million acre-feet. During the Dust Bowl years 1930 to 1937 the average yearly flow was 10.2 million acre-feet. Between the years 2001 and 2004 the average yearly flow was 5.4 million acre-feet. The drought, which ended in 2005, may be the most severe drought experienced in the Colorado River Basin for over 500 years.

About 288,000 square miles of perennial Arctic ice shelf was lost between September 2004 and September 2005 - 14% overall and 50% of the east Arctic Ocean.

The reduction of sea ice shelf is making it more difficult for the polar bear to survive as polar bears are dependent on the seals for sustenance and use sea ice shelf as a platform from which to hunt the seals.

In 2007 the Northwest Passage became navigable. National Snow and Ice Data Center reported that satellite measurements showed a reduction of the sea ice shelf to less than 2.02 million miles - down 386,100 square miles from the previous low in September 2005. At current rates Mark Serreze, a senior research scientist, predicted the sea ice shelf could be gone as soon as 2030.

In 2008 global multinational industrial concerns ordered 152 reinforced hull ships to ply the newly opened Northwest Passage at a cost of $100 million per ship - a $15 billion investment. (Global multinational industrial concerns plan for global warming to continue unabated!)

Cherry trees flowered on average in 2005 two weeks earlier than in 1995.

In the late spring of 2005 more than a thousand large lakes in Siberia had dried up within the last 25 years. Scientists speculate that the thawing of the perma frost layer allowed the water from these lakes to seep into the ground. Many migratory birds depend upon the lakes of Siberia and they are expected to be negatively impacted.

The Mexican government reported a suprising reduction of 75% of the Monarch butterfly population in the winter of 2005 due to adverse weather conditions.

"I've been doing this I was big enough to carry a bucket. Tapping in January? Never. Never. Never." - Rex Marsh, a 71 year old a Vermont maple syrup producer, stated in the spring of 2006 that he had tapped his 9000 sugar maple trees in January - two years in a row.

The July heat wave of 2006 in America set more than 2,300 daily records and 50 all-time records for hottest temperature ever recorded.

By 2006 a good example of the damage that can be done by a slight moderation in temperature was being seen in pine forests of the California, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming, Idaho and Montana. Lodgepole pines in Idaho and Colorado, ancient white-bark pines of Idaho and Montana, pinon pines in Colorado, firs in Montana and aspen trees throughout the West are dying by the millions. Beetles have ravaged the drought weakened trees. The beetles are best kept in check by cold weather.

"Nothing like this has occurred in the last 350 years. Whole landscapes have been affected." - Wayne Shepperd, Forest Service researcher

In 2008 a 160 square mile ice chunk broke off the Wilkins Ice Shelf in Antarctica.

Hurricane Katrina was expected

In the August 2005 issue of National Geographic magazine it was noted that sea temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean have risen by one to two degrees Fahrenheit since 1994. Since 1995 the Atlantic has been producing hurricanes at a pace double that of previous quarter century. The rise of sea temperatures in the Atlantic is directly responsible for the severity and frequency of hurricanes. Lower temperatures cause less severe and frequent hurricanes while higher temperatures create more severe and frequent hurricanes. In the analysis presented it was predicted that frequent severe hurricanes in the near future could cause much more damage to the region than hurricanes in the past.

Our solar system is unusual and unique. The discovery of at least 120 other solar systems that have been found have big gassy planets circling too close to their stars to allow them to be like our solar system. If the discovered systems prove representative of all systems then Earth like planets are very rare.

We need to learn to listen for the acid aversion to imagination in the kinds of comments made by defenders of the fossil fuel industrial complex. Global warming, claims that chorus, is mere "speculation" or conjecture – "left-wing" or "apocalyptic fantasy", climate change is "unproved"; we should be "skeptical" because there are so many "uncertainties" in the theory; in any case, it's "unrealistic" or "wishful thinking" to expect societies to make needed changes and that such changes would "cost jobs." Or if there is a problem, it is more "realistic" to try to adapt.

In this vapid, banal "realism," the spirit of Arrhenius' professor echoes.

Americans face the evil of banality.

Andrew Marshall, the director of the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment, the father of ‘Star Wars' and the military's graybeard expert on future strategic threats, was commissioned by Richard Nixon "to weigh the military balance in specific areas, determine what the important long term trends are, and to highlight existing or emergent problem areas, or important opportunities that deserve attention to improve the future American position in the continuing global military-economic-political competition."

A report commissioned by Andrew Marshall describes the disasters that would occur if the climate shifted abruptly in a decade or two, as happened some 12,000 years ago. The climate model used in the movie The Day After Tomorrow is based on the climate model portrayed in this report.

