Greenversations

Each week we write about the science behind environmental protection. Previous Science Wednesdays.

About the author: Michael Firestone, Ph.D., is a biochemist who is the Science Director in EPA’s Office of Children’s Health Protection and Environmental Education.

Simply put, EPA is interested in children because they are not little adults. Their bodies are developing; they eat more, drink more, and breathe more in proportion to their body size than adults; and their unique behaviors such as crawling and putting their hands and objects in their mouths can expose them more to chemicals and organisms. These differences may increase the susceptibility of children to environmental contaminants such as mercury and lead and certain pesticides.

In 1987, I was fortunate for two reasons – I received a promotion to manage a group of scientists who evaluated occupational and residential exposure to pesticides, and I became a father for the first time. Watching my young daughter crawl around on the grass and picking up a small pebble to explore with her mouth made me wonder about possible exposure of young children to pesticides used on lawns – at the same time, I realized that our group of scientists had very little data to answer the question. Thus, I began on a 20-year journey to promote research related to better understanding children’s environmental exposure.

Along the way, even the President became concerned by issuing Executive Order 13045: Protection of Children from Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks.

Take some time and watch a toddler very carefully and you will begin to understand just how unique children’s behaviors can be compared to adults – here is a great example:

We’ve made great progress toward improving our knowledge about children’s exposures including the development of guidance to standardize childhood age groups and a brand new database of children’s exposure factors information.

And the federal government is starting an exciting new study called the National Children’s Study whose goal is examine the effects of environmental influences on the health and development of 100,000 children across the United States.

It has been said that our children are our future – so let’s make sure we develop the tools and data which will help us protect both!

My name is Ashley, and this semester I have the privilege to work at the EPA Office of Children’s Health Protection and Environmental Education. I am so excited to spend the next couple of months writing blog entries in order to give middle and high school students a voice to express their own thoughts and feelings on issues like global climate change. Let me start off by mentioning a few things about myself.

What brought me to Washington D.C…

Originally I am from Bolingbrook, Illinois which is about 30 minutes away from Chicago. I am finishing up my last year at Indiana University with a degree in Public Finance. During my junior year in college, I heard about this exciting program called WLP, the Washington Leadership Program. The second I heard about WLP, it instantly caught my attention. WLP offers students the opportunity to spend a semester in Washington DC, in my case, during an exciting time of the year; the presidential election. Students get the chance to experience DC during a fun time in their life, gain practical experience in an area of interest, meet influential people, and take classes up on the Hill. How amazing is that? Not bad for a student.

I wanted to work at OCHPEE after learning the office focuses on environmental health threats and contributes in so many ways to helping parents as well as middle and high school students become environmentally conscious. During my time here at OCHPEE, I want to hear your story including your activities to address global climate change. Your activities can inspire others.

Let’s get started on this week’s topic.

Today many kids are driven to school by their parents rather than taking the bus, walking, or riding a bike. This increases traffic and energy use. Choosing to walk, ride a bicycle or school bus, or even take public transportation, reduces air pollution. Air pollutants can harm kids and cause respiratory problems. Children have respiratory systems that are not fully developed and they are often involved in activities where they breathe deeply and take in toxic air pollutants. Because October 8th is International Walk to School Day we want to hear what you are doing to reduce energy use getting to and from school and other activities. Have you talked to your friends and classmates? What has your school done? Your activities can inspire others so tell us what you’re doing. Send us pictures.

About the author: Brenda Reyes Tomassini joined EPA in 2002. She is a public affairs specialist in the San Juan, Puerto Rico office and also handles community relations for the Caribbean Environmental Protection Division.

Last Saturday, as I was watching the 11:00 p.m. news, the weather anchor gave an advisory of Sahara dust in the area. Too late I thought, since I have an asthmatic three year old. Most of us who suffer with asthma can feel the effects before satellites detect this Saharan cloud. Following the weather advisory, I had him stay inside the house all Sunday as a preventive measure. As feared, Monday morning came and he was wheezing with a full blown asthma attack.

