Nonetheless, lead poisoning is a serious problem.

[Andrew D]

According to the CDC:

Today at least 4 million households have children living in them that are being exposed to lead. There are approximately half a million U.S. children ages 1-5 with blood lead levels above 5 micrograms per deciliter (µg/dL), the reference level at which CDC recommends public health actions be initiated. Lead exposure can affect nearly every system in the body. Because lead exposure often occurs with no obvious symptoms, it frequently goes unrecognized.

Half a million U.S. children with dangerous levels of lead in their blood strikes me as a serious problem.

[oldr_n_wsr]

Where's it coming from?

[rubato]

Lead in motor fuel and leaded paint are two main sources. Even though lead is now banned from US fuel for cars there is a lot of lead already deposited in soil from past emissions. Leaded paint is ubiquitous in older buildings where children can be exposed directly, when paint chips or flakes into the soil or when the surface oxidizes and produces dust. And as I mentioned elsewhere lead pollution in other countries (Czech, China &c) winds up in food which becomes a part of international trade and thus part of our food supply.

In short, the only way for us to have a better life for our children is to be concerned with pollution everywhere else as well.

yrs,
rubato

[Sean]

Sushi...

[Joe Guy]

I always ask for lead free sushi.

[Sue U]

Unleaded sushi is easy to get. It's the mercury-free sushi that's a lot tougher to find.

[rubato]

Mercury is more widespread because of coal burning but at least its not in the form of methyl mercury.

yrs,
rubato

[dales]

[Big RR]

True, the mercury released into the atmosphere by burning of coal is inorganic mercury, but certain microorganisms in aquatic systems will convert this to methyl mercury, which is then eaten by fish... Sadly, as we burn more coal (and it's inevitable that we will), this will also increase.

[rubato]

... Sadly, as we burn more coal (and it's inevitable that we will), this will also increase.

Not inevitable at all. The US is in the process of cutting the use of coal for generating electricity.

yrs,
rubato

[dales]

We're going nukilar.

[rubato]

We're going nukilar.

I thought you were against higher energy costs? Nuclear is the expensive option.

yrs,
rubato

[Lord Jim]

I saw this on Farid Zakaria's CNN program Global Public Square yesterday...

I don't often agree with Farid,..(he's a complete defeatist when it comes to the projection of American power).. but he's a bright guy with an interesting show...If you're interested in international affairs, I highly recommend it.

But I definitely think he's on to something here; here's the text of what he had to say :

07:00 AM ET
Could fracking in China be a climate game changer?

We have been thinking about an idea in the opinion pages of the New York Times to tackle one of the great challenges of our times: cutting carbon emissions to slow down climate change. It would result in the single largest reduction of CO2 emissions globally of any feasible idea out there. But there are a couple of hitches. Let's explain.

Here's the idea: it's time to help China master fracking safely.

By now it's clear that fracking (the process of extracting shale gas) has dramatically lowered America's CO2 emissions. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, in 2006, a fifth of our electricity came from natural gas, while almost 50 percent came from coal. By 2012, natural gas had increased its share to 30 percent of our electricity. Coal's share dropped to 37 percent. The change was because of fracking: over that same period, shale gas production grew 800 percent.

The reason this shift is important is that coal is the world's dirtiest source of energy – both in its emissions of CO2 and particle pollutants. Thanks in large part to our reduced dependency on coal, U.S. CO2 emissions hit an 18-year low in 2012. U.S. emissions fell over the last five years by more than all of Europe's did. So – and this is the first hitch – environmentalists have to understand that, whatever the fantasies, natural gas is in reality producing a dramatic reduction in carbon emissions.


But now the second hitch. Why is it a good idea to help what some consider our greatest rival catch up with us? Why should we help China copy our winning formula?

The answer is simple: it's a win-win scenario.

