11-2-08

 11-2-08Modesto BeeTuolumne project nearing completionHundreds of trees will be planted on site near Grayson...Ken Carlsonhttp://www.modbee.com/local/story/484483.htmlA group devoted to the Tuolumne River is looking to complete a project to restore the natural environment along the river near Grayson.For the past four years, the Tuolumne River Trust has led efforts on the 240-acre site to restore forest, river and wildlife habitat. It's called the Big Bend Habitat Restoration because of its location on a bend in the river east of Grayson, not far from Shiloh and West Grayson roads.Native trees such as oaks, cottonwoods and willows have been planted on the site and the land was reshaped to connect the river channel with the flood plain.In the next four months, project organizers and volunteers will plant several hundred additional trees on the site and then let the young forest grow to maturity."The trees are only 1 to 4 years old," said Patrick Koepele, deputy executive director of the Tuolumne River Trust. "In the next five years, you should see a difference."The site was formerly productive farmland owned by the Venn family, who raised almonds, fruit trees and row crops. But during the Tuolumne River flooding of 1997, the land was inundated with water carrying everything from raw sewage to trash and debris.The family had endured previous flooding going back to the 1980s, so farmer Tim Venn was open to fresh ideas when the Tuolumne River Trust approached him seven years ago. An arrangement was worked out for the federal Natural Resources Conservation Service to buy easements on the parcel.It took two years to plan the restoration and obtain the required permits. The dying orchards were removed, so work could begin to restore habitat suitable for rabbits, foxes, raccoons and beavers, as well as cranes, geese and other birds.According to the plan, only native trees, shrubs and grasses are being planted. Much of the tree-planting has been done by volunteers, including individuals and community organizations, with Cub Scout and Girl Scout troops chipping in.During the upcoming work days, members of the nonprofit trust may also remove clusters of water hyacinth from the river.The project is part of a bigger vision for a lower Tuolumne River parkway similar to the string of parks on the Stanislaus River between Knights Ferry and Ripon. The idea is to have access points on the river for people to put a canoe or kayak in the river in Modesto and float downstream.The vision includes the parks being developed along the Tuolumne in Modesto and Ceres, riverfront parcels in Waterford and efforts to restore salmon in the river.The "big bend" parcel near Grayson is still private property. Tim Venn retains ownership and associated hunting and fishing rights.Funding for the $2 million restoration has come from federal and state grants. The Tuolumne River Trust, the East Stanislaus Resource Conservation District and other government agencies are sponsoring the project.Contra Costa TimesFeds plan for new era in nuclear deterrence...Suzanne Bohanhttp://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_10875822Under a new federal plan, Lawrence Livermore Laboratory would become the nation's center for testing and developing explosive devices for nuclear weapons. The proposed expansion at the Livermore site is one of numerous sweeping changes recommended by the agency overseeing the nation's nuclear weapons arsenal. The plan, released Oct. 24, aims to reconfigure the country's eight national security labs to meet 21st century demands for maintaining a reliable and credible nuclear deterrence with an aging weapons stockpile.Watchdog groups monitoring activities at the labs, however, say the plan reflects an agenda by the Bush administration, presented in its waning days, to support innovations in nuclear weaponry development, despite repeated congressional rejection of such an initiative. While stripped of one of its most controversial elements — increased production of the plutonium cores critical to nuclear weapon denotation — the final plan would nonetheless create an infrastructure for more easily ramping up to produce these and other weapons components, said Marylia Kelley, executive director of Tri-Valley CAREs in Livermore. She cited a potential new building at Livermore to bolster its ongoing high explosive research as an example."It is actually a provocative revitalization of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex," Kelley said of the plan. "It's an end-run around congressional intent by going ahead and creating the infrastructure for developing new nuclear weapons." But a spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration, an agency within the Department of Energy that oversees the stewardship program for the nation's nuclear arsenal, said such charges miss the point of the sweeping new vision for how the network of national security labs operate. "They're tying together two separate things," said John Broehm. There's no intent to design new weapons with the plan, he said. It's solely intended to move operations into buildings more easily secured against theft of nuclear material prized by terrorists and rogue nations for bomb-building — plutonium and enriched uranium. Modern buildings will also facilitate development of new technologies for maintaining the existing stockpile of nuclear weapons, Broehm said. The eight labs' primary mission is running the "Stockpile Stewardship Program," which assesses the safety, security and reliability of the warheads without nuclear testing, and to develop new technologies for extending the life of the aging stockpile. No new nuclear weapons have been built since the early 1990s, Broehm said. "What this (plan) does is reflect that the nuclear