Category: Environment

Categories
Activism Environment

[505] Of Earth Week on campus

Earth Week is here baby. Below is the list of what’s going on, on campus.

Schedule of events:

MONDAY march 28
1.)fair trade coffee at residential dining services all week…

TUESDAY march 29
2.)the beehive collective “plan columbia” 7pm in wolverine room, union

Front

WEDNESDAY march 30
1.)Diag Day – music, info, freebies 11-4pm
2.)Dining Hall Sustainable Lunch – organic & local foods featured
3.)movie: “The Price of Health” – 7:30pm ERB institute, Ross B-school E1550
4.)Transformer’s green business tour – Leopold’s 7pm 523 s. main
5.)2nd annual hunger banquet – 6:00-8:30 in the wedge room, west quad. $1 dinner

THURSDAY march 31
1.)!!keynote address by Winona LaDuke!!, 1996 & 2000 Green Party VP Candidate,
Native American author & activist – SNRE Dana Building 1040 7pm

FRIDAY April 1
1.)movie: �the take� 8pm fair trade apparel conference at school of social
work, education conference center

SATURDAY april 2
1.)The Detroit Project – service day! register www.umich.edu/~thedp
2.)North Campus Woods Conservation – Invasive Species Removal Project. contact
3.)PitE student organizer Tony Shourds tshourds@umich.edu

SUNDAY April 3
1.) Showing of “Oil on Ice” and “Being Caribou” at the Banff Film Festival

SATURDAY april 9
1.)Hands on the Planet – service day! register www.umich.edu/~mserve
2.)Environmental Justice Toxic Tour of Detroit – register tyogawa@umich.edu
3.)North Campus Woods Conservation – contact tshourds@umich.edu

On Wednesday, which is tomorrow, Environmental Justice along with other greenies will be camping at the Diag. If you are passing by the Diag tomorrow, make sure you go to the EJ table and put your signature down on a poster that says “Thank You RDS for serving Fair Trade Coffee!”

The poster is a way to thank the University’s dining services for serving fair trade coffee for the rest of the week in honor of Earth Week. The people in EJ (me included, ehem) made the posters.

On April 3rd, Oil on Ice will be shown. Oil on Ice is an award-winning documentary about Arctic Wildlife National Reserve. If you haven’t heard, the Senate is planning to pass a bill to drill AWNR soon. This is a good opportunity to be educated on the ANWR issue.

Happy Earth Week people.

Categories
ASEAN Environment

[504] Of here we go again, but pray not

I woke up, went to ReCom.org and read a thread about a new quake off Sumatra with 8.2 magnitude on Richter scale. As in right now, tsunami alert has been sounded. However, three hours after the quake was first discovered, no tsunami has been detected yet.

On the blogosphere, to show how strong the quake is, lots have reported that even Malaysians felt the tremor.

Categories
Economics Environment Personal

[501] Of St. Patrick Day 2005

St. Patrick Day is the day when everybody:
1. pretends its holidays
2. pretends its spring
3. pretends everybody is above 21

Climate change has possibly made sure that pretending one of the above is harder – I woke up just now and I saw a number for tiny vengeful white flakes invading the cursed Ann Arbor. Heck, as if seeing the disgusting weather with my own eyes is not enough, on the internet, winter storm watch for the Midwest has been issued.

Anybody willing to check when was the latest snowfall each year for the last 100 years for Ann Arbor?

Though I know some econometrics, I’m just too lazy to analyze them. If you want to do it, some sites to look at are the NOAA and the pioneer of online weather report at the University of Michigan Weather. The zipcode for Ann Arbor is 48109 and its location is longitude 83 deg, 43 mins and lagitude of 42 deg, 18 mins. North and west of course.

p/s – somehow, I remember, it snowed in April too. Maybe it’s not too unnatural.

Categories
Economics Environment Politics & government

[500] Of from the plain to the marshes

So, the bid to remove the ANWR provision from the budget has predictably failed by a small margin. The Senate voted 51-49 to reject the amendment. With this, the probability of seeing ANWR being drilled is higher than any other time the drilling idea has reached the floor. The shroud of the dark side has fallen, begun the clone wars has. Er, I mean, er, – actually this ANWR scuffle has been dubbed the first political battle of the year. And Star Wars latest trailer is goddamn sexy though was out a week ago.

And the left is losing badly though the vote will be slim. (Cough) But it’s not so bad. Looking at history, the left loves losing actually.

Official result can be read from the Senate website. Creek Running North has a short entry on who voted what.

Half way around the world, the New York Times has reported earlier last week that progress is being made by conservationist in the Tigris-Eupharates marshes that were devastated by Saddam Hussein. I’m unable to provide the link since it has been archived. However, and fortunately, Google provides an excellent search. For background on the story, read some of my earlier entry and also the enlightening Laputan Logic.

In Malaysia, the ones that are responsible for the environmental destruction near a nature reserve – the ones in the government – has gotten away. Instead, some of the the developers, are being charged. While it’s good to see action is being taken, sadly, the target should be the ones that approved the irresponsble projects, not the ones that conducted the project. But then, again, in Malaysia, priority means nothing. Hey, we will have the biggest courthouse in the world but not the best judiciary system in the world.

p/s – update on Coke campaign. Some student entity from outside Michigan and other schools (Canada… eh?) has contacted the people in Michigan about solidarity and cooperation when Coke is concerned. And some has somewhat called for a North America anti-Coke coalition.

Plus, the College Democrats has jumped onto the bandwagon. The Republicans, I’d imagine, would love to be on the other side. And the official color for this campaign should be green instead of red. Red looks like too commie.

Categories
Economics Environment Politics & government

[499] Of losing the battle

John Kerry offers to strip the drilling proposal from the budget (via). I don’t think Kerry’s suggestion will work, unfortunately.

The Republicans are shrewd to attach the drilling proposal along with the budget. Because of such arrangement, it would only take a simple majority to pass the drilling bill. At the same time, the Republicans are controlling the House.

Alternative Hippopotamus aptly describes the situation for ANWR. The real quote however is:

It would take a miracle to get you out of Casablanca and the Germans have outlawed miracles.

The hippo is right; it would take a miracle to prevent drilling and time to resist is running out. ANWR’s only hope to be left undisturbed is the word no from rational Republican representatives that understand that, as John Kerry has stated during the 2004 Presidential campaign, we can’t drill our way out of this energy crisis.

After more than two decades of fighting, it all comes down to here and now. And the future looks grim.