Despite the enormous amount of plastic pollution in the world, the United Nations Environment Programme has discovered that by 2040, it is still possible to cut it by up to 80%. Major adjustments would be necessary, yet undertaking these efforts would still be practical and even economical.
In a recent report titled Turning off the Tap: How the world can eliminate plastic pollution and Build a circular economy, the UNEP discussed the potential for significant reductions in plastic pollution. The research highlights other measures to limit pollution through reuse, recycling, reorientation, and diversity strategies in addition to lowering plastic manufacture.
Reuse and recycling are concepts that are widely known. The paper underlines the need for better systems and policies to support both. Additionally, the reorienting and diversification strategies aim to substitute compostable or paper-based goods for single-use plastics.
Inger Andersen, executive director of UNEP, said in a statement that the production, use, and disposal of plastics are degrading ecosystems, posing threats to human health, and disrupting the climate. By using a circular strategy that keeps plastics out of ecosystems, our bodies, and the economy, this UNEP research lays out a roadmap to drastically minimize these hazards. We may achieve significant economic, social, and environmental gains if we adhere to this road map, including during talks on the plastic pollution deal.
The authors estimate that these initiatives might reduce the amount of improperly managed plastic pollution to roughly 41 million metric tons. There would be 227 million metric tons of improperly managed plastic pollution under the status quo. Other forms of plastic pollution would also be reduced further, including:
149 million metric tons of fossil fuel-based plastics compared to 380 million metric tons in the business-as-usual scenario;
95 million metric tons of landfilled plastics compared to 129 million metric tons in the business-as-usual scenario; and
216 million metric tons of total plastic waste was generated compared to 408 million metric tons in the business-as-usual scenario.
The UNEP reported that even with an 80% decrease in plastic pollution, 100 million metric tons of plastics would still need to be managed annually by 2040. Ghost gear and microplastics will need to be addressed, and waste management and disposal methods will need to be improved.
The paper claims that these changes might result in an additional 700,000 jobs, especially for low-income countries. Changes could cost more initially, but they would be less expensive than carrying on as usual, saving $1.27 trillion in direct costs and $3.25 trillion in avoided externalities.
After 193 nations agreed to take part in a legally binding agreement to reduce plastic pollution worldwide, the study acts as a road map for future plastic treaty negotiations. Without the accord, Back to Blue found that plastic usage may double by 2050.
As part of the Climate Desk partnership, this article was originally published by Canada’s National Observer and is reprinted here.
The Floodwaters Rose
When a storm unleashed a ferocious downpour of rain in November 2021, flooding stealthily and swiftly rose inside Nicole Norris’s family home and neighboring Halalt First Nation homes on Vancouver Island.
According to Norris, an Indigenous planning officer for the British Columbia Ministry of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness, her brother, who was asleep in the ground-floor suite of the house, was awakened when the overflow from the Chemainus River drowned his leg, which was dangling down the edge of the bed.
The basement of our house was filled with four feet of water. Norris, also known as Alag a mi, said that there was no sound to it.
He immediately called for my daughter, which allowed them to begin retrieving items from the basement.
According to Norris, a weaver, creator of regalia, and keeper of traditional information, not anything of significance was spared.
Because of the wetness in the house, the prints and artwork on the walls were bent. Fortunately, Norris’ stash of wool, loom, and cedar hat tools escaped destruction since they were at her off-reserve apartment, she added.
Norris noted that not many families were as fortunate. Many of the traditional weavers in the neighboring Penelakut Nation lost the wool that had been used to manufacture the renowned Cowichan sweaters or button blankets that were drenched and ruined during the flood.
She highlighted that it was the second consecutive winter flood to hit the Chemainus region in two years, only to be followed by a third in 2022.
Communities of the Cowichan Tribes to the north of Chemainus have recently seen a wave of evacuations and significant flood damage. The hazard of flooding in the area and potential damage to priceless cultural objects are predicted to increase as a result of ongoing climate change, which is also expected to cause increasingly heavy rainstorms.
According to Norris, a new program will now assist First Nations in preserving and repairing priceless artifacts from climate-related catastrophes like fires and floods. Indigenous cultural safety training will be provided in the Strathcona Regional District with $250,000 from BC’s Community Emergency Preparedness Fund.
We’re encouraging First Nations communities from all around Vancouver Island and the central coast to come and take part in seminars so they can get the skills necessary to care for their precious objects on their own, she added.
According to Norris, First Nations homes might resemble museums because they frequently contain relics, holy items, or artwork that has been passed down through the family.
The loss of priceless cultural objects like masks, sculptures, blankets, paddles, or totem poles frequently goes unrecognized, even if damage to homes or communal infrastructure is typically accounted for, insured, and repaired after an event.
Some of these designs or artifacts were made by people who are long gone and have been passed down through generations.
When I conduct quick damage assessments in the neighborhood [after disasters], I focus on everything that wasn’t salvaged, Norris added. Some of these artworks or designs were created by long-dead individuals and have been handed down over the centuries.
Goal
According to Shaun Koopman, the protective services coordinator for Strathcona Regional District, the funding will be used to co-develop a pilot training program and then provide five workshops for First Nations on Vancouver Island who are interested in learning practical skills to preserve, recover, salvage, and restore community or generational belongings or artifacts.
the BC Heritage Emergency Response Network(BCHERN), a volunteer network of heritage and restoration specialists, emergency response personnel, and First Nations cultural workers.