Every summer, particles of dust from the Sahara Desert travel halfway around the globe and settle in the Caribbean area around Puerto Rico. This dust impacts not only our air quality, but the climate. This cloud, full of minerals and fungi, alters the quality of air and impacts not only respiratory health, but ecosystems as well. Some studies trace the loss of coral reefs in the Caribbean to this phenomenon. It’s incredible that these small particles from the Sahara Desert in Africa can cause so many adverse impacts to the environment and health an ocean away.

According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), in July 2000 alone, nearly eight million tons of dust from Africa reached Puerto Rico. That’s the equivalent of eight million pickup trucks (each pickup truck weighs one ton. Satellite imagery tracks this gigantic cloud that arrives from Africa every year, peaking between May and August in our area. Most of the population relies on the Puerto Rico Environmental Quality Board air quality information. Also the National Weather Service, issues warnings whenever the uninvited guest drops by our beautiful Caribbean island.

I was counting my blessings all summer long since it had been five months since my son’s last attack. A combination of factors had been successful in helping us manage his asthma over the past months. First the medications, second, I had been very vigilant about indoor asthma triggers and third, during the summer, since he was at home, I made him stay indoors every time the air quality index rose to alert levels. Nevertheless, here I was back to square one with our yearly uninvited visitor: Sahara dust.

Sobre la autor: Brenda Reyes Tomassini se unió a la EPA en el 2002. Labora como especialista de relaciones públicas en la oficina de EPA en San Juan, Puerto Rico donde también maneja asuntos comunitarios para la División de Protección Ambiental del Caribe.

El sábado pasado, mientras veía el noticiario de las 11:00 p.m. el reportero ancla del tiempo anunció un alerta de polvo del Desierto del Sahara en el área. Muy tarde, pensé, ya que mi hijo de tres años es asmático y al igual que otras personas asmáticas y alérgicas puede sentir los efectos antes que los satélites puedan detectar esta nube de polvo. Ese día nos había acompañado a realizar encargos e inclusive había jugado afuera. Al día siguiente del aviso, hice que mi hijo se mantuviera dentro de la casa como medida preventiva. Sin embargo y tal como temiera, el lunes ya tenía un ataque de asma.

Todos los veranos las partículas de polvo del Desierto del Sahara viajan alrededor del mundo y se asientan en el área del Caribe, especialmente en Puerto Rico. Este polvo no solo afecta nuestra calidad de aire, pero también el clima. La nube, lleva de minerales y hongos, altera la calidad del aire e impacta severamente a aquellos con condiciones respiratorias, pero también afecta los ecosistemas. Inclusive algunos estudios asocian la pérdida de corales en el Caribe a este fenómeno. Es increíble que partículas tan pequeñas sean responsables de tanto impactos adversos al medioambiente, las personas y a los ecosistemas que se encuentran a un océano de por medio.

De acuerdo a la Administración Nacional Aeronáutica y Espacial (NASA, por sus siglas en inglés), en el mes de julio del año 2000 llegaron a Puerto Rico 8 millones de toneladas de polvo del Desierto del Sahara. Eso es el equivalente a 8 millones de camionetas! ( cada camioneta pesa una tonelada). Aunque las imágenes de satélite vigilan esta nube gigante que llega a nuestro vecindario caribeño entre los meses de mayo y agosto, la gran mayoría de la ciudadanía depende del informe de caldidad de aire de la Junta de Calidad Ambiental de Puerto Rico. Este a su vez es el que utilizan los noticiarios junto a los avisos que emite el Servicio Nacional de Meteorología (NWS, por sus siglas en inglés) para alertar a la población.