In the past two decades, despite global investments in clean energy, the International Energy Agency says that net-net, the world's energy consumption has gotten cleaner by only 1 percent. We've essentially made no progress. Why? Well in large part, it is because of the means by which China is powering its super-fast growth. IEA data shows that if you exclude China, global consumption of coal has increased only slightly in the past decade. China, by comparison, has more than doubled its consumption. It now burns nearly as much coal as the rest of the world, combined. And it won't stop there. Every week, it opens new coal plants, leading to increasingly polluted and hazardous air. This, of course, is not just China's problem…but the whole world's problem.

As it turns out, we're not the only ones sitting on top of a shale gold mine: China actually has shale gas reserves that are nearly 50 percent larger than ours.

Beijing is going to try and mine these reserves in every way it can. But many experts worry that China lacks the experience and technology to frack effectively. As important, it really has no understanding of how to frack safely. Here in the United States, we have environmentalists and a free press to push authorities to regulate and monitor this very new industry. China, on the other hand, may not have the same checks and balances.

This is why the United States needs to share its expertise, not keep it secret.

One of the perennial dilemmas at any climate summit is how to wean developing countries off of the dirtiest forms of energy. China can – understandably – argue that its overriding priority is growth. As the last few decades have shown, a fast-growing China translates to a fast-growing world. A cleaner China would have a similar impact.

http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com ... e-changer/

I think it's impossible to overstate the significance of this:

By now it's clear that fracking (the process of extracting shale gas) has dramatically lowered America's CO2 emissions. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, in 2006, a fifth of our electricity came from natural gas, while almost 50 percent came from coal. By 2012, natural gas had increased its share to 30 percent of our electricity. Coal's share dropped to 37 percent. The change was because of fracking: over that same period, shale gas production grew 800 percent.

What this means is that in just six short years, the application of fracking technology (which has received a pittance in financial support from the US government) has done more to reduce US CO2 emissions than all the billions spent on wind mills and solar panels in the past 20 years combined... ( or the reduction that those technologies are likely to produce in the next 20 years)

It's clear that in both the short and mid term, fracking technology is the key both to ending our dependence on energy from odious sources, (while still meeting the needs of a growing economy) and reducing the output of green house gasses....

And it makes perfect sense to share this technology with other countries. (I agree with rube's basic premise; that we need to be concerned about what other countries are doing environmentally; especially those with large and growing economies)

[Big RR]

... Sadly, as we burn more coal (and it's inevitable that we will), this will also increase.

Not inevitable at all. The US is in the process of cutting the use of coal for generating electricity.

yrs,
rubato

I hope you are right and that we will continue curtailing the burning of coal to generate electricity, but as petroleum becomes more scarce (and expensive) I doubt it.

[Lord Jim]

Big RR, as the article I posted points out, in just the past 6 years, the percentage of electricity generated by coal in this country has dropped from 50% to 37%...

That represents a huge drop in a very short period of time, and we have fracking to thank for that.

[Big RR]

Jim--no doubt, but when energy becomes scarcer and more expensive, I predict we will start using coal again at ever expanding rates. It will become "we need energy, the environment be damned", with a slightly better spin on it.

I hope I'm wrong, but I'll bet I'm not.

[oldr_n_wsr]

I predict we will start using coal again at ever expanding rates.

And I predict that technology will make it much cleaner when that happens.

[Big RR]

Let's hope.

[Andrew D]

As I demonstrated not long ago, even if we could reduce our per capita output of greenhouses gases by one-third between now and 2050 -- an unlikely achievement, especially considering the populous countries whose per capita emissions of greenhouse gases are growing rapidly -- unless we do something about population growth, our total output of greenhouse gases will be exactly what it is today. In other words, our herculean efforts will have accomplished exactly nothing.

We cannot go on like this -- not if we want a reasonable and sustainable standard of living for ourselves, our loved ones, our posterity, and the rest of our fellow human beings. Whether the human population of our planet will be reduced is not a serious question; it will. The serious questions are when and, most importantly, how.