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Chapter | Page(s) | Quote | Keywords |
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| Preface |
xiii |
"Until now, industry and business have been the twin bogeymen of conservation, yet we desperately need their cooperation, innovation and partnership if we are to reverse the trends. Business must move again towards the provision of society's needs and away from the primacy of profit." |
|
| Preface |
xiii |
"...it remains a sad fact that the combination of life expectancy and consumption patterns makes an American child 500 times as much of a burden on the environment as one born in Mali." |
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| A Brief History of Pollution |
6 |
"The plague also precipitated a pogrom against the Jews. Despite the fact that most people believed the disease to be spread thorugh the air, the Jews were blamed for deliberately poisoning the wells. Through the winter of 1348 and on into the next year, the citizens of town after town in central Europe massacred Jews. In Basle they were penned in wooden buildings and burned alive; 600 Jews were killed in Brussels and similar inhumanities occurred in Stuttgart, Frieburg, Dresden, Erfurt, Barcelona and a host of other cities. In trying to explain the blame that was so brutally conferred on the Jews, Philip Ziegler suggests: 'many wells were polluted by seepage from nearby sewage pits. The Jews, with their greater understanding of elementary hygiene, preferred to draw their drinking water from open streams.... Such a habit, barely noticed in normal times, would seem intensely suspicious in the event of plague.'" |
Persecution |
| First Consumer Revolution, The |
42 |
"The development of the new specialisms of advertising and market research as well as the marketing of consumer festivals such as Christmas, all strehgthened the drive towards consumerism." |
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| First Consumer Revolution, The |
46 |
"And then in 1936, along with Standard Oil and the Firestone Tyre Company, GM started National City Lines, a company whose purpose was to buy up and close down rail and tramways that might compete with the car as means of transport." |
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| First Consumer Revolution, The |
46 |
"The flip-side of the consumption coin is population. If everyone in the world were to own a car, there would be 5.5 billion of them on our roads, resulting in global gridlock and unsupportable air pollution. As it is there only [sic] about 500 million cars, but the number is growing at an alarming rate. Ask a car company representative what is the limit to the number of cars in the world and you will be answered with silence. Today's commerce cannot think in terms of limited markets..." |
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| First Consumer Revolution, The |
47 |
"As a result of the consumer revolution described above, the 21 percent of the population that lives in the industrialized world currently consumes roughly 80 percent of global resources and is responsible for the vast majority of waste and pollution." |
|
| First Consumer Revolution, The |
47 |
"Energy used to heat a house or cook a meal in Africa cannot fairly be compared with energy used to overheat a house or to drive a lawnmower in America." |
|
| Water Pollution and Chemical Contamination |
60 |
"Then came the Gulf War whose burning oil fires turned day into night and which spawned apocalyptic visions of global cooling because of the smoke. The global cooling never happened, and it is sobering to note that the total emissions from the months of burning wells contributed a mere 1 percent of total fossil fuel emissions for the globe in 1991. Between us, with our industry, our cars and our electrical appliances we multiply the pollution impacts of the Gulf conflagration a hundredfold." |
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| Water Pollution and Chemical Contamination |
60 |
"American carowners alone pour ten times more motor oil down their drains and sewers every year than the amount of crude oil that was spilled by the Exxon Valdez." |
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| Water Pollution and Chemical Contamination |
62 |
"By the 1960s the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland, Ohio, which flowed into Lake Erie 'ran a chocolate brown or rust colour and was choked with debris, oils, scum and floating organic sludges'. The situation was so extreme in 1969 that the river caught fire and burned bridges crossing it in an inferno of toxic flame and fumes. Although the acute pollution problems of the Great Lakes are receding, the danger now lies with chronic contamination by more than 350 toxic substances. Efforts at clean up are concentrating mainly on the 11 worst ones. This critical list includes PCBs from the electrical industry, dieldrin and toxaphene from agriculture and mercury from the metallurgical, chloralkali and paint industries." |
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| Water Pollution and Chemical Contamination |
63 |
"The issue of the sale of chemicals banned in the coutry of manufacture for use in another, usually developing, nation is a highly sensitve one for the chemical industry. And there is also the associated question of the transfer of manufacturing to developed countries where environmental standards are less strict. These are the 'double standards' issues, and the multinational corporations have been most adept at exploiting the differences in national legislation. There have been numerous documented cases of Northern multinationals' subsidiaries operating double standards leading to pollution in the South. Examples include Mitsubishi and the dumping of radioactive thorium waste in Malaysia; pollution from a Bayer chromium plant near Mexico City; water pollution from the manufacture of dyes in Bombay from a factory partially owned by the Italian Montedison group; and mercury pollution in Nicaragua's Lake Managua from the US Pennwalt Corporation's chlorine plant." |
|
| Poisoned Atmosphere, The |
67 |
"...Britain's Alkali Inspector, Angus Smith, who in 1872 was to publish his book Air and Rain. This seminal work clearly showed that levels of sulphate were an order of magnitude higher in industrial towns and cities than they were in the countryside. Smith coined the phrase 'acid rain'..." |