Ante este panorama, siempre tomo mis precauciones especiales durante el verano con mis niños para que no se vean afectados con alergias o asma. Hacía cinco meses que a mi hijo menor no le daba un ataque de asma. Una combinación de factores que incluyen medicamentos, controlar los detonantes y el mantenerlo dentro de la casa cuando los informes de calidad de aire indicaban un nivel insalubre, habían resultado exitosos para manejar su condición. Pero cierto visitante no invitado, el polvo del Desierto del Sahara, se encargó que todos mis esfuerzos se hicieran sal y agua en menos de 48 horas.

About the author: Mary Kemp is currently the Homeland Security Coordinator in the Dallas, TX regional office. Mary started at EPA in 1985 and has worked in the asbestos, Superfund, and air programs. She’s keeping us updated on how her office is responding to Hurricane Gustav.

Our first reconnaissance flights from yesterday showed no emergencies at facilities and limited damage. Our water experts will be assisting the state with assessments of drinking water and waste water infrastructure in the hurricane impacted area. They are also sharing and distributing information along the way. Our Public Information Officer is located at the Joint Field Office in Baton Rouge. He is coordinating information sharing and distribution of information too. We are continuing to work with the state. I’m on hold waiting to see if there will be an activation of the general Response Support Corps.

Each week we write about the science behind environmental protection. Previous Science Wednesdays.

About the author: Aaron Ferster, a science writer in EPA’s Office of Research and Development, is a regular contributor to Science Wednesday.

Last Spring, a pair of barred owls took up residence in the upper reaches of a tree just past the edge of our yard. They announced their presence during dinner one warm evening, a series of deep hoots in a pattern birders describe as “who-cooks-for-you.”

We caught a brief glimpse of one as it leaned off its perch and in a long, silent swoop faded into the shadows of the woods behind our house, disappearing like a ghost.

The owls didn’t disappear for long. The girls soon discovered a trove of owl pellets beneath the roost. By picking the pellets apart we learned what the owls were eating. Sometimes there were crayfish claws or fish scales, but the owl’s main course must have always included small mammals. Every pellet contained the tiny white vertebra and jaw bones of mice.

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	Curtis Tackett adds a handful of sunflower seeds to one of the small, humane traps the survey team sets to survey mammal diversity. After examining the small animals, the team sets them free. (Click image to enlarge.)

Could owls and other wild neighbors be good for health by reducing the relative abundance of tick-infected mice? Last week I got to tag along with a team of Yale researchers surveying mammal diversity in the forests of Connecticut, part of an EPA-funded effort to explore just such questions.

Naturally, the team is taking a much more scientific approach than sifting through a handful of owl pellets. Instead, they set out small aluminum traps to humanely capture a representative sample of the local small mammal population.

Every critter caught was identified, ear-tagged (if not previously captured, a regular occurrence), and weighed. Before they were set free, each animal was thoroughly inspected and any black-legged ticks found were collected for further analysis. After the first day, we joined forces with another team conducting a similar survey of birds, part of an ongoing population study now sharing their efforts with the Yale team.

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	Field coordinator Kim Tsao carefully examines each a white-footed mouse, counting and removing black-legged ticks for further analysis for the bacterium that causes Lyme disease. (Click image to enlarge.)

The few days I spent with the survey team is a small part of a larger, two-year study to better understand of the links between biological diversity, land use, and Lyme disease. I was happy to have the chance to escape the office for a few days in favor of the forest. It reminded me once again how fun it is to explore the woods and to learn more about our wild neighbors, some of which might prove to be important for our health.

About the author: Dominic Bridgers joined EPA’s Office of Public Affairs as a summer intern.

I have a Toyota Solara, it was given to me as a Christmas present a few years ago. I love my car because it is comfortable and it is gas efficient, rounding off at about 30 mpg. I believe those should be the main reasons for buying a car these days.

Going through and collecting the stats from the June 16th Question of the Week, “What do you drive, and why?” I came up with the following. Most of the bloggers drive a midsize/sedan type of vehicle, almost half of the people that responded drive either SUVs and trucks, and a handful of people like to throw on their leather jackets and let the wind hit their face when they jump on their motorcycles, a very fuel efficient vehicle!