In addition to creating workshop materials, Koopman said emergency response personnel will learn to retrieve artifacts after catastrophes by cooperating with First Nations people in a more culturally sensitive way.
The province’s disaster financial support to communities has loopholes and doesn’t take into account the worth of culturally significant possessions, he continued. In order to develop guidelines about the respectful and proper management of baskets, masks, carvings, drums, feathers, regalia, and other artifacts, BCHERN will also solicit input from First Nations.
A core number of First Nations responders will eventually be trained by the workshops to function as a sacred cultural object salvage strike team, he claimed.
When a calamity happens, the ultimate objective is to make sure that First Nations people are handling and restoring items, particularly sacred artifacts, which call for reverence and ritual and shouldn’t be exposed to anyone outside the community, said Norris.
When it comes to regalia, we have guidelines about what we are permitted to do and what we are not, according to Norris. It’s critical to recognize objects that are sacred and ought to be handled by a First Nations curator, the curator continued.
Norris attended a prior BCHERN restoration program and thinks it is beneficial for both the individual and the community.
Regalia artisans spend a lot of time and money creating sacred items or articles, and these sales are frequently their main source of income, she continued.
Personally, if I lost my wool, my cedar, or if my weaving loom was damaged, I would be distraught, Norris added. The maintenance of our close biological connection to our forebears is at stake here.
For communities looking to repatriate artifacts from museums taken at the height of colonialism, expanding First Nations’ technical capacity to protect and restore artifacts is also important, according to Mindy Ogden, heritage place specialist for Ka: yu: k t h/Che:k tles7et h (Kyuquot/Cheklesath) First Nation on western Vancouver Island.
If we do construct exhibit cases or an artifact room for the repatriation of some precious things from museums, we are also considering the future, she added. Sometimes, museums are reluctant to relinquish those items. They could be curious as to how we plan to ensure the safety of this object.
The emergency planners at KCFN are concerned with compiling an inventory and determining how natural calamities like tsunamis or the climate crisis can affect sacred sites or places of cultural significance, according to Ogden. Climate change-related issues like rising sea levels and more severe storms are on our radar.
Things like a midden and abandoned town sites can begin to deteriorate, which causes the loss of that information.
After being almost completely lost, First Nations culture must be rebuilt and preserved, according to carver Matt Jack, who is now creating the first village totem pole for KCFN in decades.
This requires protecting or restoring essential artifacts from weather or natural calamities.
As a type of historical record, totem poles capture and represent the culture and important events of a community at the time they are carved, according to Jack, who is also an elected legislator for the KCFN government.
According to Jack, totem poles depict the timeline that we are currently in.
Much of that, including the carvings, dancing, and songs, has been lost. Our story would thus be that we have been attempting to rebuild and undertake all this work in an effort to try to save it.
Big CanyonOne of the most famous public properties in the country is National Park, but nearby acreage has long been coveted by developers, particularly uranium miners.
The Grand Canyon Tribal Coalition is asking President Joe Bidento to designate 1.1 million acres of land north and south of the park as the Baaj Nwaavjo I vah Kukveni Grand Canyon National Monument in order to permanently conserve these areas.
Every Havasupai person is a part of the canyon. At a virtual press conference asking for the designation of the monument on Tuesday, Havasupai Tribe Vice Chair Edmond Tilousi stated, “It is our home, it is our land, our source of water, and our very being.”
The Havasupai Tribe, Hopi Tribe, Hualapai Tribe, Kaibab Paiute Tribe, Las Vegas Band of Paiute Tribe, Moapa Band of Paiutes, Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah, Navajo Nation, San Juan Southern Paiute Tribe, Yavapai-Apache Nation, Pueblo of Zuni, and Colorado River Indian Tribes are all represented in the Grand Canyon Tribal Coalition. The proposed monument highlights the close ties that these Tribes have to the area surrounding the Grand Canyon. For the Havasupai Tribe, “baj nwaavjo” means “where tribes roam,” and for the Hopi Tribe, “i tah kukveni” means “our footprints.”
According to Hopi Tribe Chairman Tim Nuvangyaomas, the Grand Canyon is the form in which the creator gave us a gift. The splendor and magnificence of this location, which is home to numerous tribes, must be preserved.
Grand Canyon Trust asserts that only public properties would be included in the proposed monument. Within its boundaries are springs and rivers that flow into the Colorado River, as well as places that are historically significant or holy to Indigenous cultures, such Red Butte.
Although there are over 600 undeveloped mining claims in the monument site, they would not proceed if Biden agreed to designate it. The area has also been threatened by uranium mining. At least three administrations have been involved in the conflict over mining in the area. According to HuffPost, President Barack Obama enacted a 20-year mining ban close to the Grand Canyon in 2012.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit affirmed the prohibition in 2017, despite legal challenges. While attempting to revitalize the country’s uranium industry, the Trump administration blocked legislation that would have permanently protected the area from uranium and other mining. The conflict and mining threat would disappear if the area was designated as a monument under the Antiquities Act of 1906.
Hualapai Tribe Vice Chair Scott Crozier stated, “I, as a Hualapai tribal leader, stand strongly against any mining on tribal lands and ask that you support us in this fight to stop mining.”
At the video conference, which began at 10:30 a.m. local time, the Tribes were joined by Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.).
According to Grijalva’s remarks on Tuesday, the Grand Canyon is protected by the national monument, according to AZ Mirror. The Indigenous people and tribes who view the Grand Canyon in a more meaningful and in-depth manner are given security by it.
