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Change brewing in organic wine labeling
When organic standards went mainstream under the USDA, many of those who are most passionate about organic farming were outraged. The USDA isn't known for making flexible rules or for concerning itself with sustainability.
To wit: Because preservatives were verboten in most organic foods, the USDA also forbade the addition of sulfites to any wines earning the organic label.
The choice preempted the development of any serious organic wine industry. It's really, really hard to make good wine without sulfites, which stop fermentation at the desired point and keep fruit flavors bright.
California winemakers — many of whom are very serious about sustainability — have adapted in a number of ways. Some label their wine as "made with organic grapes," but find that label lackluster.
Others have gone with more woo-woo philosophies, such as biodynamics, that gave birth to the organic movement in the first place. The California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance has developed its own seal, which embraces a variety of approaches. (Find a list of wines earning that seal here.)
The result of the multi-pronged approach, however, is a confused consumer.
But some green vintners — including Paul Dolan, pictured, a pioneer of organic grape growing — are now pushing the USDA to allow sulfites in wine labeled organic.
I've heard from people who've worked with wine that sulfites are, in fact, nasty stuff, but only a tiny amount is used per gallon of wine. Nor are they the source of most wine allergies — and, as their advocates point out, allergies are not part of the organic criteria.
What do you think? Should added sulfites be allowed in organic wines?
| January 07 2011 at 01:32 PM
Obesity caused by what you breathe?
Diabetes. Asthma. Obesity. All are on the rise. What if they're all caused by the same thing?
Courtesy The Ohio State University
At least one study found that air pollution — known to contribute to asthma — also spurs both obesity and diabetes in young mice, suggesting that it may also contribute to the ubiquitous problems in humans.
Ohio State researchers found that young mice exposed to air pollution had larger and more fat cells in their abdominal area and higher blood sugar levels than mice eating the same diet but breathing clean air.
According to Dr. Quinhua Sun, associate professor of environmental health sciences at Ohio State University and lead author of the study, his is "one of the first, if not the first, study to show that these fine particulates directly cause inflammation and changes in fat cells, both of which increase the risk for Type 2 diabetes."
Another recent study even suggests that air pollution may be behind that other epidemic: autism. Researchers from Saban Research Institute of Children's Hospital Los Angeles calculated that children living within 1,000 feet of a freeway had twice the risk of autism as those who didn't.
The body of evidence is still small, but so many studies link air pollution with so many diseases that it's clear it's time to get serious about it. Fortunately, most predict that California's new cap-and-trade program will reduce particulate pollution in addition to greenhouse gas pollution.
| December 29 2010 at 12:57 PM
It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a flying wind turbine!
A new generation of renewable energy entrepreneurs are developing turbines to harness the wind in the upper layers of the atmosphere, where some believe as much as 870 terawatts (or 87 trillion watts) of energy lurks. The question is how bring it back down to Earth.
Courtesy Makani Power
NASA aerospace engineer Mark Moore has proposed tethering floating turbines with nanotube cables that would double as transmission wires.
But that's just one idea in the ascendant industry, and Moore has won a the first-ever federal grant to evaluate airborne wind generation. He will study all the proposals private companies have begun to float, such as Italian startup TWIND's paired balloons with sails attached and Alameda-based Makini Power's glider wing concept (pictured). "We're trying to create a level playing field of understanding," explains Moore, "where all of the concepts and approaches can be compared."
However it works, every tethered turbine would require a swath of no-fly zone around it, something the airline industry would surely resist. Moore will look into the possibility of flying the turbines above the ocean, which would minimize competition for air space but increase the difficulty of getting the energy to where it's needed. Because the questions surrounding airborne wind power generation are so big and so global, it's great to see the government open up the funding tap.
| December 27 2010 at 03:03 PM
WikiLeaks suggest Chevron sought illegal oil deal with Tehran
Despite the U.S.'s aggressive support for sanctions on Iran, cables leaked as part of the WikiLeaks dump suggest that local company Chevron sought to establish an oilfield straddling Iraq's border with the enemy state.
The revelation comes in a cable reporting that Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki asked the U.S. for guidance on participating in such a deal with a U.S. company, given the sanctions.
According to the Guardian, "Chevron declined to either confirm or deny that it had been in contact with Iran, and confined its reaction to a statement saying it had not done, and would not do, anything in violation of U.S. law."
However, sanctions against Iran would appear to specifically prohibit engaging in such lucrative deals with Iran.
As Glenn Beck might say if he weren't a pro-industry conservative: Chevron. Tehran. Hear the connection?