Most of the bloggers responded that they drive what they drive because it is gas efficient. While some people said their vehicles suit there personnel needs, such as picking up the kids or loading luggage. I was surprised to see that a handful of bloggers said they picked their vehicle because they don’t have to spend as much on maintenance, while others chose their vehicle because it is comfortable and it is what they can afford.

Thanks for your time in responding to “What do you drive, and why?” and remember to buckle up!

Each week we ask a question related to the environment. Please let us know your thoughts as comments. Feel free to respond to earlier comments or post new ideas. Previous questions.

Paper or plastic? We take shopping bags for granted, especially at the grocery store, and it’s easy to fill up several bags per trip. Both paper and plastic bags use resources, multiplied by the billions of bags used annually worldwide. You can reuse and recycle both paper and plastic types, which delays their being thrown away, or you can reduce waste with permanent bags.

What do you use: paper, plastic, or reusable bags?

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En español: Cada semana hacemos una pregunta relacionada al medio ambiente. Por favor comparta con nosotros sus pensamientos y comentarios. Siéntase en libertad de responder a comentarios anteriores o plantear nuevas ideas. Preguntas previas.

¿Papel o plástico? Damos por sentado las bolsas al momento de comprar, especialmente en el supermercado, y es fácil llenar varias bolsas en cada compra. Tanto las bolsas de papel como las de plástico utilizan recursos, multiplicados por miles de millones de bolsas usadas anualmente a nivel mundial. Usted puede reutilizar o reciclar tanto las de papel como las de plástico, lo cual puede aplazar el tener que disponer de ellas. O también puede reducir los desechos con bolsas permanentes.

¿Cuáles utiliza: bolsas de papel, plástico o reutilizables?

About the author: Lina Younes has been working for EPA since 2002 and chairs EPA’s Multilingual Communications Task Force. Prior to joining EPA, she was the Washington bureau chief for two Puerto Rican newspapers and she has worked for several government agencies.

Lea la versión en español a continuación de esta entrada en inglés.
Some links exit EPA or have Spanish content.

In an effort to fulfill EPA’s mission, we seek community involvement in the decision-making process. We do this by engaging all interested groups through dialogue and collaboration, including those with limited financial and technical resources, English proficiency, and/or past experience participating in environmental decision-making.

By engaging the public, we aim at fostering environmental stewardship in all communities in the U.S., including those with limited English proficiency. End result–the Agency benefits, it’s advantageous to these communities, and ultimately, the environment profits as well.

Census data reveals that around 18 percent of the total population in the US over the age of 5 speak a language other than English at home. Given that language can be a barrier to environmental understanding, we want to address those barriers. Moreover, multilingual communities may live or work in areas that are subject to greater environmental hazards. Therefore, we provide environmental information on lead, pesticides, flood and mold cleanup, children’s health protection, to address many of these issues.

The Agency has been consolidating its environmental information on multilingual websites to facilitate access. Currently, we have websites in Spanish, Chinese (both Traditional and Simplified script), Vietnamese and Korean. We have several initiatives designed to reach out effectively to these communities. For example, the Hispanic environmental health page, the nail salons air quality initiative in Vietnamese and Korean; the informational materials on dry-cleaning regulations in Korean; and the Hispanic Stakeholders Initiative—Beyond Translation, and the EPA-China Environmental Law Initiative in English and Chinese to name a few.

Increasingly, we have found that these multilingual websites are receiving numerous worldwide visitors who are looking to EPA for environmental leadership. New technology such as Web 2.0 is just another valuable tool in facilitating environmental communication across the globe.

Alcanzando a las comunidades multilingües a través de la nación y del mundo

Sobre la autor: Lina M. F. Younes ha trabajado en la EPA desde el 2002 y está a cargo del Grupo de Trabajo sobre Comunicaciones Multilingües. Como periodista, dirigió la oficina en Washington de dos periódicos puertorriqueños y ha laborado en varias agencias gubernamentales.