Other environmental organizations support the call for a monument.
According to Sandy Bahr, who leads the Sierra Club’s Grand Canyon Chapter, this historic tribal-led initiative would safeguard lands and waters crucial to the region, including the Red Butte Traditional Cultural Property, and protect lands that surround one of the country’s most well-known national parks. We request that the President creates the Baaj Nwaavjo I tah Kukveni Grand Canyon national monument after hearing from Arizonans and Tribal leaders.
On April 4, 2023, in Chicago, Illinois, union organizer, and Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson gives a speech after being picked as the eventual mayor. Getty Images/Alex Wroblewski
This article, which was first published by Gristand, has been reprinted on Climate Desk as part of a cooperation.
The newly elected mayor of Chicago, Brandon Johnson, who prevailed in a close battle on Tuesday, campaigned on issues of crime and education, but he also raised the issue of environmental justice.
Cook County Commissioner Johnson, 47, is a former educator and union activist. Making Chicago a sustainability leader and tackling the city’s polluted neighborhoods were among his campaign promises.
Paul Vallas, 69, the former CEO of Chicago Public Schools, was his rival in the run-off election and ran on a platform of tough-on-crime.
While other observers and environmental activists applaud his election as mayor, they are also aware of the truth.
He essentially supports the environment, especially equity, but he wasn’t elected on the basis of the environment, according to Dick Simpson, a former alderman and professor emeritus of political science at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Thus, pressure may be the determining factor in advancement.
Climate activists need to exert pressure on the new administration, according to Simpson. It will remain a very minor issue without vocal, ongoing pressure from both residents and the alderman in the municipal council.
In recent years, Chicago neighborhoods have organized to combat environmental injustice. The most recent conflict attracted national attention when Southeast Side neighbors protested the proposed establishment of a scrapyard in their already polluted neighborhood.
Eventually, activists were able to stop the move, although it took years of effort, including hunger strikes.
Scar Sanchez, a Southeast Environmental Taskforce organizer, was one of those hunger strikers.
He suggested that we consider Brandon to be a friend. But we also expect our pals to be responsible.
Activists will therefore be keeping an eye on Johnson to see if he keeps his campaign promises, particularly his pledge to reinstate the Chicago Department of Environment, which was abolished in 2011 by a previous government. Also promising to reinstate the Department of Environment, the current mayor, Lori Lightfoot, fell short.
According to research by Neighbors for Environmental Justice, Chicago’s polluters have mostly escaped punishment without the existence of that department. The local organization examined data spanning 20 years and discovered that, following the Department of Environment’s closure, environmental violations and air quality citations both decreased by 50% and 90%, respectively.
Meanwhile, Chicago’s air quality has gotten worse. According to a recent examination of air quality statistics by the Guardian, Chicago’s South and West sides have the third-worst air quality in the country.
According to Sanchez, there is a strong connection between these pollution and environmental justice issues and other problems in the city.
According to him, environmental justice includes housing, energy costs, our capacity to access clean water at home, and the opportunity to bring our kids to school without worrying about diesel trucks.
Americans have come under fire from East Palestine, Ohio, residents. EPA for its response to the derailment of a Norfolk Southern train, which discharged contaminants into the town’s environment, including vinyl chloride, a plastic manufacture chemical related to liver cancer.
The EPA’s internal watchdog has since announced that it will look into how the agency handled the disaster.
The EPA Office of Inspector General (OIG) stated in a statement on Monday that as part of the investigation, we will conduct interviews, acquire information, and examine some concerns, including risk communication, soil and sediment sampling, hazardous waste disposal, and air and water monitoring.
An agency spokeswoman declined to explain to The Guardian why it decided to look into the matter. The EPA, however, has come under fire for the tests it carried out after the incident to ensure that the derailment site and the area around it were safe for inhabitants.
According to Kyla Bennett of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a former EPA scientist, there are too many unanswered issues and contradictory pieces of evidence. The IG can investigate the reasoning behind the choices made on how the testing was conducted and determine whether those choices were adequate.
Testing for dioxins was one of the most contentious issues regarding the government’s response to the derailment. Stephen Lester of the Center for Health, Environment & Justice explained this type of harmful and persistent chemical in an opinion piece for The Guardian.
Dioxin is not produced on purpose. According to Lester, it is an accidental result of industrial processes that use or burn chlorine.
But why didn’t the EPA conduct a dioxin test right after burning five cars’ worth of vinyl chloride and other chemicals under controlled conditions in the days following the derailment? Instead, it didn’t declare that Norfolk Southern had been told to test for dioxins until March 2, or nearly a month later. More than 100 organizations responded by writing a letter to the agency on March 13 with suggestions for how the testing should go, suggesting that EPA should undertake the testing itself and set up a thorough, transparent process open to public participation.
The letter stated that the neighboring and downwind communities have a right to know whether the fire led to elevated dioxin concentrations. The testing process must be open and thorough. This would serve as evidence of the EPA’s dedication to a thorough response to this catastrophe, the advancement of environmental justice, and the restoration of confidence with East Palestine and other afflicted communities.
Instead, the EPA gave Norfolk Southern permission to continue the testing. Dioxin levels were initially found to be hundreds of times the level at which EPA scientists discovered they could cause cancer in 2010, but they were still below the federal action trigger, which was never updated after the findings, according to The Guardian, whose landfill is storing East Palestine soil.