stockpile is going down," he added. Since 2001, the number of U.S. nuclear warheads has declined by 50 percent, with another 15 percent reduction in the works, according to the nuclear agency.The new plan, called the "Complex Transformation" and released Oct. 24 in the environmental impact statement, spells out how the National Nuclear Security Administration proposes to consolidate operations at the nuclear weapons labs scattered across the country. Thirty days after its release, the agency can issue one or more decisions for adopting favored plans, although it's unknown when any decisions will be announced. "We absolutely need to do this," Broehm said. "We're in buildings 50 years old, and it shows." But Kelley, with Tri-Valley CAREs, said the plan "abandons the very modest consolidations" proposed in 2006 for Livermore lab and instead calls for constructing a new building at the Livermore site to augment an existing high explosives research and development program, or for moving that expanded program into existing buildings at the lab's facility near Tracy, called "Site 300." "To my shock and disbelief, Livermore was chosen to be the high explosives research and development center for the entire nuclear development complex," Kelley said. "When you're talking about R&D, you're talking about the next generation of nuclear weapons." Aside from alarm that high explosives R&D portends a potential resurgence of nuclear weapons development, Kelley expressed concerns about the environmental effects of the expanded facility. "It will continue and even increase the pollution I'm faced with," said the Livermore resident. Lynda Seaver, a spokeswoman for the Livermore lab, responded that the expanded high explosives facility will generate more emissions but still fall within state and federal limits. Kelley was also disappointed that the 2012 timetable for removing all plutonium and enriched uranium — highly radioactive materials — off the Livermore site wasn't moved up, given the potential threat of a terrorist attack on the facility and the presence of a nearby earthquake fault.But Broehm said that moving any more quickly could prove hazardous. "I can assure you that's a priority to the administration to get that (material) out," he said. "But it's not like moving out of your apartment. These moves are a highly guarded state secret." Seaver added that two loads of the radioactive material have already been shipped out of the Livermore lab by a truck convoy. It's the Bush administration's keen interest in increasing the production of "plutonium pits," the triggers at the heart of nuclear weapons, that particularly alarms Kelley and other watchdog organizations over the future of the nation's nuclear weapons program. In 2003, the National Nuclear Security Administration recommended establishing a facility for producing 450 plutonium pits. Facing objections, it revised it to no more than 80 per year. But with continued opposition to even that figure, the agency retreated to the existing level of 20 per year in the final plan released Oct. 24. That's the maximum number experts estimate is needed to maintain the existing arsenal. Regardless of what, if any, decisions the Bush administration issues on the final plan for the national security labs' next chapter, the new U.S. president will have a significant effect on its ultimate implementation. "These are decisions being made by a lame duck administration," noted Jay Coghlan, executive director of Nuclear Watch of New Mexico. "A new administration could change it." What is Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory? Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, founded in 1952, is a key national security facility that plays a primary role in the nation's "Stockpile Stewardship Program." Since no nuclear weapons have been built in the United States since the early 1990s, and Congress has refused to fund additional nuclear weapons development, the shrinking stockpile of warheads is carefully managed to maintain its longevity. While the majority of the lab's work centers on nuclear weapons, it also runs research programs on climate change, energy security and fusion energy, among other initiatives. In addition, the lab is involved in efforts to reduce the threats posed by the proliferation of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction. Livermore is one of eight national security labs located across the country. Los Angeles TimesUpsurge of West Nile virus linked to foreclosures, study findsScientists say cases soared in Bakersfield last year largely because of mosquitoes breeding in abandoned swimming pools...Mary Engel...10-31-08http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-westnile31-2008oct31,0,1620287,print.storyOne of the nation's worst-hit cities for foreclosures in 2007 -- Bakersfield -- became an epicenter of West Nile virus that year largely because of mosquitoes breeding in abandoned swimming pools, UC Davis and Kern County scientists reported Thursday. The Central Valley city had 140 diagnosed cases, up from 51 in 2006, or a 275% increase. Over the same period, mortgage delinquency notices went up by 300%.Since the mortgage crisis began, public health officials throughout the state, particularly in Southern California, have complained that neglected pools are contributing to West Nile infections.But the Bakersfield study, published in the online journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, was the first to quantify the effect.Other factors played a role. Unusually mild weather allowed virus-carrying mosquitoes to survive the winter, the study found. And mosquitoes became active earlier and multiplied more rapidly in an exceptionally warm spring and summer. By the time public health officials noticed the