Back on Earth, it's just another tick in the column that says reliance on oil undermines our national security, and it's a red herring to distinguish between oil that comes from friendly states — like Iraq or, you know, California — with oil that comes from countries that make their living sowing hatred for the U.S.
| December 21 2010 at 12:09 PM
Chromium 6: It's in the water again
The more things change, the more they stay the same. So it seems with regard to Erin Brokovich's exposure PG&E;'s contamination of Hinkley, California's drinking water with the cancer-causing chromium 6.
The movie's old news, but a plume contaminating groundwater with the probable carcinogen is currently expanding, forcing PG&E; to offer to buy residents' homes.
And it turns out that chromium 6 (also known as hexavalent chromium) was found in 31 U.S. cities' water supplies in a sampling of 35 cities. Among them, and in order of the severity of the contamination, are Riverside, San Jose, and Sacramento, California.
California has proposed a safe level of of .06 parts per billion, a limit that 25 of the city water supplies — including all of those in California — exceeded.
Industrial use of chromium 6 has dwindled since the Erin Brokovich's time, and, as a strange footnote that shows how difficult it is to conclusively tie a contaminant with specific health effects, later studies have suggested that there is no cancer cluster in Hinkley.
Even so, I'm certainly going to stay tuned to see if the next round of tests includes San Francisco.
| December 20 2010 at 03:26 PM
Mom: "I want McDonald's to stop interfering with my family"
Yesterday, California mom Monet Parham teamed up with the Center for Science in the Public Interest to sue McDonald's for marketing to children via the Happy Meal. The lawsuit is seeking Class Action status and, if successful, would bar the fast food giant from offering the Happy Meal.
Parham explains that her daughter, previously content to visit the Golden Arches once a month, became obsessed with going every week in order to collect the full set of Shrek toys offered in Happy Meals.
"This doesn't stop with one request," Parham noted. "It's truly a litany of requests."
The lawsuit basically claims that McDonald's, by "getting into her kids' heads without my permission," forced her to spend money there, creating "injury in fact." The more compelling part of the suit alleges that use of toys to market Happy Meals is illegal because it uses marketing tricks on children who do not have the "cognitive skills and the developmental maturity to understand the persuasive intent of marketing and advertising. Thus, McDonald's advertising featuring toys to bait children violates California law because it is inherently deceptive and unfair," the suit reads.
Given that other world-class marketers like Coca-Cola view marketing as so inherently deceptive that they claim that any reasonable adult would not expect a product named vitaminwater to be healthful, it's hard not to agree that it shouldn't be deployed against children who can't be expected to understand that, in an advertisement, up means down and healthy means junk.
The suit was deliberately filed in San Francisco, rather than in Sacramento where Parham lives, because the city has banned toys in meals containing more than 600 calories.
Its chances of success seem, err, slim — of course, so did the McLibel lawsuit's in its early stages — but you've got to give Parham credit for tapping into the family values meme. Apparently, she's no stranger to marketing tactics.
But in other San Francisco anti-fast food news, a local team has advanced to the finals in a national competition to reinvent fast food. Rather than burgers, the team of David Gumbiner, Deb Meisel and Ian Sherman propose pad thai.
| December 16 2010 at 02:15 PM
Chevron gets 30-year lease in Santa Monica Bay
This past Friday, Chevron scored a 30-year lease renewal for its offshore marine terminal near El Segundo over environmentalists' objections and despite an environmental review that cited "a reasonable possibility that operation of the Marine Terminal offshore loading facilities during the 30-year lease period will cause an oil spill."
Environmental groups argue that open-water terminals — where tankers pump their oil into pipes leading to refineries — are "more susceptible to spills and harder to clean up" than those at port, as Santa Monica Baykeeper marine programs manager Brian Meux put it. Baykeeper and other groups say that the open-water facilities should be phased out in favor of new terminals at the Port of Los Angeles, which would have the additional benefit of safeguarding the Santa Monica Bay.
"Clearly, Santa Monica Bay is an important asset for the region," acknowledged Chevron public affairs manager Rod Spackman. "We understand that in the same way that the environmental community does. But that shouldn't mean that we should not be able to continue to operate there under the most rigorous standards.... That would be unfair, given our track record."
But would it? According to Rainforest Action Network, which is leading a corporate social responsibility campaign against Chevron, in the week prior to getting its marathon lease, Chevron experienced no fewer than three spills: Chevron's Richmond refinery spilled 1,300 barrels; a Chevron pipeline spilled about 500 barrels in Salt Lake City, Utah; and it was revealed that the company's North Burnaby refinery in British Columbia is still discharging oil into the Burrard Inlet seven months after the leak was discovered. Chevron's Pascagoula, Mississippi, refinery also reported a release of the known carcinogen benzene.