According to NBC News, the EPA has maintained that current levels are comparable to average background levels but has withheld its data, stating the final study won’t be available for several weeks.
I think it absurd that the EPA makes claims like this without offering any supporting evidence. Lester told NBC News that this approach is completely opaque.
According to the creator of Beyond Plastics, Judith Enck, a former regional administrator for the EPA, the organization made two critical errors: postponing the test and placing Norfolk Southern in charge.
She remarked, “I am aware of what the EPA is capable of. Without a doubt, they ought to have handled this themselves rather than delegating it to the business’s contractor given the community’s already high level of mistrust. The EPA has to acknowledge that.
Advocates and residents are now hoping that the OIG inquiry may offer some solutions.
According to Ohio River Valley Organizing Director Amanda Kiger, they are not performing their duties, and everyone is aware of it. It’s all a clusterfuck, for lack of a better word, but I hope it’s a decent, in-depth investigation.
Sensitive environments will suffer “severe and irreparable” harm from deep sea mining, according to NOAA. As part of the Climate Desk partnership, this article was originally published by the Guardian and is being reprinted here.
According to research conducted by environmentalists, deep-sea mining for rare minerals may harm the environment severely and permanently.
The report, which was released on Monday by the worldwide animal organization Fauna & Flora, adds to the growing debate over plans to remove rare minerals like cobalt, manganese, and nickel from the ocean floor. Mining corporations claim that there is a shortage of available land and that these resources are essential to the alternative energy industry.
It Has Become Increasingly Clear that Deep-Sea Mining Poses a Particular Threat to The Climate.
Oceanographers, biologists, and other scientists have cautioned that these plans will result in widespread contamination, devastate fish stocks around the world, and wipe out marine ecosystems. According to Sophie Benbow, the organization’s marine director, the ocean is essential to the basic operation of our planet, and safeguarding its delicate ecosystem is important for both marine biodiversity and all life on Earth.
In a 2020 study, Fauna & Flora first voiced opposition to ocean mining. Since then, researchers have focused more on deep-sea zones and highlighted additional risks associated with mining there. The organization’s report focuses on these. According to Catherine Weller, head of global policy at Fauna & Flora, deep-sea mining offers a unique threat to the climate in addition to other risks over the past few years.
Massive carbon reserves in the deep water might be destroyed by mining on the scale contemplated, which would further worsen the current global crisis caused by rising greenhouse gas levels.
Several studies have also underscored how grossly underdeveloped our knowledge and understanding of biodiversity are. We discover that between 70% and 90% of the species we capture on each journey are brand-new to science, according to Benbow. Not only are there new species, but also entire genera of plants and animals that we were completely ignorant of before.
David Attenborough, who has demanded a halt to all deep-sea mining proposals, shares this opinion. He claimed that mining destroys, and in this instance, it destroys an ecosystem about which we have very little understanding.
Dredging would annihilate delicate, long-lived polychaete worms, sea cucumbers, corals, and squid, according to biologists. Therefore, there would be no prospect of a speedy recovery. Food and energy are scarce at depths of several kilometers, and life advances incredibly slowly. The paper claims that once lost, biodiversity will be impossible to recover.
The trillions of manganese, nickel, and cobalt nodules that cover the ocean floor are the main focus of the conflict over our planet’s deep-sea resources. The production of electric vehicles, wind turbines, and other technologies that will be required to replace carbon-emitting lorries, power stations, and factories depends on these metals.
Because of this, mining corporations are now vying to dig them up in massive amounts using robot rovers that would trundle over the ocean floor, sucking up nodules and pumping them to their mother boat. These rovers would be connected by pipes to surface ships.
Yet, according to marine biologists, such activities would wreak havoc on our already strained oceans, ruin their delicate ecosystems, and send poisonous metal-laced sediment plumes surging upward to poison marine food chains.
Mining firms, on the other hand, have justified their plans by stating that drilling for mineral reserves on land causes even greater harm to the planet’s already stressed ecosystems. If we devote all our efforts to mining cobalt, nickel, and manganese there, the ecosystem would deteriorate even worse. It is suggested that you should look to the ocean’s depths instead.
Weller rejects the assertion. Deep-sea mining is being promoted by these firms as a new frontier, but they mean it to be another one as none of them claim that if we began mining the deep seabed, they would stop mining elsewhere. We would only make things worse.
With Nauru’s intention to increase sea bed exploitation, ocean specialists are concerned about the likelihood that deep-sea mining operations may start in the near future. It declared its intention to sponsor an exploitation application for nodule mining in the Pacific to the International Seabed Authority (ISA), which is in charge of regulating mining in territories outside of national jurisdiction, in June 2021.
By doing this, Nauru activated a two-year rule, a legal clause that sets a deadline for the ISA to establish its first set of exploitation regulations for deep-seabed mining. As a result, deep-seabed mining may now be approved this year. The 167 ISA member states are now in conversation.
The year is crucial, Weller said. The recently adopted UN High Seas Treaty shows that the value of ocean conservation is clearly understood on a worldwide scale, but continued cooperation is required to keep the brakes on deep-sea mining.
To show the possibilities of meat made from cells without animal murder, Vow designed the gigantic meatball. Lind, Aico As part of the Climate Desk partnership, this article was originally published by the Guardian and is being reprinted here.
A business that produces cultured meat has revived the flesh of long-extinct species by creating a mammoth meatball.
The initiative aims to emphasize the relationship between large-scale livestock production, the extinction of wildlife, and climate catastrophe as well as to show the possibility of meat being produced from cells rather than actual animals.