According to this climate scenario, most of Holland and Bangladesh would be submerged by violent storms and rising oceans. Northern Europe would freeze because of disruptions to the Gulf Stream currents. Millions of environmental refugees would gather at the frontiers of the developed world, driven by wars, famines, and floods. Nuclear conflict, continental droughts, and widespread rioting would erupt across the face of the Earth. Nations would be forced to expand their military power to defend dwindling food, water, and energy supplies. The report paints an image of America as a giant gated community insulating itself from an Earth it helped create, isolated and despised by its angry, jealous neighbors.

Although this outcome is presented as a worst-case scenario the report suggests climate change should be elevated beyond a debate over reality to a American national security concern.

An ice shelf core about two miles long - drilled in Antarctica - shows that at no time in the last 650,000 years have levels of the greenhouse gases carbon dioxide and methane been as high as they are today.

The research, published in a 2005 issue of the journal Science, describes the content of the greenhouse gases within the core and shows that carbon dioxide levels today are 27% higher than they have been at any time in the last 650,000 years and levels of methane are 130% higher.

The research proves that human activity has significantly altered the Earth's atmosphere.

"Anyone counting on an ice age to head off global warming or hoping to justify human greenhouse gas emissions to head off the next ice age, will find no comfort in the ice core record." - Richard Alley, Penn State University geophysicist and ice core analysis expert.

Americans need to take seriously the implications of global warming and act decisively to stop what could turn into all out climatic mayhem.

Americans do not need to remain on our self destructive course.

"A 2005 study on Americans' perceptions of global warming found that most are moderately concerned, but 68% believe that the greatest threats are to people far away or to nonhuman nature - a dangerous and delusional misperception.

Only 13% of Americans perceive risk to themselves, their families or their communities.

Many Americans perceive global warming to be an insoluble problem and respond by circling the family wagons and turning inward.

Americans behave as better environmental citizens when educated. When our individual actions are visible and rewarded a phenomenon known as "social facilitation" occurs. The opposite "social loafing", the tendency of individuals to drag their feet when work is shared and individual performance is not assessed. (The monkey that broke the back of totalitarian communism in the Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin's United Soviet Socialist Union (USSR), Mao Tse Tung's Red China and Ho Chi Minh's Vietnam.)

If Americans were vigorously informed about how global warming endangers our neighborhoods, we would individually forgo the McMansions and the Hummers and make sustainable choices.

Anything less compromises our children's future." - Julia Whitty

"Nobody can use the phrase 'our greatest problem' anymore unless they are talking about global warming.

George W. Bush is an alien sent here to destroy us; I know it sounds crazy, but it made perfect sense when Tom Cruise explained it to me.

This is not about being a liberal or a tree hugger; it's not even about my sentimental love of innocent animals - it's about my even more profound love for my own butt.

Man is the animal on the endangered species list I'm concerned about, especially this man." - Bill Maher

Addressing the threat of climate mayhem could offer avenues of hope and renewal everywhere for everyone.

The basic changes needed to effectively limit global warming would necessarily entail a tremendous amount of hands on labor, providing meaningful, community based employment in areas such as the reconstruction and retrofitting of buildings for energy efficiency and solar power, the reforestation and redesign of cities, the accelerated development of high mileage cars, the nurturing of sustainable local agriculture, the construction of interlinked public transportation systems and high speed rail networks and intensive development of renewable energy sources.

"Everything is interconnected. (Just look at Google Earth.) Everyone everywhere is affected by global warming. We all must do our part now. See Al Gore's movie. The facts are empowering. Use your car as little as possible. Turn off the engine when waiting at the curb. Turn off the lights. Hang your clothes outside to dry. Buy only things you really need. Encourage others to follow your lead. Let elected officials know you care about reducing global warming. Don't despair. Every effort we make to reduce global warming contributes to reversing the increase in weather-related catastrophes. America consumes more oil and produces more carbon dioxide emissions per person than any other country on Earth. It is time for Americans - that's you and me - to take the lead in reducing global warming." - Robin Schlevink

Of course wealth could no longer be concentrated in the hands of a few resource hoarders and manipulators, American aristocracy, and this is precisely why little has been done to stop the train wreck of climate mayhem.

A transition to an ecologically benign civilization, proceeding industry by industry, building by building and tree by tree, could radically improve the material circumstances of most individual's lives and greatly reduce economic disparity.

Bloated militaries would have to go: The need to limit global warming provides a compelling argument for massive cuts in national arsenals and greatly increased international cooperation.

New hope for planet Earth could supplant insipid consumption and temper our acid cynicism.

We need not remain in thrall to the mind's machinery of animosity to the imagination, in the mind's banal reaction to new possibilities and to hope itself.

