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Exxon Valdez Shows Oil Spills Persist Longer Than Expected CHAPEL HILL, North Carolina, December 19, 2003 (ENS) - Oil spills have longer and more harmful impacts on coastal marine ecosystems than previously assumed, according to a new study of the effects of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska.The ship spilled some 11 million gallons of crude oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989. The new study finds that the environmental consequences went far beyond the more than 250,000 seabirds, and thousands of marine mammals and other coastal marine species killed in the first days, weeks and months. The researchers synthesized results of numerous more specialized but revealing investigations of the Alaskan disaster's impact on various plant and animal species. This work showed that "that oil has persisted in surprisingly large quantities for years after the Exxon Valdez spill in subsurface reservoirs under course intertidal sediments," said principal investigator Dr. Charles Peterson, a marine sciences professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "This oil was sequestered in conditions where weathering by wave action, light and bacteria was inhibited, and toxicity remained for a decade or more," Peterson said. As a result, many species suffered long term loss, he said. For example, chronic exposure to the oil in mouths of streams boosted mortality among incubating pink salmon eggs for at least four years after the spill. "Earlier experiments incorrectly implied that lower oil concentrations were safe, which the new work clearly showed was not true," Peterson said. The study by Peterson and his colleagues appears in today's issue of the journal "Science." ExxonMobil Vice President Frank Sprow criticized the study. "What science has learned in Alaska and elsewhere is that while oil spills can have acute short term effects, the environment has remarkable powers of recovery," Sprow said. Sprow says there is ample evidence that oil remnants are only being found where they were known to have existed at the conclusion of the cleanup and where the U.S. Coast Guard concluded there was no net environmental benefit associated with further cleanup 11 years ago. "The abundance of biology in close association with the remnant oil remaining today refutes the notion that this oil residue has any significant biological effect," Sprow said. "The vast majority of the affected shorelines have no visible oil remnants on the surface or subsurface." But the new study finds oil lingers in sea bed sediments. Researchers found that marine mammals and sea ducks suffered high mortality for years after the accident in part because they ate invertebrates contaminated by the hidden oil and also because they contacted oil directly while digging up prey. Species as diverse as sea otters, harlequin ducks and killer whales suffered large, long term losses, Peterson and colleagues report, and oiled mussel beds and other tidal shoreline habitats will take an estimated 30 years to recover. Peterson said studies of the Exxon Valdez oil spill should lead to a new understanding of how lingering oil deposits affect species over many years, how sublethal, chronic doses compromise health, growth and reproduction and how impaired species interact negatively with one another in "cascade" fashion. According to the National Academy of Sciences, nearly 11 million gallons of oil - the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill - runs off streets and driveways into U.S. waters every eight months.
Conservationists Not Convinced by New Missouri River Plan WASHINGTON, DC, December 19, 2003 (ENS) - A new biological opinion by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service endorses lower summer flows on the Missouri River in order to protect three endangered species - the pallid sturgeon, piping plover and interior least tern.But the recommendations fall short of what conservationists want and look unlikely to help solve one of the nation's longest running environmental disputes. The Army Corps operates six dams on the Missouri River - in Montana, North and South Dakota, and Nebraska - and conservationists have criticized the agency's management of water flows from these dams for more than a decade. To ensure the Missouri River is navigable for barges, the Army Corps releases high volumes of water from its upstream dams. In the summer, this floods out sandbar nesting habitat for endangered river birds - the piping plover and least tern - and reduces survival rates for juvenile pallid sturgeon. In 2000, the Fish and Wildlife Service provided ready ammunition for conservationists with a final biological opinion on Missouri River dam operations that concluded the least tern, piping plover, and pallid sturgeon are likely to go extinct on the Missouri River if the Corps fails to change dam operations. The Fish and Wildlife Service's recommended flow changes were to take effect in 2003, but the Corps defied a court order before finally complying with the recommendations for three days. Senior Bush administration officials have stated over the last couple of months that they oppose any flow changes despite the conclusion by the Army Corps that these changes would also improve the economy along the river. This new biological opinion was requested by the Army Corps - conservationists were pleased that it at least recommended lower flows, but noted that these recommendations were some 4,000 cubic feet per second (cfs) above the 2000 opinion by the Fish and Wildlife Service. "The flow changes outlined in this document are smaller and implementation is delayed, and are therefore less likely to result in the benefits for wildlife and for people comparable to those that would be achieved with the flows first prescribed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2000," the environmental coalition wrote in a joint statement. "Also, our initial reading of this document reveals that the new flow recommendations are packaged along with a number of troubling caveats that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers may seize upon as a pretext to make no meaningful changes in its river management at all," the coalition wrote. "These two facts strongly indicate to us that immediate peer- review by a team of qualified, independent scientists is necessary." Conservationists argue that reduced summer flows have little impact on the barge industry because 80 percent of the cargo that transported by barges on the river moves before July and after August. But the Army Corps has agreed with river barge operators and some agricultural interests, who say the economic interests of barge operation merit keeping the Missouri River high enough for barges to operate throughout the summer. Barge interests caution the new opinion's recommendation of a summer flow at 25,000 cfs is 3,500 cfs less than the industry needs to operate.
