Wow, Conventional Milk makes Twins!

Byoliveridley

44m.jpgHoly tentacular twins, Batman! This is crazy news, the first study linking the incidence of twins with environmental factors. The culprit is growth hormone fed to cows to increase milk production. According to this Wikipedia article, a third of all dairy cattle use Monsanto’s rBGH (or rBST) brand Posilac®, so obviously, use is widespread.

FEED – July 2006 (from the Union of Concerned Scientists)

1. Engineered hormone in milk may be linked to twinning. A recent study found that women who consumed dairy products were five times more likely to give birth to twins than vegan women. The study suggested that the use of engineered bovine growth hormone/bovine somatotropin (BGH/BST) to boost milk production in dairy cows may be related to the higher level of twinning. BGH is known to increase twinning in dairy cows. In addition, the rate of human twinning is twice as high in the United States, where BGH is used, as in Britain, where BGH is banned. BGH affects twinning rate by increasing insulin-like growth factor (IGF), a protein produced in the milk of both animals and humans, that promotes ovulation and may help early-stage embryos survive. A separate study found that levels of IGF were 13 percent lower in vegan women than in women who consumed dairy products. Read a press release about the study, which was published in The Journal of Reproductive Medicine.

If true, no woman should ever drink “conventional” milk (non-organic, non rGBH free, etc). Twins are fun, I love my twin nieces very much, but they are much more difficult to carry and deliver, and there are more complications.

Scary, but I suspect this is the tip of the iceberg as far as environmental effects on childbirth are concerned.

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ED is not just Erectile Dysfunction.

Byoliveridley

The grist features a must read post on endocrine disruption (ED). Great first paragraph, BTW, but read the whole thing. Before Viagra, had any one other than doctors and the unfortunate masses suffering such dysfunction ever heard of erectile dysfunction? The effects of direct to consumer drug marketing of diseases and disorders is the subject of other posts, but this one’s about endocrine disruptors!

Side note, Erectile dysfunction has 2.3 million hits in google, Endocrine Disruption (or disruptors) has 1.7 million, so, at least google is catching up!

The ED you should really be worried about: Endocrine disruption | Gristmill: The environmental news blog | Grist

What a crazy world we live in when almost everyone knows what the acronym ED stands for. Millions of dollars have been poured into creating awareness of ED, erectile dysfunction, because it is profitable. This 21st-century sales-pitch strategy — “disease mongering” — has proven to be good for the bottom line. The irony of all this is that there is another ED out there into which millions have also been poured — to keep it a secret. That ED is endocrine disruption, and if the public were to learn about it, bottom lines could shrink instead of grow.

Endocrine disruption should be right at the top of the list of most critical technological disasters facing the world today, up with climate change. With little notice, vast volumes and combinations of synthetic chemicals have settled in every environment in the world, including the womb environment. Synthetic chemicals at very low concentrations in the womb change how genes are programmed, cells develop, tissues form, and organs function, and thus undermine the potential and survival of developing animals, including humans. The chemicals threatening the integrity of future generations are derived from the processing of crude oil and natural gas, the same processes that are driving climate change. This is an integral part of the climate change story.

Organic, Schmorganic, who cares!

Byoliveridley

That’s what the USDA is saying, anyway.

USDA may relax standards for organic foods – Los Angeles Times

With the “USDA organic” seal stamped on its label, Anheuser-Busch calls its Wild Hop Lager “the perfect organic experience.” “In today’s world of artificial flavors, preservatives and factory farming, knowing what goes into what you eat and drink can just about drive you crazy,” the Wild Hop website says. “That’s why we have decided to go back to basics and do things the way they were meant to be … naturally.” But many beer drinkers may not know that Anheuser-Busch has the organic blessing from federal regulators even though Wild Hop Lager uses hops grown with chemical fertilizers and sprayed with pesticides. A deadline of midnight Friday to come up with a new list of nonorganic ingredients allowed in USDA-certified organic products passed without action from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, leaving uncertain whether some foods currently labeled “USDA organic” would continue to be produced.

Whatever you think about the virtues of organic food, this amounts to dilution of the label, misleading labeling, almost amounting to adulteration favoring the big boys at Anheuser-Busch and General Mills, ADM, etc. Knowing fully well that the average consumer has no time to read every frigging label behind every food item, knowing that they would see the “organic” label and assume that the whole thing is organic.