The sky, as Svante Arrhenius has shown, really is the limit.

"The average American would probably take it as a badge of pride that he's less interested in rational debate than his European counterpart, and therein lies the problem. America has cornered the market on blissful ignorance." - John Wolfenden

air

From the 1920s to the 1960s seven incinerators dumped toxic ash containing lead, arsenic, dioxins and PCBs into predominantly African American neighborhoods in Jacksonville, Florida.

In May 2001 thousands of people were evacuated or sealed off their homes when a toxic cloud blanketed a Chicago residential area. Acme Barrel Co. removed chemical residues from barrels and drums and repainted them for reuse.

In August, 2001 a professor at Carnegie Mellon University's Heinz School for Public Policy and Management stated that "it is our best estimate that more people are being killed by air pollution from traffic than from traffic accidents." This includes people who prematurely die from asthma, heart disease and lung disorders.

Texas Petrochemicals released 148,000 pounds of 1,3 butadiene in 2002 over East Harris County, Texas neighborhoods. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality took air samples from 41 monitoring sites during 2003. The results found excessive levels of benzene, 1,3 butadiene and formaldehyde. Industrial facilities in Harris and Brazoria counties in Texas released 20.4 billion and 19.2 billion pounds of toxic air pollutants in 2003.

In January 2003 the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency stated that people who lived near the New Boston Coke plant during the 1990s, "are more at risk of cancer than almost anyone else in the world." Throughout the 1990s the company also failed to accurately report emissions. For example, in 1996 the company originally reported that the New Boston facility released 60 tons of chemicals into the air. Two years later, the company admitted it was actually 5,357 tons of chemicals.

In August 2003 according to an internal inquiry by the Environmental Protection Agency's Inspector General, at the request of the White House, the Environmental Protection Agency skewed reports on the air quality in New York City following the collapse of the World Trade Center on September 11th. The White House "convinced" the Environmental Protection Agency to issue "misleading assurances that there was no health risk from the debris-laden air." White House has stated that lying was justified by national security. In June 2002 the Environmental Protection Agency found that the air quality had returned to pre-9/11 levels.

In September, 2004 a federal jury in Alabama ordered Continental Carbon and its parent company China Synthetic Rubber, to pay $20.7 million in damages caused by excessive releases of carbon black into the surrounding neighborhood. The releases were caused 40 year old equipment which did not have the required pollution controls.

In June, 2004 it was estimated that American power plant emissions shorten nearly 24,000 lives by an average of 14 years, caused 2,800 cases of lung cancer and 38,200 nonfatal heart attacks annually.

In August, 2004 Stone Container Corp. has agreed to pay $885,000 to settle allegations that it violated air pollution regulations at its Hopewell facility. The facility violated emission limits for sulfur, sulfur dioxide and particulate matter.

In October, 2004 Chevron Phillips Chemical Co. agreed to settle a federal action by paying a $1.8 million fine for Clean Air Act violations. The chemical releases took place at the Pasadena, Texas plant in 1999 and 2000.

In November, 2004 a study by researchers from the University of Southern California concluded that exposure to fine particulates, like those from power plants and vehicles can cause and accelerate artery disease. The study found that a 10 micrograms per cubic meter of air increase in fine particulates lead to an increase of up to 4.3% in the thickness of artery walls. This thickening can lead to calcification and rupture of the arteries.

In November, 2004 an Environmental Protection Agency panel has approved the final draft of a report concluding that exposure to fine particulates in the air, those less than 2.5 microns in diameter, can shorten life expectancy by up to 2 years.

In January, 2005 ConocoPhillips agreed to pay $64.5 million to settle several class action lawsuits filed over 2 chemical releases - 64 tons of sulfur dioxide, the other 40 tons - at it's Westlake, Louisiana facility in 2003.

In February, 2005 a study by researchers from the University of Albany, School of Public Health concluded that people living near sites contaminated with PCBs and persistent pesticides have an increased risk of developing chronic respiratory disease, including chronic bronchitis and chronic airways obstruction as well as suppression of the immune system.

" Particulate pollution from diesels shortens the lives of nearly 21,000 Americans each year.

Almost 3,000 Americans die prematurely from lung cancer.

Tens of thousands of Americans suffer over 27,000 heart attacks and 400,000 asthma attacks as well as other respiratory problems associated with particulate emissions from diesel vehicles.

These illnesses result in thousands of emergency room visits, hospitalizations, and lost workdays. Together with the toll of premature deaths, the health damages from diesel fine particles will total $139 billion in 2010.

Nationally, diesel exhaust poses a cancer risk that is 7.5 times higher than the combined total cancer risk from all other air toxins.