American Geophysical Union Issues Climate Change Warning WASHINGTON, DC, December 19, 2003 (ENS) - The American Geophysical Union (AGU) released a new position statement on global warming this week that affirms the view that the global climate is changing and human activities are contributing to that change.The statement, adopted by the 28 member council of the union, states that "scientific evidence strongly indicates that natural influences cannot explain the rapid increase in global near surface temperatures observed during the second half of the 20th century." A quarter of the organization's 41,000 member scientists from 130 countries are involved in climate and atmospheric science. The statement warned that concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) may be climbing faster now than at any time in Earth's history "except possibly following rare events like impacts from large extraterrestrial objects." "It is virtually certain that increasing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases will cause global surface climate to be warmer," according to the statement. "The unprecedented increases in greenhouse gas concentrations, together with other human influences on climate over the past century and those anticipated for the future, constitute a real basis for concern," the AGU council statement says. The new AGU position statement replaced a less definitive statement adopted four years ago and is a blow to the Bush administration and other climate change skeptics. The administration has repeatedly questioned validity of the science behind global warming and argued against mandatory reductions of greenhouse gas emissions. Joining this new announcement was Dr. John Christy, a prominent skeptic of global warming, who publicly recognized the reality of human impacts - CO2 emissions from cars and power plants, for example - on global warming. Christy's work to measure atmospheric temperatures using satellites is often cited by climate change skeptics. Many scientists believe that if greenhouse gas emissions are left unchecked, the climate will warm and thus cause rising sea levels, the melting of the polar icecaps, erratic and severe weather patterns, and a host of other environmental problems that could have far reaching impacts. The council cautioned that some of the effects - and the rate of change - from global warming remain unknown, but said "scientists are confident in other predictions." The council said scientists believe mid continent warming will be greater than over the oceans, and there will be greater warming at higher latitudes. "Some polar and glacial ice will melt, and the oceans will warm; both effects will contribute to higher sea levels," the council wrote. "The hydrologic cycle will change and intensify, leading to changes in water supply as well as flood and drought patterns." The council called on scientists worldwide - and across disciplines - to participate in climate research.
