Daily Score Blog

Yesterday, a number of papers reported on a nationwide study of toxics in house dust that tested 70 homes in seven states--including Washington and Oregon--for six classes of chemicals, including PBDEs. (PBDEs are toxic flame retardants that have also been found at high levels in the bodies of northwesterners.)

Thirty-five of 44 chemicals measured were found in one or more of the seven states' samples, providing another clue to the puzzle of how toxics end up in people. Dust samples from Oregon had the highest levels of PBDEs, pesticides and perfluorinated chemicals. (Oregonians also had the highest median levels of PBDEs in our study, as you'll see in this animation.)

The good news is that action is being taken. As the Oregonian noted yesterday in a supportive editorial, the Oregon legislature is considering a bill to phase out several types of PBDES. The editorial points out--accurately--that countries that have banned the chemicals have seen declines in body burdens; that there are safe alternatives to PBDEs; and that manufacturers such as Intel, Hewlett-Packard and Epson are already using them. (Washington is considering a similar bill.)

For info on what different areas of Cascadia are doing about PBDEs, go here.

In all the Northwest's varied bestiary, probably no creature is such a crowd-pleaser, has the plain old cuteness, of sea otters. Their faces are expressive and eager, their rollicking behavior is adorable. They are what biologists call "charismatic megafauna"--large and often cute animals that attract public attention--par excellence. But sea otters are a lot more than just another pretty face.

Like wolves, their recent story is heartening. But much more remains to be done, a point that Washington's Department of Fish and Wildlife is making with the recent release of its "Sea Otter Recovery Plan," which as far as I know has, unfortunately, been overlooked by local media. The recovery plan argues that the state's sea otters should re-colonize much of their original habitat.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Following up on Gordon's post below...I had two reactions to Tim Egan's article on the declining number of kids in the most vibrant cities.

The first was that, if kid-free cities are really a problem, we should be looking for solutions by copying places that have done things right.  Exhibit A, at least within our bioregion, seems to be Vancouver:  the city made it a conscious priority to build amenities for families with children, and--lo and behold--families liked the results.  So if Portland and Seattle really want to retain families with kids, the thing to do is to stop with the lip-service, and start copying the places that have done things well.

But my second--perhaps conflicting--reaction was to wonder whether this is really a trend worth hand-wringing about.  Cities are already doing fairly well at attracting singles, young couples without kids, "down-nesters" whose kids have grown up and moved out, and couples who don't want kids.  These folks are growing a share of the population, as more people live longer and delay--or even avoid--childbearing.  Many of them like the amenities of a big city, and may not need (or want) quite the same things that families with children want.  So what's the big deal if cities work great for some people, but not for people who want big families with lots of kids?

In today's New York Times, Timothy Egan reports on a phenomenon familiar to anyone who has walked the streets of Portland's Pearl District: there aren't many children to be seen.

"Crime is down. New homes and businesses are sprouting everywhere. But in what may be Portland's trendiest and fastest-growing neighborhood, the number of school-age children grew by only three between the census counts in 1990 and 2000, according to demographers at Portland State University.

" 'The neighborhood would love to have more kids, that's probably the top of our wish list," said Joan Pendergast of the Pearl Neighborhood Association. "We don't want to be a one-dimensional place.' "

Mind you, it's not entirely true that you won't see children in the Pearl: you'll see lots of kids running through the fountain in Jamison Square on a warm day.  But even then, one wonders if they're visiting from some other neighbourhood.

Egan reports on the falling 'kid ratio' in other cities around the U.S., and also on the efforts to reverse that trend.  But he doesn't ask the critical question: are urban neighbourhoods being designed for children?

The fight over logging in southern Oregon's Siskiyou Mountains is burning hot--reminiscent of the 1980's-era timber wars in the Northwest. To date, 40 protesters have been arrested for trying to prevent the US Forest Service from selling logging rights on a 19,000-acre tract of roadless old-growth reserve, Fiddler Mountain, that was scorched by the infamous Biscuit Fire in 2002. Recently, the frontlines of the battle moved from the forest to a courtroom, where the action is being keenly watched for its potential precedent setting.

Southern Oregon has been hammered by clearcut logging, losing fully 27 percent of its forests in just 3 decades. Don't believe me? Check out Sightline's animated time-series map of clearcutting in the region.

Cars that get five hundred miles per gallon?  According to this piece by LA Times editorialist Max Boot, it's possible using today's technology, including plug-in hybrids and "flexible fuel" vehicles that run on both petroleum and biofuels, such as ethanol and biodiesel.

Now, I'm inclined to agree with the editorial's main points:  North America's petroleum dependence is a profound strategic and economic vulnerability; and we can make our transportation system much, much more fuel efficient using existing technologies--and without waiting decades for new technologies, such as hydrogen fuel cells, to catch on.

But what about this statement:  "How to do better? Biking to work or taking the train isn't the answer. Even if Americans drive less, global oil demand will surge because of breakneck growth in India and China."

What on earth is he talking about?

Bummer:  according to the Tacoma, WA News Tribune, Puget Sound salmon are contaminated with especially high levels of PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls.

The important thing to remember about this story is that PCBs haven't been manufactured in the U.S. for nearly three decades; they were banned in 1977.  But the compounds are perniciously long lived in the environment, and they continue to leak from old and abandoned equipment. Getting rid of them is going to be a matter of many decades, and, possibly, billions of dollars to clean up contamination hotspots -- such as the old industrial zones surrounding the Sound.

It really makes me wish that we'd been more careful the first time around -- if you don't make a mess in the first place, you don't have to worry about cleaning it up.