|
| Poisoned Atmosphere, The |
70 |
"...all compounded by the uncomfortable politcal fact that the worst consequences of climate change will be felt by future generations and poorer countries, yet much of the pollution was caused in the past by rich countries." |
|
| Poisoned Atmosphere, The |
74 |
"In the USA, for instance, the publication of President Clinton's Climate Change Action Plan in October 1993 was greeted with very muted enthusiasm by enviromentalists. The plan, although more detailed than those of other major greenhouse gas emitters such as Japan and Germany, relied mainly on voluntary action by industry, and almost completely failed to address the critical issue of reducing car exhaust emissions. The report authors admitted that 'It relies on the ingenuity, creativity, and sense of responsibility of the American People.' In the eyes of some, this provided a sure sign that the plan would be destined to fail in a country where most working people rate the fear of unemplyment much higher amongst their concerns than the environment." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
78 |
"Post-war America is the undisputed champion of material consumption. Where the US consumer leads, the rest of the world aspires to follow. Bill Clinton presides over an America that eats more meat, uses more water, drives more cars, watches more TV and produces a greater volume of domestic refuse than any other civilization has ever done." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
79 |
"Worldwatch Institute's Alan Durning identified three world consumption classes in his book How Much is Enough? First come the poor. Numbering 1.1 billion, they earn 2 percent of the world's income, eat almost no meat, drink dirty water, travel mostly by foot and struggle to find adequate shelter. Then comes the middle-income clase, who account for a third of global income and include 60 percent of humanity. They have and adequate diet, better sanitation, solid housing, access to electricity and basic stocks of durable consumer items. Durning's third group is the consumer class, and they are us: the 20 percent of the world's population which earns 64 percent of its income, lives on meat and processed food, which drives cars and flies off for vacation taking along the latest in consumer gadgetry. The consumer class is also responsible for much of the world's water pollution, most of its toxic and domestic wastes, for the manufacture of the vast majority of synthetic chemicals, and is the source of approximately 80 percent of global air pollution. Pollutants are now the chief products of the consumer society." |
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| An All Consuming Passion |
80 |
"This economic revolution spawned a situation where even in 1992, President Bush could prepare for the Earth Summit - the largest gathering of heads of state the world has ever seen - by claiming as he got on the plane to Rio, that jobs came before environmental protection. His Vice President, Dan Quayle, headed up the Competitiveness Council, a White House unit set up specifically to block and dismantle environmental legislation perceived by business to be hindering it in the pursuit of production. All this followed a decade from 1985 to 1985 when more than 300 of the 'Fortune 500' companies had been convicted of serious environmental pollution offences." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
82 |
"Europeans buy more than one and half billion pairs of shoes each year, 19 million fridges and freezers, more than 7 million cookers and as many microwave ovens. These go along with annual sales of 21 million colour TVs, nearly 11 million video recorders, 14 million cameras, 4 million electric blankets, 16 million hair dryers and 6 million toasters. History does not yet record how many Mickey Mouse peanut dispensers, dancing Coke cans, plush Garfield car mascots or electronic dog whistles the average European buys." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
82 |
"The modern consumer seems to satisfy a bulimic urge to gorge on goods, vomiting forth a constant stream of waster packaging, obsolescent durables and rubbish, before returning once again with an empty feeling to binge at the trough of commercialism. The amount of garbage flowing from the spending frenzy is prodigious - approximately 350 kilos annually per capita in Europe - and it has been estimated that five times as much waste is generated in manufacture and 20 times as much at the site of original resource extraction. Apart from the pollution, the resource wastage is phenomenal. Domestic water needs, for instance, could be met almost everywhere in the world with about 100 litres per person per day. It takes this much water to produce a kilogram of paper, and 50 tons of water to make a ton of leather." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
86 |
"Aside from aluminum cans, packaging of all kinds in now under the spotlight of environmentalists' attention. In the US, packaging waste accounts for roughly one third of municipal solid waste, while in the Netherlands domestic packaging is thought to make up 22 percent of the total waste stream." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
86-87 |
"The fact that packaging pollution is moving up the political agenda in Europe also can be seen from the new (1991) German Packaging Recycling Ordinance, which requires that manufacturers must take back and recycle packaging materials. Targets have been set for the compulsory recycling of between 64 percent and 72 percent of all packaging materials by June 1995. Less than a year after the law came into effect, there had been a significant move from the use of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and other plastics to paper and card, and a trend towards reduced packaging overall." |
|
| An All Consuming Passion |
88 |
"Plastics pervade the lives of the post-war generation and of the consumer class. The US has 700 times more plastic flamingoes in its backyards than real ones in natural habitats. In Japan individual fruits are packed on polystyrene trays and wrapped in clingfilm. Fresh orange and lemon juice in Switzerland comes in plastic bottles. No trip to the shopping mall or market is complete without a plastic bag. Electrical goods like video cameras, radios and CD players are encased in plastic." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