In the U.S., the average lifetime nationwide cancer risk due to diesel exhaust is over 350 times greater than the level U.S. EPA considers to be "acceptable".

Residents from more than two-thirds of all U.S. counties face a cancer risk from diesel exhaust greater than 100 deaths per million population. People living in eleven urban counties face diesel cancer risks greater than 1,000 in a million – one thousand times the level EPA says is acceptable.

People who live in metropolitan areas with a high concentration of diesel vehicles and traffic feel their impacts most acutely. The risk of lung cancer from diesel exhaust for people living in urban areas is three times that for those living in rural areas.

Reducing diesel fine particle emissions 50 percent by 2010, 75 percent by 2015, and 85 percent by 2020 would save nearly 100,000 lives between now and 2030."

Diesel and Health in America: The Lingering Threat, February 2005, Clean Air Task Force

November, 2005 researchers from the University of North Carolina School of Medicine found that the sustained elevation of a dramatically increased suicide rate among North Carolina residents linked to industrial airborne pollutants emanating from asphalt plants, paper mills and sewage treatment facilities. Previous studies have shown that occupational exposure to hydrogen sulfide, at levels of 10 parts per million for a ten minute ceiling, can result in nervousness, mania, dementia and violence. A local paper mill has reportedly released over 93,000 pounds of hydrogen sulfide since 2003 and the suicide rate is rate in two Salisbury neighborhoods is tripled the statewide average and the suicide rate in Haywood County has doubled since 1996. These North Carolina residents live in mountain valleys that experience frequent temperature inversions which prevent the hydrogen sulfide from dispersing.

In March, 2006 a new study by researchers with CIIT Centers for Health Research (CIIT was formerly known as the Chemical Industry Institute of Technology) concludes that inhaled nanoscale particles can pass through the blood/brain barrier and lodge in the brain.

ground water,brooks, streams, rivers and lakes

"When the Environmental Protection Agency, charged with the job of protecting our environment for the benefit of the American people, stone walls on regulating a known toxin in public drinking water, in my mind it is akin to our government saying it's OK to poison Americans." - Mike Laskavy

Copper smelting from 1884 to 1980 by Anaconda contaminated 120 miles of the Clark Fork River in Montana.

Powerine Oil Co. dumped oil wastes from the 1920's to the 60's creating an under ground pool of toxic sludge some 900 feet wide in Santa Fe Springs, Los Angeles.

Pacific Gas & Electric Topock facility dumped waste water containing chromium 6 untreated into percolation beds from 1951 to 1969. In 2004 wells 125 feet from the Colorado River, a drinking water source for some 18 million Californians, were found to have levels of chromium 6 at 100 ppb. In February, 2005 levels of the contaminant in a well within 60 feet of the river measured 354 parts per billion (ppb). The allowable limit set by the state is 50 ppb. Pacific Gas & Electric Corp. (PG&E) used chromium 6 as a rust prevention agent in natural gas compressor stations along the company's pipelines during 1950s and 1960s.

In 1978 the U.S. Coast Guard discovered a plume of oil beneath Brooklyn, New York containing between 17 million and 30 million gallons of oil that had migrated from tank farms.

In December, 1998 in St. Maries, Idaho a wood treatment facility was found to be leaching contaminates into the St. Joe River. The facility operated as a creosote wood pole treating plant from the 1930s through the 1960s. The Environmental Protection Agency has determined that coal tar creosote is a probable human carcinogen.

In 1999 a massive 7 million tire fire in Westley, California released 250,000 gallons of oil into spring which ran into the California Aqueduct.

In February 2000 a cracked Sunoco pipeline spilled 192,000 gallons of oil into a pond and surrounding wetlands in the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge, Pennsylvania.

In March 2000, a buried 28 inch Explorer Pipeline Co. pipeline ruptured spilling over 500,000 gallons of gasoline into Lake Tawakoni, Texas which is used as a backup water supply reservoir by the City of Dallas.

In August, 2001 Columbia Terminals Inc. plead guilty to illegally disposing over 500,000 gallons of hazardous chemicals. The company will pay $1.3 million in fines.

In August, 2001 the Hecla Mining Co. agreed to pay $138 million over the next 30 years as part of a settlement for cleanup costs associated with toxic mine tailings in the Coeur d'Alene basin, in the 1,500 square mile Bunker Hill area, Idaho. Estimated cleanup costs will run $1.3 billion.

In August, 2001 the House of Representatives passed a measure ordering the Environmental Protection Agency to reduce the current maximum allowable level of arsenic in drinking water, 50 parts per billion (ppb), by 80% - in effect backing the 10 ppb put into affect by the Clinton administration and subsequently rescinded by the George W. Bush administration. Arsenic in drinking water can cause lung, bladder and skin cancer and according to a study by the National Academy of Sciences, the current 50 ppb standard "could easily" result in a cancer risk of 1 in every 100 people exposed. Three thousand water systems nationwide serving over 13 million people currently supply water which exceeds the 10 ppb level.

