Researchers in southern California explored that question in a new paper published in the Journal of Adolescent Health.  They teamed up with the community-based group Youth, Family, School and Community Partnership in Action to recruit about 100 adolescents aged 12 to 21 years to participate in the study.  Each participant made two restaurant visits, one to a McDonald’s and one to a Subway restaurant, on predesignated dates and times.  They were instructed to order a meal, turn in their receipts (on-site) to a research assistant and complete a short written survey.  The researchers prepared food intake surveys for each participant’s meal in order to calculate calorie intake and other nutritional information about the meal purchased.

The mean age of the participants was 16.9 years, 61 percent were males and 47 percent were Asian.   The adolescents purchased 1,038 calories of food at McDonald’s, compared to 955 calories at Subway.  The overall 83-calorie difference was not statistically significant.  At McDonald’s, the participants purchased more grams of carbohydrates and sugars, and fewer grams of protein.  There was no difference, however, in the amount of fat or saturated fat purchased at the two restaurants.   The difference in price of the meals was statistically significant with the McDonald’s meal averaging $4.46 and the Subway meal averaging $6.14.

The authors conclude:

“the true measure of a healthy restaurant is whether people actually consume a healthy meal there.”

Both McDonald’s and Subway offer less calorie-dense options, but making healthier choices requires mindful, not mindless eating.  After all, Jared Fogle  lost 245 pounds eating Subway sandwiches and went on to become the company’s spokesperson.   The Jared lunch consisted of a modest 6-inch sub (about 250 calories) and 120-calorie bag of baked potato chips.  That’s fewer than 400 calories.   I guess the teenagers in the study who racked up 955 calories at Subway were going for the footlongs, smeared with mayo and layered with cheese.

This is one of those books that contains political propaganda, is printed in large(ish) numbers, then sent around to teachers, academics, policy makers, etc. whether they want a copy or not; it is a sort of high level form of spam. You may remember Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life (A Free Press Paperbacks Book) or J. Philippe Rushton’s Race, Evolution, and Behavior : A Life History Perspective (2nd Special Abridged Edition), also produced by entities with an anti-social (in this case, racist) agenda, with piles of free copies sent out to a gazillion people. This is the same thing, but for climate change. It is a climate denialist book.

I’m not going to critique The Mad, Mad, Mad World of Climatism: Mankind and Climate Change Mania because my friend and colleague John Abraham has already done a great job of that:

Heartland Institute wastes real scientists’ time – yet again

This spring, I began receiving calls and emails from colleagues about a strange little book that was mailed to environmental science professors around the country. This was a big mailing, in total, a reported 100,000 copies were sent out. What was it about this little book that got us talking? Many things. First….

CLICK HERE to read John’s excellent blog post. You won’t want to miss this. Also, while you are there look at the other posts at John’s new blog, written with Dana Nuccitelli.

Since we are on the subject of books and science denialism, may I recommend that you read, if you’ve not already, Shawn Otto’s excellent book Fool Me Twice: Fighting the Assault on Science in America.

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Photo Credit: AZRainman via Compfight cc

As is occasionally my habit, I have pulled together a chronology of sorts. It is a chronology of all the various cuts, insults, muzzlings and cancellations that I’ve been able to dig up. Each of them represents a single shot in the Canadian Conservative war on science. It should be noted that not every item in this chronology, if taken in isolation, is necessarily the end of the world. It’s the accumulated evidence that is so damning.

Most of the items come from various links I’ve saved over the years as well as various other media articles I’ve dug up over the last week or so. This series at The Huffington Post has been particularly useful as has this article at the Wastershed Sentinal.

A long list of various environmental programs that the Harper government has discontinued or slashed funding to is here. I haven’t found individual media stories about all of them, so they aren’t in the list below. If you can help me find stories about some of those programs, etc, please let me know. As well, some stories are treated multiple times, with perhaps an initial story telling the big picture or introducing a large series of cuts and later stories fleshing out details.