96 |
"The choices involved in personal transport are some of the most important in reducing energy consumption. Ivan Illich wrote almost twenty years ago that 'the average Amercian male devotes more than 1600 hours a year to his car. He sits in it while it goes and while it stands idling. He parks it and searches for it. He earns the money to put down on it and to meet the monthly installments. He works to pay for the petrol, tolls, insurance, taxes and tickets. He spends four of his sixteen waking hours on the road or gathering his resources for it.'" |
|
| Energy and Survival |
96 |
"In 1907, the year before he became British Prime Minister, Asquith called the motor car 'a luxury which is apt to degenerate into a nuisance'." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
99 |
"In 1990, 15 percent of the world's population bought 79 percent of the world's vehicles." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
99-100 |
"In his apocalyptic tale Christopher Unborn, Carlos Fuentes described 'The mortal breath of three million motors endlessly vomiting puffs of pure posion, black halitosis, buses, taxis, trucks, and private cars, all contributing their flatulence to the extinction of trees, lungs, throats and eyes.'" |
|
| Energy and Survival |
100 |
"In the southern Brazilian city of Curitiba, where the population has tripled in the twenty years of his tenure, Mayor Jaime Lerner has guided an astonishing experiment in urban living. He says, 'we have simply forseen the problems of rapid urban growth', and in doing so the city planner of this remarkable development may have provided a model for sustainable development. Strict land-use zoning and growth of the city along predetermined axes have been central to the success, as has the installaiton of an effective public transport system. Priority lanes allow buses to run seperately from cars, and the mass transit system has been made as comfortable and convenient as possible. One inspiration was to solve some of the problems of the slums, or favelas, by offering food or bus tickets to their inhabitants in exchange for refuse. This helped to tackle the problem of waste collection in the narrow favela tracks, reducing water pollution and pest problems for the people living there, as well as improving resource flow to the poor sectors of the community and enabling them to save money on transport. These and other innovations have led to 1.3 million journeys - in a city of 1.6 million people - being taken on the mass transit system every day, 25 percent lower fuel use than in other Brazilian cities and, above all, a clean and liveable city." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
101 |
"...the air industry is one of the fastest growing energy use sectors in the world. Civil aviation alone contributes approximately 3 percent of global carbon emissions and its total emission are rising by about 4 percent annually." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
105 |
"Energy has, for too long, been associated with development and increased standard of living, and in the modern world, is tied up with the idea of national security. This has led to energy strategies that are driven from the supply side rather than by solid analysis of energy service needs. Per capita consumption of energy can no longer be regarded as an indication of 'modernity', but should be looked at within the context of global development and equity." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
105 |
"At current rates of use, recoverable oil supplies are likely to last only for a further century, yet global annual oil consumption rose from 17 billion barrels in 1970 to 24 billion barrels in 1990. Both natural gas and coal consumption more than doubled over the same period." |
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| Energy and Survival |
106 |
"The lifetime of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is approximately 120 years, therefore coal burned in 1872, the year Angus Smith first published his theories on acid rain, was still having an impact as the nations at the 1990 World Climate Conference stated that stabilization of CO2 at 50 percent above pre-industrial levels by the middle of the next century would require a 'continuous worldwide reduction...by 1 to 2 percent per year, starting now.'" |
|
| Energy and Survival |
106 |
"The new aim should be for the people of all nations to fall within a band of roughly equal per capita energy consumption which provides for an equitable and sustainable quality of life. This must allow for a growth in energy consumption in the developing countries, as energy use is radically reduced in industrialized nations, ultimately leading to convergence at a level which is within the earth's carrying capacity." |
|
| Energy and Survival |
107 |
"On top of these technical changes must come lifestyle changes. Inevitably these will include a move away from use of the private car, change in buying habits, and even in choice of clothes. Just as health conscious eating requires a knowledge of the nutritional and calorie content of food, so will environmentally friendly shopping involve making choices informed by an understanding of the energy costs of purchases." |
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| Pollution in the Making: the Example of Asia |
114 |
"Sewage treatment is available for only 2 percent of China's and 4 percent of India's population." |
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| Pollution in the Making: the Example of Asia |
114 |
"The booming economies of the region [Vietnam's] seem not to have time to wait for the enactment or implementation of water pollution laws." |
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| Pollution in the Making: the Example of Asia |
115 |
"The economic costs of inaction are beginning to add up. It is estimated, for instance, that the equivalent of 1 percent of Jakarta's GDP is spent annually just boiling water to render it drinkable." |
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| Pollution in the Making: the Example of Asia |
116 |