In August, 2001, the State of Colorado determined over 50,000 fish were killed along a 7.4 mile length of Clear Creek by Coors Brewing Co. from the release of 77,000 gallons of bad beer into the tributary of the Colorado River.

In October 2002 measurements taken in Red Lion Creek, Delaware found levels of benzene at up to 22,000 times federal drinking water standards. The benzene contamination resulted from tank failures of the Metachem Chemical facility spilling 6.8 million pounds of chlorinated benzene compounds into the soil in 1986. The facility had been one of the world's largest producers of chlorinated benzenes which were used in pesticides, herbicides, dyes and other products.

In July 2003 outside of Tucson, Arizona gasoline from a ruptured pipeline of SFPP L.P., a subsidiary of Kinder Morgan Energy Partner L.P. contaminated soil and ground water. The spill, estimated at 10,000 gallons, was larger as some 52,000 gallons had been recovered by January, 2005.

In October 2003 a landfill was determined to be leaching chemicals into Petrolia, Pennsylvania wells. Cromptom Corporation agreed to pay $4.5 having acquired companies that dumped chemicals at the landfill during the 1950s and 1960s. Beazer East Inc. agreed to pay $18.1 million in cleanup costs.

In September 2003 Kaiser Aluminum agreed to pay $24 million in cleanup costs for 66 contaminated sites.

In November 2003 a 4 million gallon under ground plume of gasoline contaminated the ground water of Hartford, Illinois. Pipelines carrying gasoline from a refinery to the Mississippi River were leaking 15,120 gallons of gasoline per week. The facility operated from 1981 to 2002 when the refinery was closed.

In February, 2004 the Environmental Protection Agency developed three options to remediate pollution caused by mining waste along Butte's Metro Storm Drain, Montana.

In February, 2004 Kerr-McGee Chemical Corp. agreed to remove thorium contamination from Kress Creek and the DuPage. From the 1930s, Lindsay Light and Chemical Corp. began processing ore to make radioactive thorium used in the manufacture of gas lamp mantles. Kerr-McGee bought the facility in 1967 and closed it 6 years later. During the years of operation, the facility dumped waste water into local creeks. An estimated 800,000 tons of mill tailings were also generated and were spread around the community for use as landfill for flood plains and on residential lawns.

In August, 2004, at a redeveloped limestone mining and cement manufacturing plant, failure to cap cement kiln dust piles created a high pH leachate contain metals, including mercury and arsenic which is seeping into Little Traverse Bay, Lake Michigan, Michigan.

In August, 2004 Mobil Exploration and Producing U.S., Inc. settled a federal and state action by agreeing to pay $5.5 million for spilling oil in tributaries of the San Juan River, Utah between 1991 and 1999.

In October, 2004 plastics maker Keysor-Century Corp. will pay $4.3M dumping toxic waste water into the Santa Clara River, California.

In October, 2004 a new study by the nonprofit group Center for Progressive Regulation concludes that many states do not have the money to enforce the federal Clean Water Act.

In October, 2004 Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp. agreed to cleanup an Albuquerque, New Mexico wood treatment facility. The wood treatment facility operated from 1908 to 1972 releasing creosote into the soil and ground water.

In October, 2004 the Environmental Protection Agency stated that Colonial Pipeline is responsible for "at least 194" oil spills in 12 states from 1966 to 1994 and "numerous" spills in subsequent years. In one spill, more than 950,000 gallons of diesel fuel spilled into the Reedy River in South Carolina in 1996, killing 35,000 fish and other species of wildlife, and dispersing more than 34 miles downstream.

Almost 150 species of amphibians have become extinct and as many as 55% of all known species, more than 3,000, could be on the verge of extinction according to a report published in the journal Science in October 2004. More than 500 scientists were included in the first global amphibian assessment.

"Amphibians are one of nature's best indicators of overall environmental health. Their catastrophic decline serves as a warning that we are in a period of significant environmental degradation." - Russell A. Mittermeier, president of Conservation International

David B. Wake of UC Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, a leading amphibian expert, called the prospects for amphibian survival "very grim."

Scientists say amphibians serve as sentinels for environmental problems that might be jeopardizing entire ecological systems of animals which includes humans. In the America, 21 % of known species are threatened or extinct.

"Amphibians are indeed telling us that the Earth is being harmed right where you and I live," said Andrew R. Blaustein, director of the graduate program in environmental sciences at Oregon State University.