Feds Sued Over Gray Wolf Reclassification MONTPELIER, Vermont, December 19, 2003 (ENS) - A coalition of five conservation groups filed suit in federal court Thursday challenging the Bush administration's decision to relax protections for the gray wolf in the Northeastern United States.The coalition says the Bush policy effectively terminates federal wolf recovery efforts in the Northeast and violates the Endangered Species Act. "The administration's plan is illegal and contrary to what all scientific experts recommend for wolf recovery," said John Kostyack, senior counsel with the National Wildlife Federation and lead counsel in the forthcoming lawsuit. "The Fish and Wildlife Service has an obligation under the ESA to recover wolves in a significant portion of their historic range, and this includes the forests of the Northeast states." The NWF is joined in the lawsuit by the Maine Wolf Coalition, Maine Audubon Society, Vermont Natural Resources Council and Environmental Advocates of New York. In March the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reclassified gray wolves into three distinct population segments (DPS) and issued a rule to downlist the species from "endangered" to "threatened" throughout the lower 48 states, except for those in the Southwest DPS. The Bush administration said the revision was appropriate for the Eastern DPS because of successful recovery efforts within the Great Lakes. Conservationists contend that the success of those recovery efforts in no way warrants changing the status for the species in the Northeast. In its complaint filed in federal district court in Vermont, the coalition assets that such a decision is a direct violation of the federal government's responsibility under the ESA to prevent extinction across a "significant portion" of the wolf's range. The gray wolf once roamed from coast to coast and from Canada to Mexico, but only a few hundred remained when the ESA became law in 1973. One of the first species listed as endangered under the law, conservation efforts have helped build the numbers to some 4,000 spread across less than five percent of the gray wolf's historic range. By terminating the federal recovery program in the Northeast, NWF asserts that the administration reduces the likelihood that wolves migrating southward from Canada will be able to establish a viable population in the sparsely populated regions of Maine. The plaintiffs note that the Clinton administration proposed a rule in 2000 through the Fish and Wildlife Service that called for recovering Northeast wolves, explaining that "a population of gray wolves in [the Northeast] is significant and will contribute to the overall restoration of the species." In October, a coalition of 17 conservation and animal rights groups also filed suit challenging the gray wolf rule. That challenge is pending in federal court in Oregon.
Preble's Jumping Mouse Stays on Endangered List WASHINGTON, DC, December 19, 2003 (ENS) - The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has denied a petition to remove the Preble's meadow jumping mouse from the Endangered Species List. The agency said the available scientific information did not warrant lifting protection for the species, which was listed as "threatened" in 1998.The petitioners, including Wyoming Republican Congresswoman Barbara Cubin and the Wyoming Farm Bureau Foundation, argued that the species is not distinct from common mice and therefore not worth protecting under the law. In its decision, the agency determined that the mouse is a "valid, scientifically accepted subspecies of meadow jumping mice." Conservationists - and agency biologists - see the decline of the species as a direct result of sweeping residential and commercial development along Colorado's Front Range. The species is endemic to eastern Colorado and southeastern Wyoming, where it lives along streams and rivers. The Fish and Wildlife Service has designated some 31,000 acres has been identified as critical habitat for the mouse. But this protection of the mouse has frustrated Western developers, farmers and private landowners, who believe the restrictions put in place to protect the mouse are ineffective and unnecessary. The state of Wyoming responded to the decision by filing a new petition calling for the delisting of the Preble's mouse. The petition centers on a study by researchers at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science that casts further doubt on the genetic distinctness of the mouse. A recent study by researchers from the University of Michigan examined the case of the mouse and cast doubt on whether listing the species has actually helped it. A quarter of the land in the study area had been managed to improve the mouse's habitat, but another quarter had been managed to keep the mouse from living there. The survey also showed that 56 percent of the landowners would not allow a biological survey to determine the abundance and distribution of the mouse on their land, information that is critical for developing and fine tuning conservation plans. The Mountain States Legal Foundation, a Denver based conservative legal center, filed suit in federal court last week challenging the listing of the Preble's mouse.
WASHINGTON, DC, December 19, 2003 (ENS) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced this week that it is restructuring its criminal enforcement program. The decision comes after broad criticism of the Bush administration for sluggish enforcement of pollution laws and allegations that it has starved the enforcement division of much needed funding.
A survey of EPA staffers this spring by the watchdog group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) found that nearly three of every four respondents said that EPA's criminal program is not "headed in the right direction" and more than four of every five employees did not think the agency's criminal program "is being well managed."
The April survey came in the wake of reports that EPA enforcement agents were running errands and providing security for then EPA Administrator Christie Whitman.
In the wake of negative publicity generated by the PEER survey, J.P. Suarez, EPA assistant administrator for enforcement and compliance assurance, removed the head of the criminal program this past July and ordered a management review.
The management review, released this week, reduces non-enforcement security assignments and calls for consistent hiring and promotion standards, along with a coherent strategic plan for enforcement, including meaningful measures of performance.
