Wednesday, 11 Dec 2002

Oh, Yeah, Canada

Canada's House of Commons voted overwhelmingly in favor of ratifying the Kyoto Protocol yesterday, concluding months of rancorous debate and paving the way for a concerted international effort to curb emissions of climate-altering greenhouse gases. A triumphant Prime Minister Jean Chretien, who staked a fair bit of political capital on Kyoto, will sign Canada's official ratification by the end of the year. Though it had no legal impact, the House of Commons vote was an important symbolic gesture of support for the treaty in a country where Alberta provincial leaders and segments of the business community have vociferously opposed limits on greenhouse gas emissions. Also yesterday, on the other side of the globe, New Zealand ratified the protocol.

Wild Horses Couldn't Prius Away

Toyota Prius owners -- celebs and regular folks alike -- are doing more than saving money at the gas pump and curbing greenhouse-gas emissions: They're also making a political statement, thumbing their noses at Saddam Hussein, oil barons, and SUV owners everywhere. Wyatt Earp, a descendant of the legendary gunslinger, has purchased four hybrid-electric Prius sedans for the sheriff's office in Marion County, Fla., where he works as fleet manager. "This is a technology that will take us out of our dependence on foreign oil," Earp says. On the opposite coast, actress Cameron Diaz is one of a growing cohort of stars who's taken to tooling around Hollywood in high eco-style. "I can milk 40 to 45 [miles per gallon] out of the Prius, if I'm driving like a good girl," she says. And talent agent Ariel Emanuel had foreign policy on the brain when he traded in his Ferrari for a Prius. "Every time I get into it, I feel like I'm demonstrating my point of view on national security," Emanuel says. "Fifteen of the 19 terrorists came from Saudi Arabia. I refuse to give them more money."

Music to Calm the Salvage Beast

Salvage-logging operations that extract downed trees from storm-damaged areas may actually wreak more havoc on forests than did the original storm, according to a study conducted at the University of Colorado at Boulder. The research, which was partially funded by the U.S. EPA, focused on Colorado's Routt National Forest, where a 1997 windstorm blew down 13,000 acres of spruce trees. In spots where salvage logging was conducted after the storm, heavy erosion and reduced shade made it more difficult for new tree seedlings to take root. In contrast, in areas that had been left alone, the forest was growing back more quickly and seedlings were thriving. A University of Georgia scientist found similar results when he studied an area of downed trees in Pennsylvania. The study's findings come just a week after the Bush administration announced regulations that are expected to make it much easier to approve salvage logging in fire-damaged public forests.

Sperm Wail

Next time you're perusing the cosmetics counter at Macy's or the personal-care aisle of CVS, you might want to take a pass on the lip liner and aftershave. According to new research conducted by scientists at the Harvard School of Public Health, exposure to monoethyl phthalate, a chemical commonly used in cosmetics and fragrances, may lead to DNA damage in men's sperm. Other studies have linked chemicals in the phthalates family to birth defects in animals, but this is one of the first studies on the effects of phthalates in humans. The finding comes just weeks after a controversial decision by the U.S. Cosmetic Ingredient Review panel, an industry-backed watchdog, to allow the continued use of three types of phthalates in personal-care products and perfumes, with assertions that the chemical uses were safe. The new study, published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, does not indicate whether sperm damage from monoethyl phthalate could lead to infertility or birth defects.

A Hull of a Problem

Oil continues to seep out of the sunken oil tanker Prestige, further threatening coastal areas of northwestern Spain that have already suffered severe damage from the spill. An estimated 33,000 gallons of fuel oil are leaking each day from numerous cracks in the vessel, officials warned yesterday. If unaddressed, the leaks could continue into 2006, said Emilio Lora Tamayo, head of a scientific commission studying the environmental disaster. To stem the tanker's oily tide, the main cracks could be sealed using a robot or the remaining oil could be pumped out to a platform on the surface, but both options pose major technical challenges. The single-hulled Prestige, which had been carrying 15 million gallons of fuel oil, broke apart and sank about 130 nautical miles off the coast of Spain more than three weeks ago. Cleanup ships have mopped up about 3 million gallons from the sea, but a number of slicks remain and oil continues to move toward the coastline, where it is destroying fisheries, beaches, and the livelihoods of locals. In the wake of the disaster, the European Union last week barred single-hulled tankers that are carrying heavy fuel oil from entering EU ports.