En un esfuerzo por llevar a cabo la misión de la Agencia (EPA, por sus siglas en inglés), constantemente buscamos la participación de las comunidades en el proceso para tomar decisiones. Hacemos esto al exhortar la participación de los grupos interesados por medio del dialogo y la colaboración incluyendo a aquellos con recursos económicos y tecnológicos limitados, habilidad de hablar inglés, y/ o experiencia participando en el proceso de decisiones ambientales.

Al buscar la participación del público, tenemos como meta fomentar la capacitación ambiental en todas las comunidades d la nación, incluyendo a aquellos con la habilidad limitada de hablar inglés. Esto es beneficioso para la Agencia, es ventajoso para esas comunidades, y el medio ambiente se beneficia también.

Los datos del Censo revelan que alrededor del 18 por ciento del total de la población en los Estados Unidos sobre la edad de cinco (5) años hablan un idioma diferente al inglés en el hogar. Dado el caso que el idioma puede ser una barrera para que las persona comprendan los problemas ambientales, queremos tratar esas barreras. Además, las comunidades multilingües podrían vivir o trabajar en áreas que sujetas a gran riesgo ambiental. Por lo tanto, proveemos información ambiental acerca de plomo, pesticidas, inundaciones y limpieza de moho, protección ambiental para niños para tratas todos estos tópicos.

Con el propósito de facilitar el acceso informativo, en la Agencia, hemos estado consolidando la información ambiental en las páginas Web multilingües. Entre otros, actualmente, tenemos páginas Web español, chino (ambos caracteres tradicional y simplificado) y coreano. También tenemos varias iniciativas de alcance especialmente diseñadas para estas comunidades. Por ejemplo, El medio ambiente y su salud, la iniciativa de calidad de aire en los salones de belleza en vietnamita y coreano, materiales informativos sobre regulaciones para tintorerías y comercios de lavado en seco y la iniciativa para la comunidad hispana, Beyond Translation, - Más allá de la traducción - y la iniciativa para la Ley ambiental US-China en inglés y chino.

Cada vez más, estamos encontrando que las páginas multilingües reciben numerosas visitantes de alrededor del mundo buscando información y liderazgo de parte de la Agencia. Las nuevas tecnologías tales como Web 2.0 es otra herramienta valiosa para facilitar la comunicación ambiental alrededor del mundo.

About the author: While Jeffrey Levy of EPA’s blog team enjoys vacation, he’s sending along environmentally relevant thoughts and pictures.

Aloha from sunny Hawaii! Like Karen Reshkin a few weeks ago, I’ll be sending a few entries from vacation back to the office.

Several years ago, I worked for the SunWise Schools program, so I know all about sun safety, from applying (and re-applying) sunscreen to wearing long- sleeve shirts, and even staying out of the sun during the middle of the day. And I know that the strongest sun occurs on the summer solstice (last week), when there are no clouds, at low latitudes and at high altitudes. Add in no recent exposure, and my wife and I have the perfect setup for major sunburn.

So when we went up Haleakala on Maui, we knew we needed to be very careful. We put on SPF 50 sunscreen that blocked both UVA and UVB, and we wore jeans, long-sleeve t-shirts, and hats with big brims (it’s only in the 60s at 10,000 feet).

For snorkeling the next day, we slopped on SPF 60, which was so thick it took several squirts to cover everything. And we wore shirts in the water.

The result? Sunburned faces. We couldn’t believe it until we realized:
1) we hadn’t been burnt at all after the mountain, so it wasn’t that trip.
2) our faces were in the water and the backs of our legs weren’t burnt, so it wasn’t snorkeling.

But we did stand outside in line for breakfast for 45 minutes from 9:30-10:15. Bingo! It’s not only the activities we know will burn us, but being outside here anytime.

So enjoy yourselves outdoors this summer, but follow the SunWise actions steps no matter what you’re doing.