The enormous meatball was created by Vow, an Australian business that is uniquely using cultured meat. Several businesses are developing alternatives to traditional meats including chicken, hog, and beef. But Vow wants to develop new types of meat by fusing cells from unusual animals.
The Goal Is to Transition a Few Billion Meat Eaters Away from Eating [conventional] Animal Protein.
The business has already looked at the possibility of over 50 species, including peacocks, alpacas, buffalo, crocodiles, kangaroos, and various fish. Japanese quail, which the business anticipates will be available in Singaporean restaurants this year, will be the first domestic meat to be marketed to diners.
According to George Peppou, CEO of Vow, we have a problem changing our behavior when it comes to eating meat. A few billion people who consume meat should switch from eating [traditional] animal protein to foods that can be generated using electric technologies.
And we think that creating meat is the greatest method to achieve that. To produce exceptionally excellent meat, we mix and match cells that are simple to grow, incredibly palatable, and nutrient-dense.
Cofounder of Vow with Peppou, Tim Noakesmith, stated: “We chose the woolly mammoth because it’s a symbol of biodiversity loss and climate change.” The creature is believed to have perished as a result of human hunting and global warming following the last ice age.
Bas Korsten, a creative director at Wunderman Thompson, came up with the original concept: “Our goal is to create a conversation about how we eat and what the future alternatives can look and taste like.” Cultured meat is still meat, but not the same kind.
Although meat substitutes made of plants are already widespread, cultured meat mimics the flavor of traditional meat. Currently, consumers in Singapore are the only country where Good Meat’s chicken is sold as cultivated meat, but two businesses have recently completed an approval process in the US.
2018 saw the creation of gummy bears derived from the mastodon, another elephant-like mammal, using DNA from an extinct animal.
The mammoth muscle protein was developed by Vow in collaboration with Prof. Ernst Wolvetang at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering at the University of Queensland. His team used elephant DNA to fill in the few gaps in the Genetic sequence for mammoth myoglobin, a crucial muscle protein that contributes to the flavor of the meat.
Cultivated Meat Uses Much Less Land and Water than Livestock, and Produces No Methane Emissions.
This sequence was introduced into sheep myoblast stem cells, which multiplied to expand to the 20 billion cells that the business subsequently utilized to generate the mammoth meat. Wolvetang said that it was absurdly simple and quick. In a matter of weeks, we completed this. He claimed that the original plan was to manufacture dodo meat, but the required Genetic sequences are lacking.
The enormous meatball has yet to be tried. Since thousands of years ago, we haven’t seen this protein, claimed Wolvetang. So, we are unsure of how eating it would affect our immune system. But if we did it over again, we could undoubtedly do it in a way that regulatory authorities would find more acceptable.
Wolvetang stated that he could understand people being initially apprehensive of such meat because it is initially weird and unfamiliar. But I believe [cultivated beef] makes a lot of sense from an ethical and environmental standpoint.
Several studies have found that a significant drop in meat consumption in wealthy countries is necessary to halt the climate disaster because the large-scale production of meat, especially cattle, causes significant environmental damage.
Compared to livestock, meat from farms consumes far less land and water and emits no methane. Fetal bovine serum, a growth medium made from cattle fetuses, is not utilized in any of Vow’s commercial goods, the company claimed, and all of the energy it utilizes is derived from renewable sources. To date, the company has received investments totaling $56 million.
According to Wolvetang, there will be more and more overlap between the technology employed in cultured beef production and medical and human stem cell research. For instance, it is possible to train cells to respond to their local environment, enabling the growth of meat cuts with muscle, fat, and connective tissue.
I hope this unique research will spark fresh discussions regarding cultured meat’s incredible potential to generate more sustainable food, according to Seren Kell of the Good Food Institute Europe.
Yet, because agricultural animals like cattle, pigs, and chickens are the most popular sources of meat, the majority of the sustainable protein industry is concentrated on accurately simulating meat from these species, according to Kell. We can have the biggest impact on lowering emissions from traditional animal agriculture by growing beef, hog, poultry, and seafood.
On Tuesday night, the gigantic meatball will be exhibited at the Nemo scientific museum in the Netherlands.
In the Navajo Nation, a man fills a tank for drought-stricken livestock with water from a local rancher. David McNew/Getty
This article, which was first published by Gristand, has been reprinted on Climate Desk as part of a cooperation.
The Navajo Nation signed two treaties with the United States in 1849 and 1868. The treaties established a reservation as the Navajos’ permanent home as long as they permitted settlers to dwell on the majority of their traditional land, which included a large portion of what is now New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado. The treaties stipulated that the government would give the Navajo people seeds and farming equipment so they could grow food on the reservation.
Representatives for the Navajo Nation appeared before the Supreme Court on Monday to make their case that these treaties obligate the federal government to give water to their reservation, most likely from the hotly contentious Colorado River, after 20 years of litigation.
The Biden administration and a number of western states’ attorneys were on the other side, arguing that a finding in favor of the Navajo Nation would upend the legal environment surrounding the Colorado River at a time when states are already struggling to deal with drought. Future water availability in the Navajo tribe may depend on how the issue is resolved.
According to Jay Weiner, water counsel for the Quechan Indian Tribe of the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation, if the Supreme Court concurs with the Biden administration that there is no judicially enforceable obligation to do anything with water, that would be a seriously consequential and very damaging decision.