In 2007 scientists began work on an "Amphibian Ark." A deadly new fungus, the chytrid fungus, is decimating amphibian populations worldwide. Scientists hope to collect uninfected amphibians and lock them away to save amphibians from extinction.

In November 2004 a Tsakos Group ship spilled 265,000 gallons of oil into the Delaware River.

In October, 2004 drinking water wells in Glendale, California have been found to contain levels of chromium 6 at 49 parts per billion (ppb). The city council has set a safety limit of 5 ppb for chromium 6, while the state maximum allowable level remains at 50 ppb.

In November, 2004 according to a spokesperson from the Environmental Protection Agency's Montana office remediation of the Clark Fork River basin, Montana will cost $1 billion.

In November, 2004 a report from the Environmental Protection Agency indicates that Dow Chemical may be responsible for contaminating an aquifer used by residents of the Myrtle Grove Trailer Park for drinking water. High levels of the carcinogen vinyl chloride, a toxic colorless gas with a sweet odor used to make polyvinyl chloride (PVC), were found in 1997, 1998 and 2001.

In December, 2004 the Environmental Protection Agency concluded that the cleanup of up to 355,000 contaminated sites nationwide will cost up to $280 billion over the next 35 years.

In January, 2005 Shell Oil Co. agreed to pay all cleanup costs necessary to remediate contamination caused by leaking under ground storage tanks at 184 gas stations in Orange County, California. British Petroleum, which acquired Atlantic Richfield has cleaned up 10 of 60 gas stations where contamination has occurred.

In January, 2005 Weyerhaeuser agreed to remediate contamination at a mill and a landfill near the Kalamazoo River, Michigan. The landfill reportedly contains hundreds of thousands of pounds of chemicals.

In February, 2005 Allegheny Ludlum Corporation agreed to pay $2.4 million to settle a Clean Water Act lawsuit filed by the State of Pennsylvania which alleged that in the 1990s the steelmaker dumped acids and waste into Pennsylvania rivers. Litigation continued for nine years.

In January, 2005 the Government Accounting Office reported there was between 450,000 and 1,000,000 brownfield sites in America. New York City contains approximately 6,000 properties designated as brownfield sites.

In March, 2005 the Environmental Protection Agency announced over 300,000 sites with leaking under ground storage tanks have been remediated over the past 20 years. Some 130,000 leaking under ground storage tanks still need to be cleaned up and 4 out of every 10 under ground storage tanks remain out of compliance with regulations.

In May, 2005 Kinder Morgan Energy Partners has plead guilty to failure to promptly report an oil spill from one of its 14 inch pipelines to California state regulators. The company waited 18 hours to report the spill which dumped 123,774 gallons of oil into wetlands near San Francisco Bay in April 2004. The state's Attorney General stated that "the company has sort of brushed off civil penalties in the past and thought they were just the cost of doing business." In May 2007 Kinder Morgan Energy Partners paid $5.3 million to settle charges addressing the April 2004 spill at the Suisun Marsh in Solano County, the February 2005 76,902 gallon-spill at Oakland Inner Harbor in Alameda, and the April 2005 300 gallon-spill into Summit Creek that impacted waters in the pristine Donner Lake watershed in the Sierra Nevada Range in Placer County. The spills, on Kinder Morgan’s 3,000-mile Pacific Operations Unit pipeline system, discharged a combined 200,976 gallons of diesel fuel, jet fuel and gasoline into waters, sensitive ecosystems, and impacted endangered and other species, habitat and commercial uses.

In July, 2005 the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board has ordered Micro Matic USA draft beer equipment maker to cleanup up ground water contamination emanating from its Northridge, California facility. A perchloroethylene, tetrachloroethylene or PCE plume runs beneath the facility and under area homes. Levels of PCE have been measured at more than 300 times levels considered safe for drinking water. The company has operated the facility for nearly 50 years.

In August, 2005 a Wisconsin circuit court judge fined home improvement retailer Menard Inc. $2,025,000 for discharging pollutants from one of its distribution centers into a maintenance shop drain contaminating the Chippewa River. Regulators alleged that employees disposed of solvents, cleansers, oils and other pollutants by pouring them into the shop drain.

In September, 2005 eleven California companies will pay $8.2 million to settle their liability for the cleanup of volatile organic compounds contaminating ground water beneath the city of Industry and portions of La Puente and Walnut. The firms used solvents for degreasing operations. The settling defendants include: Acorn Engineering Co., Aerosol Services Co. Inc., GOE Engineering Co., Hexcel Corp., Lansco Die Casting Inc., Herring Investments LLC, Somitex Prints of California Inc., Union Pacific Railroad, and Utility Trailer Manufacturing Co. Over 30 square miles of ground water beneath the San Gabriel Valley may be contaminated.

