Free Republic

Environmentally-driven encroachment: Regulating farming, compliance with environmentalist demands, control and tracking of the food supply, water supply, land use The Agricultural Resource Management Plan in Virginia, Environmentally-driven encroachment: Regulating farming, compliance with environmentalist demands, control and tracking of the food supply, water supply, land use My late father-in-law was a successful farmer and cooperative extension agent with 40 year’s experience who advised farmers in his county on crop management, land and water use, fertilizers, soil analysis, pests, and plant and animal disease. He valued the land he owned and knew that it was very important to properly care for the...

A top House Republican is charging that the Environmental Protection Agency secretly drafted highly detailed maps of U.S. waterways to set the stage for a controversial plan to expand regulatory power over streams and wetlands, a claim the EPA strongly denies. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, chairman of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee, released those maps on Wednesday, while firing off a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy voicing concerns over why they were created in the first place.

Extreme drought conditions have become so harsh for the Central Valley community of East Porterville, many of its residents dependent on their own wells have run out of water.. Roughly 300 homes have received a three-week supply of bottled water after Tulare County officials discovered their wells had gone dry. In all, county officials distributed 15,552 1-gallon bottles of water, and have been filling a 2,500-gallon tank with nonpotable water so residents can flush toilets and bathe.

In 2015, American consumers will finally be able to purchase fuel cell cars from Toyota and other manufacturers. Although touted as zero-emissions vehicles, most of the cars will run on hydrogen made from natural gas, a fossil fuel that contributes to global warming. Now scientists at Stanford University have developed a low-cost, emissions-free device that uses an ordinary AAA battery to produce hydrogen by water electrolysis. The battery sends an electric current through two electrodes that split liquid water into hydrogen and oxygen gas. Unlike other water splitters that use precious-metal catalysts, the electrodes in the Stanford device are made...

The Endangered Species Act has wreaked havoc for decades on rural communities, but a newly filed lawsuit could force San Francisco urbanites like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to share their pain. A federal complaint filed this week contends that the Hetch Hetchy Project, which supplies water to San Francisco and the Bay Area, has unfairly enjoyed an exemption from the “severe cutbacks” required in rural California in order to save endangered fish species. Craig Manson, who heads the Center for Environmental Science, Accuracy and Reliability (CESAR) in Fresno, said the lawsuit is aimed at addressing the “double standard” that...

You have heard it before: “As California goes, so goes the nation.” If that is the case, the national economy will be harmed for decades to come because of California’s misplaced priorities today. Indeed, by emphasizing high-speed rail over water and failing to deal with its debt crisis, California poses a long-term threat to our national economy and is on an economic collision course of increased immigration and lack of water. California has more than 38 million residents. Despite net losses of millions of residents to other states, California continues to grow through immigration. Latinos now equal the number of...

PHOENIX - Rescue crews were kept busy with several water rescues after a monsoon surge that brought extensive flooding to Arizona, trapped residents in their homes, closed a major freeway, and paralyzed traffic on several surface streets Tuesday morning. A flash flood warning for Maricopa County and surrounding areas was extended until 3 p.m. Tuesday. Structures were demolished, heavy equipment was carried away and ranches were covered by the raging waters in New River, where more than 4 inches of rain was reported.

a debate is emerging between the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (PUC) and the Bay Area Water Supply and Conservation Agency over the potential disaster if the 89-year-old Mountain Tunnel, which supplies 2.6 million Bay Area homes and businesses with water, collapses. The PUC acknowledges that the tunnel does have a chance of "catastrophic collapse," which would require repairs costing $100 million or total replacement, costing up to $630 million. But the PUC’s 10-year-old 4.6 billion water system improvement program did not include the Mountain Tunnel in its plans. ... The risk right now is that the tunnel lining could...

The Gospel today is about faith and focus. It teaches that though storms and struggles inevitably arise, we have a choice as to whether we focus on them or on Jesus. The  admonition of this Gospel is clear: keep your eyes on the prize … hold on!Let’s look at this Gospel in four stages: Perceived Distance, Produced Distress, Point of Decision, and Process of Development.I. PERCEIVED DISTANCE – The text tells us that Jesus drew back from the disciples and sent them to make the crossing of the lake on their own, intending to join them again later. During their...

The situation is very bad. It seems that water in the area is contaminated due to algae in the area, mostly in Lake Erie, which releases a toxin called microcystin when it decays. The algae grows best in warm, shallow waters like those of Lake Erie. It can’t be boiled, boiling only concentrates the toxin. What about filters? Even filters such as Berkey filters have their limitations. They are capable of filtering pathogens and microorganisms, but getting rid of a cyanotoxins is a different story. The way I would deal with the situation would be this: I’d drink the water...