Chevron's record at the El Segundo terminal isn't spotless, either. Small spills have occurred periodically, and, in 1980, a tanker with a fractured hull spilled 105,000 gallons. Chevron's Spackman insists that industry advances since then make it unlikely that such a spill would occur again. But isn't that what all the oil companies said about offshore drilling leading up to the summer's catastrophic BP spill? It's a marker of the media's complicity in such baseless talking points that the L.A. Times repeats them without a challenge.
But the industry might be facing a surprising adversary in the near future: the Lieutenant Governor-elect Gavin Newsom. At a recent speech at the Green California Summit in Sacramento (which this writer attended), Newsom reminded the green crowd that his position would allow him to influence the decisions made by the State Lands Commission — the body which gave Chevron its 30-year pass.
| December 13 2010 at 06:18 AM
Green your cocktail hour
In the past, when I've written about the environmental problems associated with pot growing, many 420-friendly readers have responded that alcohol is no environmental saint, either.
Shutterstock
The U.S. alcohol industry releases as much greenhouse gas a year as 1.9 million households. But not all liquors are alike, according a handy analysis from Mother Jones.
If beer is your thing, go for what's on tap or what's in a can over what's in a bottle to get the most buzz for your ecological bad.
If you're into oenophilia — not that there's anything wrong with that — you might need to make some surprising choices to go green. If you live in California or anywhere west of the Mississippi, you ought to buy California wines, whether you like the value or not. (As I've written before, the local wine industry has made some major environmental advances.) If you live East of the Mississippi, you'll put down a smaller carbon footprint if you buy French or Italian.
If you're into the hard stuff, drink whiskey, preferably Maker's Mark. Yes, it's that specific — here's why: Other alcohols are made to be super pure, then diluted, requiring more energy and water. Both rum and (Write it!) tequila also produce a lot of plant waste that often gets dumped into waterways (exception DonQ, which reuses the waste).
OK, you liquor snobs may say, why not some single-malt honey from a boutique producer? Well, according to Mother Jones, those high-end producers use more energy-intensive distillers. Maker's Mark earns the medal of distinction because it buys local grain and generates energy from plant waste. As a coup de grace, much of the company's land is also a nature preserve.
| December 07 2010 at 03:37 PM
New method predicts earthquakes with 80 percent accuracy
A new Spanish study that analyzed local earthquake data since 1978 found patterns in the data that can predict a medium to large earthquakes with 80 percent accuracy.
The key factor was the fault's resistance: less resistance leads to lots of small earthquakes, whereas more resistance leads to scarcer but bigger quakes.
Fascinatingly, another recent study, this one out of Israel's Hebrew University, focused on the similar principle of friction. It found that the laws of physics long thought to determine friction don't really hold true: Rather than two blocks — used to simulate tectonic plates in the laboratory — touching at every point along their adjacent faces, there are actually a discrete set of points at which they touch, and the contact points don't all break at the same time.
When contact breaks in a slow cascade from point to point, the conditions are set for a quake causing minimum damage. But contact points that break all at once correspond to supersonic earthquakes, which cause serious damage.
The Israeli scientists suggest that analyzing the way a particular fault ruptures in one temblor will allow them to better predict what might happen next along the same fault.
Looked at together, the studies suggest that we may be much closer to being able to predict, and therefore prepare for, major quakes.
| December 03 2010 at 10:47 AM
The Lake Tahoe climate change blues
UC Davis researchers focused narrowly on Lake Tahoe in a new report and are offering what they believe are very likely specific effects that climate change will have on the California gem in this century.
There's a little good news in their findings and a lot of bad news.
First the bad news: Lake turnover — the process by which oxygen is distributed throughout the water — is going to take a big hit. According to researchers, in the second half of the century, "There are likely to be decades-long periods when the lake stops mixing to the bottom. (Historically, complete mixing ... has occurred once every four years, on average.) ... Without oxygen, a large part of the lake will be inhospitable to trout and other game fish."
Oh, and it probably won't be blue. Inadequate mixing will result in more algae, and algae hampers mixing — meaning a vicious cycle of yuckier and yuckier water.
Skiiers won't be spared, either. Even assuming the most optimistic scenario, snowpack in the Tahoe Basin will decline by half by 2100.
The study also foresees a cycle of drought and floods that will reduce the amount of water available for places like Reno, Nevada. On the upside, increased storm runoff flowing into the lake won't in and of itself hurt water quality if control devices are built to current standards.
The authors point to the Environmental Improvement Program and especially the Total Maximum Daily Load Program, which removes fine particle pollution from the lake, as the most vital ways to keep the lake beautiful and healthy.
| November 16 2010 at 02:57 PM
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