The review found that EPA had been inflating case statistics and could not gauge whether casework resulted in meaningful enforcement - a finding highlighted in a separate Inspector General's report released this fall. It also found a disproportionate number of personnel complaints, poor internal communication and supervisors lacking even "basic environmental law" training.
In recommending a cutback in security duties, the management review cited the need to refocus on the purpose of criminal enforcement and urged that EPA "engage an independent organization with experience in federal criminal law enforcement to conduct an audit."
PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch said the review "validates concerns EPA special agents brought to PEER one year ago that the criminal program needed to get back to basics."
"It remains to be seen if EPA's leadership really wants effective criminal enforcement against corporate polluters or whether this latest exercise is just more window dressing," Ruch said.
Economists Blast Forest Service Road Policies
"It defies common sense for taxpayers to subsidize any new roads when more than 80 percent of Forest Service roads are in disastrous shape and inaccessible to most Americans," said Shannon Collier, policy analyst for Taxpayers for Common Sense, who released the economists' letter. "It is becoming crystal clear that the Forest Service's only interested in serving as the road builder for the timber industry and is not concerned about the upkeep of current roads that serve to make our national forests accessible to all."
Of the more than 382,000 miles of Forest Service roads, only 80,000 miles are accessible to passenger cars. Collier's organization says poor road maintenance and continued road construction have resulted in an estimated $10 billion backlog for road maintenance and capital improvement needs.
The public policy group estimates that in addition to footing the bill for this backlog, federal taxpayers have already paid $124 million over the last five years to subsidize the construction of timber access roads.
"Prioritizing road system expenditures toward existing infrastructure, rather than commissioning the construction of new roads would help to reduce this taxpayer burden and make better use of existing roads to increase access to the National Forests," according to the economists' letter.
The letter calls for "a few good roads not more miles of poorly maintained roads that add sediment to our streams, fragment wildlife habitat and displace non-motorized recreation such as hiking and mountain biking."
The economists also call for the Bush administration to support the current Roadless Area Conservation Rule as a tool to support bring the road maintenance crisis under control.
According to the letter supporting such an effort would, "increase the likelihood that the U.S. Forest Service can maintain existing roads in good working order at a reasonable cost to U.S. taxpayers."
The Bush administration is currently reviewing the roadless rule, which prohibits bans road building within some 58 million acres - or one third - of the national forests for commercial activities.
Report Sounds Warning for North Carolina Forests
The survey by the North Carolina Division of Forest Resources and the U.S. Forest Service states that the leading cause of the timber loss is development in and around urban areas.
The losses show further evidence of the state's population growth since 1990, say officials with state and federal forest services.
Sprawl is destroying forests at record rates and remaining forests are becoming more fragmented, but Deputy State Forester Dan Smith said the news is not all bad.
"While we are concerned about the conversion of timberland to urban uses, the total net forest growth exceeds removals," Smith said. "This demonstrates increased productivity on remaining forestlands. Overall, our forests are sustainable."
But environmentalists find the report a stark warning for the future of the state's forests.
"For years, report after report has shown that North Carolina forests are in a crisis, but the state still lacks a plan to reverse disturbing trends and put forests back on a sustainable path," said Will McDow, forest economist with the North Carolina office of Environmental Defense.
The forest inventory report documents the continued decline in forestland in the Piedmont and mountain regions of the state, McDow says, and the transformation of some of the forests into tree farms.
Forests in North Carolina are younger today than 12 years ago, and young forests lack the same species composition as those that were harvested, raising serious concerns for game and nongame wildlife species.
"Forest resources provide a steady timber supply and are an economic engine for the state, but forests also are essential for clean water, clean air, healthy soils, and game and non-game wildlife species," said Daniel Whittle, senior attorney with Environmental Defense.
Whittle says development or pine tree farms should not be "the only two choices for landowners who have forestland."
"The state should develop forest policies that provide meaningful incentives to landowners to keep forest lands in trees and to manage them not only for timber production, but for wildlife and other conservation uses," Whittle said.
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