This one really takes the (urinal?) cake... I myself have spent a bit of time in Europe, and one thing that strikes you as disgusting is the taking-a-leak in public thing- particularly bad the farther East you go (Czech Republic comes to mind). And it's not just drunks at 3am -though there's never any shortage of that- but the carefree, utterly shameless roadside drainage -in broad daylight, as minivans full of families motor by- you even see on the side of the freeway (and not in any woods/weeds or anything, either). But from what I've heard, India is a whole...

Claims in the media do not seem to match up with the scientific datasets A few days ago, Channel 7 KTVB out of Boise, Idaho was reporting the following: “Idaho is drying out. Charlie Luce, a hydrologist with the Forest Service, says the Gem State is using more water, but seeing less in the aquifers. There’s 20 percent less water coming into our basins, when compared to the 1940s.” As I noted at the time: “That’s not what the NOAA National Climatic Data Center database shows. There has been no significant trend in annual precipitation for the state since records...

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday dealt a blow to North Carolina families trying to sue over groundwater contamination at a big Marine Corps base. In a technical decision with real-world consequences, the court upheld North Carolina’s limits on how long people have to bring certain pollution-related lawsuits. By upholding the state’s 10-year limit, called a statute of repose, the court effectively undercut lawsuits centering on Camp Lejeune. “Time is the controlling factor,” Justice Anthony Kennedy declared.

Tests conducted by both the state and federal Environmental Protection Agency showed high levels of toxin levels in two neighborhoods in Toledo, Mayor D. Michael Collins said early Monday. Instead of isolating the two neighborhoods, the Mayor said he'll keep the ban on drinking or using tap water in the entire city of Toledo until additional retests are completed. He declined to provide specifics on the name of neighborhoods in question and how high the toxin levels are. "A majority of areas are satisfactory, but we have two areas of concern," he said at a news conference. As many as...

he MPCA issued the alert Thursday following the death of a dog last weekend in Sherburne County. Brock Tatge, the dog’s owner, told the MPCA that he and his family were spending time last Sunday on Prairie Lake, where they live, when their dog, Copper, suddenly became ill. The dog had been fetching a tennis ball from the lake. “We noticed that Copper went on shore, began vomiting and panting very hard, and just looked very sick,” Tatge said. “I carried him to my truck and brought him to the vet’s office.” Copper’s condition deteriorated and he died at the...

The 1972 Clean Water Act requires anyone putting anything into a navigable or interstate watercourse or wetland to get a permit from the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers. Tributaries to such watercourses are covered, but the word “tributary” was not defined. Now, for the first time, in pending regulations, the EPA proposes to do so. A ditch can be a tributary. They are mentioned explicitly in the rule. They are excluded only if they “do not contribute flow, either directly or through another water, to” a watercourse already reached by the EPA’s jurisdiction. They don’t have...

A massive effort to get fresh water samples flown to a highly specialized U.S. Environmental Protection Agency laboratory in Cincinnati became an unexpected all-night ordeal, delaying any announcement about test results early today, but the plane carrying the ice-downed samples is expected to arrive at its destination about 10 a.m. It remains unclear how many hours it will take before that laboratory generates test results, data that is expected to be the most important to date in the second day of the Toledo metro area's unprecedented water crisis that affects 500,000 people.

Toxins possibly from algae on Lake Erie fouled the water supply of the Ohio city of Toledo Saturday, forcing officials to issue warnings not to drink the water and the governor to declare a state of emergency as worried residents descended on stores, quickly clearing shelves of bottled water. The city advised about 400,000 residents in Toledo, most of its suburbs and a few areas in southeastern Michigan not to brush their teeth with or boil the water because that would only increase the toxin's concentration. Showers and baths are fine, the mayor said. Toledo issued the warning just after...

<p>Gov. John Kasich says water will be flowing into the Toledo area from all corners of Ohio to help the 400,000 people who are being warned not to drink the city’s water.</p> <p>Toledo’s mayor says water is coming from Akron, Cincinnati and even a prison near Columbus.</p>

Governor John Kasich has issued a state of emergency for Lucas County and surrounding communities due to algae toxins detected in the water during routine testing. Do not drink the water. Alternative water should be used for drinking, making infant formula, making ice, brushing teeth and preparing food. Pets should not drink the water. Do not boil the water.. Boiling the water will not destroy the toxins. It will increase the concentration of the toxins. Consuming water containing algal toxins may result in abnormal liver function, diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, numbness or dizziness. Seek medical attention if you feel you have...