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POPSGreat Lakes Basin Compact: Protect a Natural & National Treasure
The Great Lakes are a finite, non-renewable natural treasure - containing a combined total of 6 quadrillion gallons of water — one-fifth of the world's fresh surface water. The lakes span 10,900 miles of coastline along the United States and Canada. The surface area of the lakes is larger than the states of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont and New Hampshire combined. In 1998, there was a Lake Superior-based company in Ontario that proposed to take water by tanker out of Lake Superior to Asia. This proposal failed and spurred the Great Lakes governors to take action. In 2001, they agreed to a framework to begin negotiating the compact. By 2005, they had a deal to take to their state legislatures...the base for the Great Lakes Basin Compact. It says clearly that the Great Lakes should not be the long-term water supply answer for any other part of the world or any other part of the country.
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POPS12 Ways to Build with a Smaller Carbon Footprint Buildings consume 76% of electricity generated & they create 48% of our greenhouse gases. Main Points: * Every brick in building required the burning of fossil fuel in its manufacture, every piece of lumber was cut and transported using energy * Aim for a complete ban of formaldehyde use in building products * Building demolitions account for 48% of the waste stream (65 million tons a year), renovations account for 44% and renovations account for 8% * A solar water heater can save $ 450 a year and keep a ton of CO2 emissions out of the air; multiply that by 80 million houses in the USA * While smaller is better almost every city has minimum floor area requirements * The losses are higher in AC than in DC because it grounds so easily * The average 1950’s house was 983 sq feet; by 1970 it was 1500 SF; last year it was 2350 SF * We can no longer afford to lose agricultural land close to our cities and towns
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POPSManmade Flood in Grand Canyon to Save Colorado River A 60-Hour Flood with more than 300,000 gallons of water released per second. 98 percent of the sediment carried by the Colorado River has been lost since Glen Canyon Dam was built in 1963: this flood should help restore some sediment and revitalize the ecosystem of the river.
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POPSEco-Sin Tax? Chicago Fights the 7 Sins of Bottled Water Chicago's 5-cent tax on bottled water took effect on Jan. 2, 2008. The tax is expected to bring an extra $10.5 million annually into the city's coffers while encouraging people to drink tap water and eschew the environmentally suspect bottles. Illinois residents consumed 270 million gallons of bottled water in 2005, making the state the seventh-biggest bottled water consumer in the United States. The Earth Policy Institute estimates manufacturers use more than 17 million barrels of oil in making polyethylene terephthalate plastic bottles. Only 23 percent of those bottles are is recycled, according to the Container Recycling Institute. The rest are tossed into landfills.
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