The USDA rules come with what appears to be an important consumer
protection: Manufacturers can use nonorganic ingredients only if
organic versions are not “commercially available.”

But food makers have found a way around this barrier, in part because
the USDA doesn’t enforce the rule directly. Instead, it depends on its
certifying agents — 96 licensed organizations in the U.S. and overseas
— to decide for themselves what it means for a product to be available
in organic form.

Despite years of discussion, the USDA has yet to provide certifiers with standardized guidelines for enforcing this rule.

Ah, good old ill-defined “voluntary enforcement” mechanisms, we all know how that works!
Why not have a second label “mostly organic”!! How about “I can’t believe this is organic!!”.

I think “mostly organic” food is still better than conventional factory food, but it should be labeled as such so the consumer can understand why General Mills “organic cereal” is 2 bucks  less expensive than your average small organic manufacturer’s cereal. Absent honesty in labeling, the average customer is apt to assume that the factory approach is always superior because it produces the same goods at lower prices, instead of coming to the correct conclusion that the factory producers constantly rig the game to their benefit.

Value a forest, cool a planet

Byoliveridley

Cutting forests is the third-largest source of climate-warming carbon emissions today, larger than the emissions produced by either the US or China. Including them in a "carbon market" is a tempting solution.

It comes down to this: Today, trees are worth more dead than alive. This despite the fact that they stash away billions of tons of carbon in their soil and themselves and constantly inhale more carbon from the atmosphere. They also help regulate the earth's climate in other ways, influencing rainfall patterns far away, including in the US. And they contain unique plant and animal life, the economic value of which is only beginning to be understood.

Yet no dollar figure is placed on these vital services. Instead, tropical forests are cut down in favor of enterprises such as palm oil plantations or cattle grazing, endeavours that make money here and now. It’s easy to see why rain forests continue to disappear at an alarming rate.

A report to the British government this month suggests that the way to recognize the true value of forests is by including them in carbon markets. Polluters around the world could earn credits to offset their own carbon emissions by paying for forest preservation.

via Value a forest, cool a planet | csmonitor.com

A carbon sink needs to be valued as much as a carbon source. Making this really happen is of course very difficult, needing accurate forest cover mappings (now available), and strict enforcement in countries that may be hard to monitor.

The moral hazard of giving people money to do “nothing” of course is something conservatives will not like, but the trees are not doing “nothing”. Paying people for stewardship is not wrong. There would be an opportunity to change an extractive subsistence based economy into a service economy, with sustainable tourism, shade grown coffee, local guards and forest officers, etc.

I like this idea very much. Carbon offset markets have gotten a bad name recently, but a larger scale program is necessary.

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Sea Turtle News o' the day – Global warming edition

Byoliveridley

ScienceDaily: Scientists Warn Of Climate Change Risk To Marine Turtles

North American marine turtles are at risk if global warming occurs at predicted levels, according to scientists from the University of Exeter. An increase in temperatures of just one degree Celsius could completely eliminate the birth of male turtles from some beaches. A rise of three degrees Celsius would lead to extreme levels of infant mortality and declines in nesting beaches across the USA.

Here’s the paper.

Like a lot of other reptiles, the sex of the hatchling is dependent on nest temperature. Warmer temperatures make female turtles (my mnemonic was hot females!), and even warmer temperatures just kill the eggs. But, I wonder if the turtles would adapt by nesting a little earlier. I don’t think it is yet clear when turtles decide to nest. If it is based on sea temperature, then they would eventually figure it out. This paper from 2004 appears to conclude that loggerheads in Florida do nest earlier than before, so there is hope.

John F. Weishampel, Dean A. Bagley, Llewellyn M. Ehrhart (2004) Earlier nesting by loggerhead sea turtles following sea surface warming Global Change Biology 10 (8), 1424–1427

The onset of spring, noted by the timing of wildlife migratory and breeding behaviors, has been occurring earlier over the past few decades. Here, we examine 15 years of loggerhead sea turtle, Caretta caretta, nesting patterns along a 40.5 km beach on Florida’s Atlantic coast. This small section of beach is considered to be the most important nesting area for this threatened species in the western hemisphere. From 1989 to 2003, the annual number of nests fluctuated between 13 000 and 25 000 without a conspicuous trend; however, based on a regression analysis, the median nesting date became earlier by roughly 10 days. The Julian day of median nesting was significantly correlated with near-shore, May sea surface temperatures that warmed an average of 0.8°C over this period. This marine example from warm temperate/subtropical waters represents another response of nature to recent climate trends.