Arizona v. Navajo Nation’s two-hour oral argument depended on a number of issues that seemed to split the nine-member court in two, making it difficult to predict the extent and course of the justices’ eventual rulings. The Colorado River litigation will cease if the Navajo lose, forcing them to hunt elsewhere for a solution to their long-standing water access issues. If they win, however, they will have a limited but manageable road to securing a major water settlement on the river.
The Navajo reservation, which spans New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah, is largely bordered by the Colorado River and has an area comparable to West Virginia. Yet, the Navajo Nation lacks the legal authority to draw water from the river. The tribe has the ability to pump groundwater and draw some water from tributaries of the river, but it lacks the infrastructure to supply water to its residents.
As a result, many areas of the reservation experience major problems with water availability. The average daily water use of tribal members is seven gallons or about one-twentieth of what residents of the nearby state of Arizona use on a daily basis. Many tribal members depend on deliveries of bottled water for their basic health needs.
According to Weiner, progress in the west has historically and systemically neglected and ignored indigenous nations for the better part of a century and a half. Off-reservation towns have received billions of dollars for infrastructure projects of various types at the expense of oppressed tribes.
On Monday, the Supreme Court was asked to decide whether the treaties between the United States and the Navajo Nation obligate it to find the tribe more water. In a historic 1908 case known as Winters, the Supreme Court declared that when the government establishes an Indian reserve, it accepts a responsibility to provide water to that reservation for agricultural use. The Navajo claim that the government has fallen short of fulfilling this duty.
The tribe contends that because a large portion of the reservation borders the main stem of the Colorado River, it should have the right to use that water even if it only has limited access to water from a few Colorado River tributaries.
The Navajo Nation’s case appeared to convince at least four justices. Justice Neil Gorsuch pressed the government’s attorney, Frederick Liu, on the topic of the government’s obligations. Judge Neil Gorsuch frequently aligns with his three liberal colleagues on Indigenous matters.
He told Liu that it was obvious that the treaty required them to immediately deliver some water to this tribe. What am I overlooking? Gorsuch’s line of thinking regarding the treaty was repeated by the three liberal justices of the court as well as by Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative, suggesting a potential majority in the Navajos’ favor.
The issue for the Navajo Nation is that other areas of water law would conflict with the delivery of water to Navajo inhabitants if the United States fulfills its commitments under Winters. As the lower Colorado River’s water was allotted by the Supreme Court decades ago, the Navajo Nation may need to take water from one or more of the seven states that use the river in order to satisfy its treaty obligations.
A group of irrigators and farming organizations from across the West argued in an amicus brief filed prior to the arguments that such a move would destabilize the western water system. They claimed that providing water to the Navajo would inevitably come at the expense of existing allocation holders, which would have serious negative effects on Arizona, which has junior rights to the river. In his questioning, Justice Alito, one of the six conservative justices on the court, repeated that claim.
He questioned Liu about the effects on non-reservation residents’ access to water. The other conservative justices questioned Shay Dvoretzky, the attorney for the Navajo Nation, on the types of remedies the group was looking for and if the US would be required to build pipelines or other infrastructure to meet the tribe’s Winters rights.
There are many possible outcomes, according to Weiner: five votes in favor of the Navajo nation could signify a strong and comprehensive reaffirmation of tribal water rights, or it could appear as a more limited affirmation of the tribe’s treaty rights with limited implications for the Navajo Nation and Indian Country in general.
The Navajo tribe would still be able to battle for their water rights in a lower court, where the Biden administration and western states will be sure to fight back, but no new water rights would be granted to the tribe as a result.
Even if that legal action is successful, securing water will involve protracted settlement talks with states like Arizona as well as the building of large amounts of new infrastructure, which might take decades.
The question in the case, according to Weiner, will be how much harm the court could do to tribal rights if a majority of the justices rule in favor of the Biden administration and the states. The Nation could still create new infrastructure to pump groundwater,
For Example, but its fight to secure new water rights would be over for the foreseeable future if the least harmful decision against the Navajo were to end the decades-long campaign for water rights from the Colorado River main stem. Future Winters litigation may be affected if the Navajo is found to be the subject of a more general ruling.
It’s an important case because it might have an impact on not only the Navajo Nation and water rights but also the entire body of law that governs whether or not tribes can hold the United States accountable for promises made in treaties, according to Weiner.
In the Navajo Nation, a man fills a tank for drought-stricken livestock with water from a local rancher. David McNew/Getty
This article, which was first published by Gristand, has been reprinted on Climate Desk as part of a cooperation.
The Navajo Nation signed two treaties with the United States in 1849 and 1868. The treaties established a reservation as the Navajos’ permanent home as long as they permitted settlers to dwell on the majority of their traditional land, which included a large portion of what is now New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado. The treaties stipulated that the government would give the Navajo people seeds and farming equipment so they could grow food on the reservation.
Representatives for the Navajo Nation appeared before the Supreme Court on Monday to make their case that these treaties obligate the federal government to give water to their reservation, most likely from the hotly contentious Colorado River, after 20 years of litigation.
The Biden administration and a number of western states’ attorneys were on the other side, arguing that a finding in favor of the Navajo Nation would upend the legal environment surrounding the Colorado River at a time when states are already struggling to deal with drought. Future water availability in the Navajo tribe may depend on how the issue is resolved.