• Apr 2006. One Tonne Challenge funding stopped

• Jan 2008. Office of National Science Adviser phased out
• Jan 2008. Nuclear safety watchdog head fired for ‘lack of leadership’
• Oct 2009. Document delivery outsourced at The Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information (national science library)
• Feb 2010. Layoffs at The Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information
• Mar 2010. Information restrictions brought in by government have severely restricted the media’s access to government researchers
• Jun 2010. Statistics Canada discontinues the mandatory long form census
• Mar 2011. NRC Press privatized to Canadian Science Publishing, removing Open Access to many articles
• Mar 2011. NSERC reduces funding for basic research
• Mar 2011. Tri-Council reallocates funds from discovery to industry research
• Jul 2011. Budget cuts to Climate Change and Clean Air, Substance and Waste Management, Weather and Environmental Services, Water Resources and Internal Services, Action Plan on Clean Water, the Federal Contaminated Sites Action Plan, Chemicals Management Plan, the Clean Air Agenda, the Air Quality Health Index, Species at Risk Program
• Jul 2011. NSERC Discovery Grants reduced
• Oct 2011. Canadian Environmental Network closes
• Dec 2011. Withdraw from the Kyoto Accord
• Jan 2012. Natural Resources Minister accuses foreign radical environmentalists of hijacking the system
• Feb 2012. Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory (PEARL) loses funding (later partial reprieve)
• Feb 2012. Closure of Kitsilano Coast Guard station
• Mar 2012. Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences closes
• Mar 2012. Guting the Fisheries Act
• Apr 2012. Cereal Research Centre cut
• Apr 2012. Muzzling of scientists at international conferences
• Apr 2012. Repeal of Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, download to provinces
• Apr 2012. Sustainable Water Management Division cut
• Apr 2012. Transport Canada Aircraft Services cut
• Apr 2012. The Centre for Plant Health relocated (later reprieve)
• Apr 2012. Scientists monitored at polar conference
• May 2012. 1000 jobs cut at Department of Fisheries and Oceans (details follow)
• May 2012. Ocean Contaminants & Marine Toxicology Program axed.
• May 2012. Centre for Offshore Oil & Gas Energy Research cut
  May 2012. Freshwater Institute cut

• May 2012. Centre for Off-shore Oil, Gas, and Energy Research cut
• May 2012. Maurice-Lamontagne Institute cut
• May 2012. Smokestacks Emissions Monitoring Team cut
• May 2012. Cuts to NSERC Discovery, Major Resources Support and Research Tools and Instruments programs
• May 2012. Mersey Biodiversity Centre slated for closure
• Jun 2012. Eliminate Experimental Lakes Area program
• Jul 2012. Arctic Institute of North America’s Kluane Research Station cut
• Sep 2012. Revamp Species-at-Risk act
• Oct 2012. DFO Habitat Management Program cut
• Oct 2012. Declining grant success rate for Post Doctoral Fellows
• Nov 2012. Bill C-45 weakens environmental laws and democracy, such as Navigable Waters Protection Act
• Nov 2012. Salmon research lab run by Frederick Kibenge at the Atlantic Veterinary College-University of Prince Edward Island targeted
• Nov 2012. Navigable Waters Protection Act altered to give developers more freedom to build around most Canadian rivers and lakes without obtaining permission from the federal government
• Dec 2012. Eliminating the Hazardous Materials Information Review Commission
• Jan 2013. Very long list of scientist muzzlings from Democracy Watch
• Feb 2013. Restrict how researchers can share data
• Feb 2013. Department of Fisheries & Oceans muzzles its scientists
• Feb 2013. Information commissioner investigates ‘Muzzling’ of federal scientists, called a threat to democracy
• Feb 2013. Prairies Regional Office: Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency closes
• Mar 2013. Muzzling of scientists
• Mar 2013. Experimental Lakes Area environmental research project loses funding
• Mar 2013. The government votes against public science, basic research and the free and open exchange of scientific information are essential to evidence-based policy-making
• Mar 2013. $100 million cut from Department of Fisheries & Oceans over three years
• Mar 2013. National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy closes
• Mar 2013. Centralizing, Slashing Federal Web Info
• Mar 2013. Quit UN anti-drought convention
• Mar 2013. Unnecessarily sabotaging ongoing research at the Experimental Lakes Area and deliberately robbing international and domestic scientist of the 2013 field season
• Apr 2013. Create barrier to public participation in pipeline hearings
• Apr 2013. Environment Canada name removed from it’s weather website, replaced with government promotional links
• Apr 2013.Closure of Department of Fisheries & Oceans libraries
• Apr 2013. Prime Minister & cabinet take over power to dictate collective bargaining and terms for other salaries and working conditions at the CBC and three other cultural or scientific Crown corporations
• Apr 2013. Scientist at National Water Research Institute in Saskatoon muzzled
• Apr 2013. Minister blames David Suzuki, Environmental Groups To Blame For Pipeline Opposition
• May 2013. Minister of the Environment Peter Kent refuses to correct Conservative MP’s crackpot views on polar bears
• May 2013. Minister of Natural Resources insults oil sands critics
• May 2013. National Research Council overhauled to do business-friendly research rather than basic science
• May 2013. Hundreds of jobs cut at Agriculture Canada
• May 2013. Agriculture Canada cuts including Prairie Farm Rehabilitation Administration, Semi-Arid Prairie Agricultural Research Centre and various centres for beef and dairy research
• May 2013. Free-speech report takes aim at Harper government’s ‘culture of secrecy’

This list is no doubt incomplete. There may also be link errors or duplications.