So the truth lies somewhere between easy adaptation and giant swarms of frustrated female turtles!

Canada and Greenhouse Gases – Epic Fail

Byoliveridley

Canada’s greenhouse emissions soaring: UN report

The figures are based on the 2009 national inventory report that Environment Canada quietly filed last week with the United Nations to meet its international reporting obligations. The full 673-page inventory is available on the UN’s website and shows Canada has the dubious distinction of having its emissions climb more since 1990 than any other G8 nation.

Canada ranks “first among the G8 nations” for increasing emissions, the report notes, even though Canada had committed to cut them. It notes that while Canada’s emissions have soared, Germany chopped its emissions by 18 per cent between 1990 and 2006, and the United Kingdom slashed its by 15 per cent.

Hey, we’re first in the G8 in something! The increase was driven primarily by increasing Tar Sands emissions thanks to the oil boom. Cars and coal also contributed.

Krugman takes on Climate Change Economics

Byoliveridley

Paul Krugman takes on climate change economics, just read the whole damn thing, but I will summarize so you don’t have to wade through 8 pages.

In what follows, I will offer a brief survey of the economics of climate change or, more precisely, the economics of lessening climate change. I’ll try to lay out the areas of broad agreement as well as those that remain in major dispute. First, though, a primer in the basic economics of environmental protection.

Magazine Preview – Climate Change – Building a Green Economy – NYTimes.com.

First off, it is well written, aimed at simplifying the economics of pollution so most people can understand, what you’d expect from him!

  1. Basic Economics and how externalities work, and why free markets alone will never solve moral problems of reducing pollution, or providing health care
  2. How the work of Pigou, a 1920s economist is the basis of all all environmental economics, with a small sidetrack on rabbits! This is well written, it captures the essence of what needs to be done with pollution – Simple prohibition is not enough, imposing a fair cost on the pollution works much better
  3. What are command and control, cap and trade, carbon taxes, and what they do. Krugman prefers cap and trade approaches where there is certainty on the pollution. But he stresses (and this is very important) that it is essential to put additional control elements in place, for example, fuel efficiency requirements for cars in addition to just carbon costs, or severe limits on coal fired power plants
  4. He talks about developed, and developing countries, and how to handle increasing emissions in China, India, etc. He postulates a combined carrot and stick policy, where China and India can trade emission permits with the rich countries. His contention is that since the Chinese economy is less efficient, the costs of cutting pollution in China are likely to be a lot lower. The stick involves the imposition of carbon tariffs on imported goods to Europe and the US if China does not play ball. So, the rich countries pass money to the poorer countries to reduce emissions, but impose taxes if they don’t
  5. He thinks that carbon costs should increase quickly rather than slowly
  6. He compares the costs of action to the costs of inaction, no surprise that the costs of inaction are orders of magnitude larger than the costs of action.

Of course, he ends with the caveat that the political will to do this is going to be sorely lacking.

What do I think? While it pretty much encapsulates what I think of as the big picture approach, Krugman hand waves around the many personal changes in consumption, land use, urbanization, localization that all have to occur. All of that is included in “additional command control based changes”. I don’t necessarily believe in Homo Economicus, the rational human who responds to economic incentives. So we will have to, as citizens, agitate forcefully for local actions that set us in the western world up for reduced consumption and increased efficiency. In addition, we have to simultaneously support national level politicians that are serious about climate change and punish the ones that are not, so they can help enact the right national and trans-national policies.

Anyway, all in all, an excellent read.

2 Comments

  1. Cool, one more thing that I can safely do that a woman. Or wait….does it make a difference if a man drinks the milk and then … you know… does the happy? Dang!

    I’m lactose intolerant anyway, like over 90% of South Indians. I’m glad to just not throw up. I like my coffee without cream, thank you.

  2. Nope, it\’s all on the woman\’s side! Of course, this is not why milk plays such a prominent role in Tamil movies (\”first night\”, anyone!), most Indian milk is hormone free, hormones being a little too expensive.

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