In October, 2005 the Environmental Protection Agency approved a $29 million cleanup plan for the Solvents Recovery Service of New England Superfund site in Southington. The company disposed of millions of gallons of solvents and oil from 1955 and 1991 by dumping them into lagoons and leach fields. The site is some 500 feet from the Quinnipiac River. Ground water beneath the site is contaminated with acetone, toluene and other volatile organic compounds. The soil at the site is contaminated with lead, cadmium and PCBs.

A December 21, 2005 study by the nonprofit research organization Environmental Working Group (EWG), which involved a review of two years worth of information on tap water gathered by regulators in 42 states, found 141 contaminants for which there are no enforceable health standards. Nineteen of these contaminants were found in levels that exceeded the Environmental Protection Agency's unenforced safety guidelines for water utilities serving 10,000 people or more. Contaminants included gasoline additive MTBE, rocket fuel component perchlorate and several industrial solvents. According to the study, the top 10 states with the most contaminants in their drinking water were: California, Wisconsin, Arizona, Florida, North Carolina, Texas, New York, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Illinois. The study also found 119 contaminants for which enforceable heath standards exist including nitrates, arsenic and barium. According to the Environmental Working Group, the contaminated tap water is used by over one hundred million people in the 42 states.

In January, 2006 it was learned the remediation of contaminants at and from the former Anaconda copper mine in Nevada will cost between $100 million and $1 billion.

the ocean

In 1989 Exxon Valdez ran aground in Prince William Sound spilling 10.8 million gallons of oil. Animals killed include 250,000 sea birds, 2,800 sea otters, 300 harbor seals, 250 bald eagles, 22 orcas and millions of salmon and herring. In 1994 Exxon was fined $5 billion in civil court as punitive damages. Punitive damages overturned on appeal in 2007. For the quarter ending September 30, 2007 Exxon posted a profit of $9.4 billion.

In 1999 an oil tanker, New Carissa owned by Green Atlas Shipping and operated by TMM Co. Ltd ran aground off the Oregon coast. At the time of the grounding the vessel was empty of cargo, but contained 359,000 gallons of heavy fuel oil in six tanks and 37,400 gallons of diesel oil in one tank. 200,000 gallons of oil, roughly half, were consumed in the fire lite for that purpose. 130,000 gallons of oil remained in the bow section after the burn was sunk in over 10,000 feet of water 282 miles west of Waldport.

On August 4, 2001, a fishing vessel sank in Prince William Sound, Alaska releasing 35,000 gallons of diesel fuel into the sound. Cleanup efforts tapered off after recovering 11,000 gallons.

In January, 2003 oil from the sunken tanker Prestige, which sank on November 19, 2002 off the Spanish coast, is still leaking about 80 tons of oil each day. About 53,000 tons of oil remain in the ship.

In April 2003 Los Angeles admitted liability for over 3,670 sewage spills over the past decade.

In the summer of 2004 a huge "dead zone" of waters so devoid of oxygen that sea life could not live in it spread across 5,800 square miles of the Gulf of Mexico in what has become an annual occurrence caused by pollution. The "dead zone" extended from the mouth of the Mississippi River in southeastern Louisiana 250 miles west to near the Texas border and has been closer to shore than usual because of winds and currents.

August 7, 2004 Connecticut shipping company, the OMI Corp. was fined $4.2 million after pleading guilty to dumping thousands of gallons of waste oil and sludge into the sea.

August 13, 2004 ConocoPhillips will pay $485,000 in fines for Clean Water Act violations arising from a natural gas platform in Alaska's Cook Inlet. 470 violations occurring between 1999 and 2004, mostly consisting of the dumping of raw sewage into the inlet.

In the late spring of 2005 a 'red' tide of plankton caused the unprecedented closure of shell fish fisheries along the coast of New England.

In the winter of 2005 was a shell disease that had struck over 30% of New England lobsters. Researchers believe that higher ocean temperatures have caused nearly a third of New England lobsters to be inedible.

Ocean fisheries had dropped to 10 percent of their 1950 levels by 2005. This had been attributed to over fishing which has indeed occured.

In the fall of 2005 it was revealed that the American military had used the ocean, up until 1970, as a dump for toxic waste. The army, alone, admitted dumping 64 million pounds of nerve agents and mustard gas, 400,000 chemical filled bombs, and 500 tons of radioactive toxic waste off the east, gulf and west coasts of America as well as around Hawaii and off the coast of Alaska.

The nerve agents, radioactive toxic waste and other toxic chemical agents could pose a hazard for generations.

The impact of the chemical dumping has never been studied. Few scientists knew it was done, so studies of the decline in sea life have never focused on the possibility of leaking chemical weapons.

