Andrew Wetzler's Blog: Living Sustainably

Minnesota Reviews Atrazine -- And Drops the Ball

2010-03-19T16:26:42Z

For those of you who have been following the growing concerns over the widespread use of the pesticide atrazine in the United States, you probably know that EPA recently announced it was going to conduct a top-to-bottom review of the chemical’s safety (for NRDC’s comments on the EPA review, click here).*

What you may not know, however, is that states can also initiate their own reviews—federal environmental law allows states to set standards that are more restrictive than those mandated by the EPA.

Minnesota recently took this much needed step when it decided to open its own review of atrazine to determine whether tighter standards were needed. So far so good. Two months ago, Minnesota released the results of its review and invited comment. On Wednesday, NRDC submitted its comments on the review, which starts with our recent report on atrazine contamination in the Midwest, Poisoning the Well. Unfortunately, the conclusions in Minnesota’s review fall far short of the mark. Here’s the top line results of our analysis:

Minnesota minimizes much of the recent science on atrazine’s effects. This includes studies that indicate that prenatal atrazine exposure may increase risk of poor birth outcomes and birth defects in infants, as well as studies that links atrazine urine levels in farm workers and rural men to reproductive effects, such as low sperm count and motility.
The report also ignores much of the experimental literature on atrazine’s endocrine disrupting effects, including a recent study reporting that 10 percent of male frogs that were born and raised in water contaminated with 2.5 parts per billion (ppb) of atrazine grew up with female sex characteristics, had reduced levels of male testosterone hormone, reduced sperm levels, and decreased fertility.
The report mischaracterizes the economic benefits of atrazine use. Minnesota fails to discuss (or mischaracterizes) studies that predict very small crop yield losses from phasing out atrazine, as well as one study that found that, despite a ban on the use of atrazine in Italy and Germany (both corn-producing nations) since 1991, neither country has recorded any economic effects.
The report relies on inadequate and probably faulty water monitoring data to reach its conclusions. Minnesota’s review relies on the results of 2,782 samples taken from the 544 community water systems. While that might sound like a lot, it averages to only about 5 samples taken per system. Moreover, these samples were taken over a period of 9 years. This averages out to fewer than one sample per system per year. Simply put: samples taken a few times a year, or once a year, or as little as once every three years (as was the case for some systems) should not be relied on. Dangerously high spikes of atrazine can occur in drinking water for just a few weeks out of the year. If a system samples only once a year or a few times a year, it is very likely that that sample will miss the spike entirely and give the false impression that there is little to no atrazine in the water.

Hopefully, Minnesota will take these comments to heart and revise its assessment. The North Star state could sure use it.

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*Quick atrazine primer: Atrazine is used mostly on corn, sugarcane and other crops to suppress weed growth. United States farmers apply an estimated 60 to 80 million pounds of atrazine active ingredient annually. Because it is typically used in the spring before crops are planted and when rains are frequent, atrazine is often transported in runoff from fields to nearby surface waters. As a result, atrazine is the most commonly detected pesticide in U.S. waters, present in more than 75% of stream samples and 40% of shallow groundwater samples in agriculture areas across the United States. It is an endocrine disrupting chemical, meaning that it can disrupt normal hormone function in a wide variety of organisms, including people.

Moral Consideration for Plants?

2008-06-18T19:13:39Z

Do we have any ethical obligations towards plants? Recently, a Swiss government panel addressed this very question--and concluded that we do.

Conservative publications, like the Weekly Standard, were predictably derisive about the whole notion. But I’m not so sure. We already--and rightly--recognize that plant species should be protected under laws like the Endangered Species Act. And last week the New York Times reported on the growing scientific evidence that plants perceptual and behavior abilities are far more complex than previously known. One scientist quoted in the article said that plants “have a secret social life.” There’s even an--albeit controvercial--Society of Plant Neorobiology composed of scientists who study plant behavior.

My intuition is that, as living things (and ones that are probably far more sentient than we realize) plants are due at least minimal moral consideration. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have the least problem with our use of plants--hell, I’m not even a vegetarian--but the Swiss panel’s basic conclusion that that we ought not to harm plants “arbitrarily” (according to the report, “[t]his kind of treatment would include, e.g. decapitation of wild flowers at the roadside without rational reason”) seems about right to me.

What do you think?

Eat It

2008-02-21T03:57:29Z

Today’s New York Times has an op-ed by Taras Grescoe about the growing problem of invasive species, a topic I’ve blogged about here at Switchboard before. Although I have a few quibbles with his column--Grescoe is far too quick to dismiss policy solutions to the problem of invasive species, such as stricter regulation of ballast water--his central idea about invasive is kind of cool. Grescoe basically advocates eating the things.

As Grescoe correctly notes, one of the worst invasive species here in the United States is the Asian carp (pictured below courtesy of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service).

I love to cook and was pretty intrigued by the idea. I wondered, is Asian carp good eating? Well, it sure seems so. Just click here to find some pretty tasty looking recipes. Others can be found here.

Our own Kate Wing has written about eating jellyfish and I know that she’s something of a cook. So how about it Kate, are there any recipes for invasive species in your neck of the woods? Chinese mitten crabcakes maybe?

Bye-bye beluga

2008-02-10T19:55:33Z

A few years ago, NRDC joined the caviar emptor campaign, an effort to save endangered sturgeon--particularly beluga sturgeon--from overfishing as a result of the caviar trade. Because of our efforts, beluga sturgeon was ultimately listed as a threatened species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act, and the importation of beluga caviar into the United States (at that time the world's biggest market) was banned.

But the price of caviar has continued to rise and, despite international protections under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the slow spiral of belgua sturgeon towards extinction continues. Now the World Wildlife Fund Russia has called for a moratorium on Russian exports of beluga caviar. Any slowdown in sturgeon harvest would be welcome. One of the challenges beluga sturgeon face (beyond the fact that folks are paying in excess of $200 an ounce of their roe) is that Russia's not the only player: Azerbaijan, Iran, and Kazakhstan also harvest beluga caviar, making comprehensive regulation of the caviar trade that much more complex.

For those of you who love the stuff, however, have no fear; there are plenty of alternatives available.