"Apart from destroying valuable agricultural land and natural habitat, golf courses are a significant pollution threat, and the level of fertilizers and herbicides needed to maintain weed-free grass swards in the lush growing conditions of the tropics is phenonenal." |
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| Pollution in the Making: the Example of Asia |
118 |
"In Shenyang, the largest of the Liaoning cities which are the backbone of one of China's most industrialized regions, the rate of lung cancers among women is one of the highest in the world. The air of Shenyang is thick with smoke from coal burning, and toxic chemicals such as lead, arsenic and flourine are found in almost every breath of air." |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
126 |
"The last fight of John Muir's life was the failed battle to save California's Hetch Hetchy Valley from flooding by a dam. Stories of this fight inspired the young Californian David Brower, born in Berkeley in 1912, to take up the fight agaist dams in the American West. Asked in the 1970s why conservationists were 'always against things', Brower replied, 'If you are against something, you are for something. If you are against a dam, you are for a river.'" |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
131-132 |
"The issue of legislation is crucial. Businesses are unlikely to radically change their operations, expecially where cost is involved, if competitors do not also have to do so. It's the 'level playing field syndrome', and once everyone is on the same footing industry will act. International trade can act as a spoiler in this regard because national governments are often reluctant to pass legislation that will put their country's businesses at a disadvantage against those of others. It can also militate aginst the developing world when multinational companies transfer their most polluting operations out of a highly legislated industrialized country to a nation with a need for foreign investment, cheap labour costs and lax pollution standards." |
|
| Politics of Pollution, The |
133 |
"Problems of this sort [the worldwide acid rain problem], however, gave rise to the concept of Integrated Pollution Contorl (IPC). The idea, which is enshrined in 1990 Environmental Protections Acts for both Britain and Sweden, is that the environmental impacts of all pollution control measures should be assessed and that the administrative and legislative structure in government should be integrated. Discharge permitting and licensing should be centralized under one authority to avoid the problem-shifting of the past. Needless to say, IPC has not yet proved effective in either country in its practical application." |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
138 |
"For just as an apparently simple issue cannot effectively be addressed without understanding its root causes and ramifications, neither can a multi-faceted problem be satisfactorily resolved without detailed attention to its constituent facets. In short, we must deal with the lone smoking chimney, the single chemical dump and individual lifestyles, with as much energy and ingenuity as can be brought to bear, just as we must with the social and economic causes of the wider problem." |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
138-139 |
"Central to a world in which personal commitment to change can help achieve concrete improvements in quality of life and reduce pollution will be political, economic and technological change. There is likely to be no more powerful catalyst than internalization of environmental costs in economic calculations. The would help to move industry towards cleaner production, governments to fairer trade and consumers to be more discriminating. Apart from full cost accounting, the reduction of pollution will require radical action in three specific areas: increased emphasis on energy efficiency and the rapid introduction and diffusion of renewable sources; massive reduction of levels of per capita resource consumption in the industrialized world; and a new development path for the Third World, in which long-term envirnonmental security is not sacrificed at the altar of short-term economic growth." |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
139 |
"...Carl Weinberg, Head of Research and Development for California's Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) company has argued for a new value system based on 'enoughness'. Weinberg believes that this is different from sustainability or efficiency, and defines 'enoughness' as 'meeting a need for getting the job done in a manner using the least resources and having the least environmental impacts. It means considering all the options to meet a need, and adopting the option that is just enough.' In the electricity business, this paradigm requires utiltiies to invest widely in energy efficiency and conservation measures rather than just trying to sell as much electricity as possible." |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
140 |
"In Chicago too, the search for new solution is hotting up. The Center for Neighbourhood Technology (CNT) has been working to help polluting industries modernize and clean up, where environmental groups might just have watched those companies go out of business. Their efforts for the electroplating industry in Chicago and Los Angeles have encouraged companies in those cities to clean up and increase jobs, while the metal-finishing industries have been laying people off everywhere else in the US. Now CNT plans to do the same for the printing and dry-cleaning industries, and they are already working to promote a non-solvent based cleaning system first developed in the UK." |
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| Politics of Pollution, The |
141 |
"In theory elected governments do what the voters want, businesses exist to serve their stakeholders and meet consumer demand, and institutions like the World Bank provide the financial and technical resources for Third World development. In reality, governments generally direct their programmes at staying in power, businesses create demand for products and promote a slavish sturggle up the ladder of consumption, and the Bank's prime objective is a good rate of financial return. Until such attitudes and practices change, pollution will continue to eat away at and rot the fabric of our societies." |
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