According to Jay Weiner, water counsel for the Quechan Indian Tribe of the Fort Yuma Indian Reservation, if the Supreme Court concurs with the Biden administration that there is no judicially enforceable obligation to do anything with water, that would be a seriously consequential and very damaging decision.
Arizona v. Navajo Nation’s two-hour oral argument depended on a number of issues that seemed to split the nine-member court in two, making it difficult to predict the extent and course of the justices’ eventual rulings. The Colorado River litigation will cease if the Navajo lose, forcing them to hunt elsewhere for a solution to their long-standing water access issues. If they win, however, they will have a limited but manageable road to securing a major water settlement on the river.
The Navajo reservation, which spans New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah, is largely bordered by the Colorado River and has an area comparable to West Virginia. Yet, the Navajo Nation lacks the legal authority to draw water from the river. The tribe has the ability to pump groundwater and draw some water from tributaries of the river, but it lacks the infrastructure to supply water to its residents.
As a result, many areas of the reservation experience major problems with water availability. The average daily water use of tribal members is seven gallons or about one-twentieth of what residents of the nearby state of Arizona use on a daily basis. Many tribal members depend on deliveries of bottled water for their basic health needs.
According to Weiner, progress in the west has historically and systemically neglected and ignored indigenous nations for the better part of a century and a half. Off-reservation towns have received billions of dollars for infrastructure projects of various types at the expense of oppressed tribes.
On Monday, the Supreme Court was asked to decide whether the treaties between the United States and the Navajo Nation obligate it to find the tribe more water. In a historic 1908 case known as Winters, the Supreme Court declared that when the government establishes an Indian reserve, it accepts a responsibility to provide water to that reservation for agricultural use.
The Navajo claim that the government has fallen short of fulfilling this duty. The tribe contends that because a large portion of the reservation borders the main stem of the Colorado River, it should have the right to use that water even if it only has limited access to water from a few Colorado River tributaries.
The Navajo Nation’s case appeared to convince at least four justices. Justice Neil Gorsuch pressed the government’s attorney, Frederick Liu, on the topic of the government’s obligations. Judge Neil Gorsuch frequently aligns with his three liberal colleagues on Indigenous matters.
He told Liu that it was obvious that the treaty required them to immediately deliver some water to this tribe. What am I overlooking? Gorsuch’s line of thinking regarding the treaty was repeated by the three liberal justices of the court as well as by Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative, suggesting a potential majority in the Navajos’ favor.
The issue for the Navajo Nation is that other areas of water law would conflict with the delivery of water to Navajo inhabitants if the United States fulfills its commitments under Winters. As the lower Colorado River’s water was allotted by the Supreme Court decades ago, the Navajo Nation may need to take water from one or more of the seven states that use the river in order to satisfy its treaty obligations.
He questioned Liu about the effects on non-reservation residents’ access to water. The other conservative justices questioned Shay Dvoretzky, the attorney for the Navajo Nation, on the types of remedies the group was looking for and if the US would be required to build pipelines or other infrastructure to meet the tribe’s Winters rights.
There are many possible outcomes, according to Weiner: five votes in favor of the Navajo nation could signify a strong and comprehensive reaffirmation of tribal water rights, or it could appear as a more limited affirmation of the tribe’s treaty rights with limited implications for the Navajo Nation and Indian Country in general.
The Navajo tribe would still be able to battle for their water rights in a lower court, where the Biden administration and western states will be sure to fight back, but no new water rights would be granted to the tribe as a result. Even if that legal action is successful, securing water will involve protracted settlement talks with states like Arizona as well as the building of large amounts of new infrastructure, which might take decades.
The question in the case, according to Weiner, will be how much harm the court could do to tribal rights if a majority of the justices rule in favor of the Biden administration and the states.
The Nation could still create new infrastructure to pump groundwater, for example, but its fight to secure new water rights would be over for the foreseeable future if the least harmful decision against the Navajo were to end the decades-long campaign for water rights from the Colorado River main stem. Future Winters litigation may be affected if the Navajo is found to be the subject of a more general ruling.
It’s an important case because it might have an impact on not only the Navajo Nation and water rights but also the entire body of law that governs whether or not tribes can hold the United States accountable for promises made in treaties, according to Weiner.
The largest animal illness outbreak in American history has been caused by the avian influenza H5N1 wave, which has so far infected 76 countries, sparked national emergencies, and killed millions of wild birds and domestic poultry. The International Organization for Animal Health estimates that more than 140 million chickens have either perished from the virus or have been killed to stop its spread. Wild bird die-offs, however more difficult to count, have proved disastrous.
The momentum must be stopped by something. Industry experts are privately discussing taking a move they have long resisted: immunizing commercial chickens, laying hens, turkeys, and ducks against the flu in the US, where losses are close to 60 million.
That doesn’t sound contentious at all; after all, influenza vaccinations for people are commonplace, and poultry already gets a number of jabs in their first few days of life. Yet, only a select few nations regularly immunize chickens against avian influenza. The introduction of vaccination might result in trade restrictions that would destroy the substantial US export market, pit different chicken industry sectors against one another, and possibly raise consumer concerns about the safety of their food.
Thus, the industry formally rejects what would be a harsh measure. Nonetheless, no one would publicly admit it, but scientists at poultry firms said they don’t see any other options. Researchers that collaborate with the US sector claim that while there may not be much of an option but to start the vaccine process, the US cannot do so on its own.