In the summer of 2006 tropical fish were sighted of the coast of New England.

As of 2006 150 "dead zones" have been identified in the oceans across the face of the Earth, 90% of the large fish species have disappeared from the oceans in the last 50 years, 97% of the elkhorn and staghorn coral off the coast of Florida has disappeared since 1975, 75% of the kelp forests off the Southern California coast have vansihed in the last 50 years and 650 gray whales have washed up dead or dying along the West Coast in the past seven years.

The dead zone in at the mouth of the Mississippi River just keeps expanding. In the summer of 2003 the dead zone was estimated to be between 4,770 and 6,900 square miles. In the summer of 2007 the dead zone had expanded to 8500 square miles.

In October 2007 British Petroleum agreed to pay $20 million in fines for pipeline leaks and spills into Alaska Prudhoe Bay.

In 2008 405 dead zones, caused by chemical fertilizers, were identified. The size of dead zones have roughly doubled every decade since 1960.

Exxon Mobil Corporation was fined $2.64 million in August 2008 for improperly handling and disposing of polychlorinated biphenyls ("PCBs") on an offshore oil and gas platform in the Santa Barbara Channel.

"There is growing consensus within the scientific community that increasing carbon dioxide levels will lead to acidification in the ocean, inhibiting the ability of small animals such as coral, mollusks and some forms of plankton to form their shells. These creatures are at the bottom of the oceanic food chain. If they disappear, the oceanic food chain collapses." - James Friedson

"In the oceans pH is a relatively constant property, and it has not changed over time scales of hundreds of thousands of years. The pH changes that are occurring in the oceans today are truly extraordinary." - Joan Kleypas, scientist National Center for Atmospheric Research.

Scientists estimate that between 1800 and 1994 118 billion metric tons of carbon has caused naturally alkaline oceans to become more acidic.

The State of California came up with $33 million to offset private costs associated with the dismal 2006 salmon fishing season. In 2006 one tenth of past normal salmon catches was made.

There are those that shrug off the impending death of oceans as "no problem". This group believes that the dearth of schools of fish is "not a problem" because "we can always farm fish." In November 2007 the lack of predators in the ocean made a lasting impact on Northern Ireland's only salmon farm. A swarm of jelly fish 35 feet deep attacked salmon penned in nets off the Glens of Antrium killing the entire farmed population worth $2 million. The jellyfish, Pelagia nocticula, is best known for terrorizing bathers in the Mediterranean Sea.

"It was unprecedented, absolutely amazing. The sea was red with jellyfish, and there was nothing we could do about it, absolutely nothing." - John Russell, fish farm managing director

In December 2007 Canadian researchers efforts to revive wild salmon populations that were exposed to sea lice infestations of farmed salmon appear to be failing. Even though the wild fishery has been closed exposed wild salmon populations are depressed and declining quickly due to sea lice infestations.

In a 337 page federal fisheries report issued in 2008 overwhelming evidence showed that the pesticides malathion, diazinon and chloripyrifos interfere with the ability of salmon to find food, reproduce and swim. The continued unfettered use of malathion, diazinon and chloripyrifos by farmers "jeopardized the continued existence" of salmon off the Pacific coast of California, Oregon and Washington.

Heal the Ocean

Heal the Bay

Blue Frontier Campaign

Power of Imagination

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This website defines a new religious ideology to which its author adheres. The author feels that the falsification of reality outside personal experience has created a populace unable to discern propaganda from reality and that this has been done purposefully by an international corporate cartel through their agents who wish to foist a corrupt version of reality on the human race. Religious intolerance occurs when any group refuses to tolerate religious practices, religious beliefs or persons due to their religious ideology. This web site marks the founding of the religion aptly named The Truth of the Way of Life - a rational religion based on reason which requires no leap of faith, accepts no tithes, has no supreme leader, no church buildings and in which each and every individual is encouraged to develop a personal relation with God through the pursuit of the knowledge of reality in the hope of curing the spiritual corruption that has enveloped the human spirit. The tenets of The Truth of the Way of Life are spelled out in detail on this web site by the author. Violent acts against individuals due to their religious beliefs in America is considered a “hate crime.”

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American social mores and values have declined precipitously over the last century as the corrupt international cartel has garnered more and more power. This power rests in the ability to deceive the populace in general through mass media by pressing emotional buttons which have been preprogrammed into the population through prior mass media psychological operations. The results have been the destruction of the family and the destruction of social structures that do not adhere to the corrupt international elites vision of a perfect world. Through distraction and coercion the direction of thought of the bulk of the population has been directed toward solutions proposed by the corrupt international elite that further consolidates their power and which further their purposes.

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