first human case, the virus had exploded. "Once we had one human case, it was almost like popcorn after that," said Dr. Claudia Jonah, Kern County's interim health officer. "In a year in which we should not have had any cases, we had the most in the nation."The exceptionally dry winter and spring had initially been expected to cut down on the number of mosquitoes. But, in fact, the drought contributed to the problem, the study found, drawing birds to the suburbs in search of water. The birds found thousands of stagnant pools, teeming with newly hatched mosquitoes. West Nile is primarily a bird disease, transmitted among birds -- and to humans -- by mosquitoes. Most people who are infected by the virus do not become ill. But about 20% of those infected develop flu-like symptoms, and about one in 150 develop the most serious form of the disease, which can cause encephalitis, meningitis and death. Aerial photographs taken over Bakersfield in July 2007 showed hundreds of suburban backyard pools with green instead of blue water, evidence that the pools were no longer being maintained. The county used an influx of state money to launch an aggressive mosquito control program, including the first aerial spraying in 20 years.The efforts have continued this year. Although the virus has been detected in birds and mosquitoes, there have been no human cases of West Nile in Kern County in 2008. So far, the state has reported a total of 355 cases, with the most -- 126 cases -- occurring in Los Angeles County.Washington PostIn Bush's end-game, lots of changes on environment...Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent, Reutershttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/02/AR2008110200748_pf.htmlWASHINGTON (Reuters) - As the U.S. presidential candidates sprint toward the finish line, the Bush administration is also sprinting to enact environmental policy changes before leaving power.Whether it's getting wolves off the Endangered Species List, allowing power plants to operate near national parks, loosening regulations for factory farm waste or making it easier for mountaintop coal-mining operations, these proposed changes have found little favor with environmental groups.The one change most environmentalists want, a mandatory program to cut climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions, is not among these so-called "midnight regulations."Bureaucratic calendars make it virtually impossible that any U.S. across-the-board action will be taken to curb global warming in this administration, though both Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama have promised to address it if they win Tuesday's U.S. presidential election.Even some free-market organizations have joined conservation groups to urge a moratorium on last-minute rules proposed by the Interior Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, among others."The Bush administration has had eight years in office and has issued more regulations than any administration in history," said Eli Lehrer of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. "At this point, in the current economic climate, it would be especially harmful to push through ill-considered regulations in the final days of the administration."John Kostyack of the National Wildlife Federation, which joined Lehrer's group to call for a ban on these last-minute rules, said citizens are cut out of the process, allowing changes in U.S. law that the public opposes, such as rolling back protections under the Endangered Species Act.WHAT'S THE RUSH?The Bush team has urged that these regulations be issued no later than Saturday, so they can be put in effect by the time President George W. Bush leaves office on January 20.If they are in effect then, it will be hard for the next administration to undo them, and in any case, this may not be the top priority for a new president, said Matt Madia of OMB Watch, which monitors the White House Office of Management and Budget, through which these proposed regulations must pass."This is typical," Madia said of the administration's welter of eleventh-hour rules. "It's a natural reaction to knowing that you're almost out of power."Industry is likely to benefit if Bush's rules on the environment become effective, Madia said."Whether it's the electricity industry or the mining industry or the agriculture industry, this is going to remove government restrictions on their activity and in turn they're going to be allowed to pollute more and that ends up harming the public," Madia said in a telephone interview.What is unusual is the speedy trip some of these environmental measures are taking through the process.For example, one Interior Department rule that would erode protections for endangered species in favor of mining interests drew more than 300,000 comments from the public, which officials said they planned to review in a week, a pace that Madia called "pretty ludicrous."Why the rush? Because rules only go into effect 30 to 60 days after they are finalized, and if they are not in effect when the next president takes office, that chief executive can decline to put them into practice -- as Bush did with many rules finalized at the end of the Clinton administration.White House spokesman Tony Fratto denied the Bush team was cramming these regulations through in a hasty push.Fratto discounted reports "that we're trying to weaken regulations that have a business interest," telling White House reporters last week the goal was to avoid the flood of last-minute rules left over from the Clinton team.There is at least one Bush administration environmental proposal that conservation groups welcome: a plan to create what would be the world's largest marine wildlife sanctuary in the Pacific Ocean. That could go into effect January 20.