According to Karen Burns Grogan, a veterinarian and clinical associate professor at the University of Georgia’s Poultry Diagnostic and Research Center, vaccination is a topic that is being considered on a worldwide basis since it would be a decision that would affect everyone. (Georgia produces around 1.3 billion broilers, or meat chickens, annually, more than any other state.) A decision would need to be made by everyone, including the US federal government, the International Organization for Animal Health, and trading partners.
But there’s no certainty that a choice will be made. After a significant outbreak in 2015, the federal government ordered limited supplies of bird vaccines against H5N1 flu, but they might not be able to stop the current strain from spreading. These cannot be used, according to the US Department of Agriculture. And because those doses would probably be administered by hand, increasing the supply sufficiently to protect billions of birds would need both a huge labor force and a massive industrial endeavor.
The conversation needs to be had soon. Although the virus they received was different from the one presently ravaging through birds, and there was no indication the sickness transmitted from them to others, the H5N1 flu recently killed an 11-year-old girl in Cambodia and sickened her father. It is quickly adapting to mammals, most recently killing minks raised in Spain and sea lions off the coast of Peru.
In contrast to its previous pattern, in which wild birds carried the virus but were unaffected by it, H5N1 flu is also causing the death of an uncountable but undoubtedly an enormous number of wild birds. According to naturalist Peter Marra, who also serves as the head of Georgetown University’s Earth Commons Center, the effect on wild bird populations is unparalleled. Several gannets and other species have completely disappeared. And this is true not just of the United States but also of the rest of the Western Hemisphere, including, we presume, Africa.
Moreover, outbreaks in poultry are growing despite the industry’s efforts to tighten its biosecurity procedures. These epidemics result in a great deal of animal suffering: The rapidly spreading illness is so frightening that a well-known expert once dubbed chicken Ebola.
However, a portion of American veterinarians argues that it is inhumane to kill hens by turning off the air, causing them to suffer heat stroke, in order to avoid the spread of disease. The impact on the food supply follows. Last year, flock losses among laying hens alone reduced egg availability by 29% while tripling costs.
The destruction among those hens gives away difficulties in immunization. Depending on what it is used for, every variety of commercial poultry is permitted to live to a different age: Layers and broiler breeders (the parents of meat chickens) are allowed to survive for a year or longer since hens can’t start producing eggs until they’re approximately 26 weeks old, but broilers reach their full size in six to seven weeks and turkeys take around six months to reach market weight.
The fact that the longer-lived breeds—layers, and turkeys—seem to account for more flu-related deaths is peculiar but noteworthy. (It may in part be a result of layer farms housing so many animals on each property that the virus’s introduction kills a lot more birds.) It follows that the poultry and egg industries would gain the most from vaccinations.
But the majority of the US’s poultry exports are neither eggs nor turkeys. Meat is what broilers cook, along with extras like feet that Americans don’t prefer to eat. According to the USDA, broiler meat exports brought in more than $5 billion in 2021.
The argument that the immunological response to vaccination and influenza illness is so similar that healthy birds cannot be separated from carriers is one that many foreign nations that import US chicken have long used to reject meat from vaccinated broilers. In other words, the US chicken industry that needs a vaccination the least would stand to lose the most financially from employing one.
That calculation might be altered by the severity of H5N1’s global attack. An international conference held in Paris last fall looked at lifting impractical restrictions on the use of the avian flu vaccination. The European Union published new laws in November that, subject to certain requirements, allow the vaccination of chickens. Countries in Central and South America, where H5N1 has only recently arrived, have indicated they will start immunizing poultry.
The USDA also approved a five-year study that will look for new avian flu vaccinations, figure out how to demonstrate that they work, and map out whether using such doses causes the flu virus to mutate in ways that vaccines wouldn’t be able to protect against.
Years ago, a section of the flu research community maintained that it was easy to tell diseased birds from vaccinated ones. The DIVA method (for identifying infected from vaccinated animals) involves changing one protein in the circulating strain that is used to produce the vaccine in order to provide a molecular marker.
When tested, vaccinated chickens show antibodies to the substitute strain rather than the wild type, proving that their immunity is a result of the vaccine and that they are therefore safe for trade. The method was applied twice in Italy, in 2000 and 2001, to stop poultry outbreaks brought on by the H7N1 and H7N3 influenza strains.
According to Ilaria Capua, a virologist and senior fellow for global health at Johns Hopkins SAIS Europe in Bologna, other nations have always claimed that the costs associated with vaccination—which include the vaccine itself as well as the testing and potential restrictions on movement—were not worth it. Capua proposed the use of the system in Italy while working at the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale delle Venezie. But if you implement a mechanism that notifies you that a flock is immunized and has not been exposed to the virus, the trade barriers can be eliminated.
Usage of the DIVA system was discontinued in Italy due to the multiyear H7 strain wave fading (albeit not before it claimed the life of a Dutch veterinarian) and the lack of resources in other countries that were at danger at the time to develop a system akin to it. Due to the global spread of the H5N1 flu, the situation has changed. The number of poultry and wild bird species it has been able to infect is a sign that the virus is spreading to a greater number of hosts where it can evolve into more severe forms as well as an indicator of the amount of harm it is causing.
According to experts, this reality makes the need for poultry immunization more pressing. It has long been understood that flu can transfer from wild to domesticated birds via ponds, droppings, or tiny birds that can fit between fan covers. Yet, it’s also likely that during certain times, the flu spreads to wild birds. And while it would be impossible to organize the logistics of immunizing wild birds, we can easily immunize domesticated birds.