In particular, if you have updates on any of the stories, including reversals or reprieves, I want to hear those too.

Please feel free to make suggestions and corrections in the comments or to me at jdupuis at yorku dot ca.

Some things I see, I think: yes, you’re doing that very well. But I understand what you’re doing, and I could, if not do it myself – I could understand how to train to get there. Like running a marathon in not-much-more-than-2-hours. I’m never going to do that, and even if I trained I couldn’t, but I can roughly understand what’s going on. With this, I can’t even imagine my brain and hands working well enough to get anywhere close to this.

Sirocko et al.:Solar influence on winter severity in central Europe

Most of what you want to know about that is at Claim of solar influence is on thin ice: are 11-year cycle solar minima associated with severe winters in Europe? Although the idea itself isn’t totally wacky; Are cold winters in Europe associated with low solar activity? by Lockwood et al. comes to similar conclusions to Sirocko. Andy Extance (who he? I’m sure I know the name) doesn’t like it either.

GMO labelling

I liked KK channelling Ramez Naam on Why GMO Supporters Should Embrace Labels.

Climate and conflict

I’ve largely ignored this area. Perhaps What is the debate over climate and conflict about? is a good intro.

Climate sensitivity

Seems to becoming interesting again. JA has a post on a recent multi-author study that finds lower values that those from the good olde dayes when I paid attention. SS didn’t much like Lewis’s J. Clim. paper but those I’ve asked think it sane, and Lewis. Though it would be nice if he learnt not to associate too closely with the non-sane.

[Update: Da Plot Thickens. Such fun!

Politics

Pols in Dixie seem even more dysfunctional that anywhere else. BB senses some signs of hope in National Journal: The Coming GOP Civil War Over Climate Change; but from a very low base.

Marcott

Last month’s thrill was Marcott et al.; but a question I alluded to briefly was: “is he notable”? The answer is No or in more detail:

2013-05-16T00:16:42 Legoktm (talk | contribs) deleted page Shaun Marcott (Expired PROD, concern was: he is only postdoc with a nature publication)

which seems fair enough.

Busy

Blacklight retribution, rowing, work and the garden all mean I’m fairly busy now.

Refs

* Political failure modes and the beige dictatorship. Its not quite right, but I struggle to say what I mean in that area.
* Don’t make fun of renowned Dan Brown.
* mt also likes VV and adds a couple of nice extra points.
* Agnotology: learning from mistakes – Benestad et al..

This is a bit nuanced but important, and I want to make clear what is going on here.

Normally, environmental impact assessments are done by private contractors ultimately hired by the entity that is building the project that could have the impacts. I often hear people complain that Trans Canada, the group that wants to build the Keystone XL pipeline across the United States to allow the export of it’s bitumen (a kind of soft coal like oily thing) overseas to places like China and Europe, “hired the contractor” that did the environmental impact assessment, and therefore they are corrupt and evil and so on and so forth. But this is how it works. The entity doing the work is responsible to pay for and supply support for the review. There is nothing wrong with that.

Also, there is a more specific allegation that individuals who work for the contractor that did the Keystone XL Pipeline review have worked previously for Trans Canada and other oil interests and therefore the are corrupt and evil and so on and so forth. This, in itself, is also incorrect. Yes, those individuals have worked for Trans Canada and other oil interests, but this is normal, expected, and in fact, a good thing. You really don’t want to have individuals with zero experience working on these important jobs, and you really don’t want to have an industry where people get trained up, with advanced degrees and apprenticeship, to work in a given sub sector of environmental management, then allow them to have one contract then put them on an ice flow.

Having said all that, which is true and must be kept in mind when complaining about Trans Canada and Keystone XL, there is a problem. The system where corporations hire contractors to look into environmental effects is corruptible. This isn’t the most corruptible way to do this. If government agencies did the work themselves, or hired subcontractors, that would be corruptible too. There is no way to do this that is not corruptible.

For this reason, regulatory agencies are supposed to keep a close eye on what happens. There are forms that must be filled out honestly that might reveal potential conflicts of interest, for example. Once these forms are in the hands of the appropriate regulatory agencies, their veracity must be checked, and if there is any problem, that must be very closely looked into.

From the information I’ve seen, it seems almost 100% likely that the process of arranging for the second Keystone XL environmental impact assessment involved some serious mistakes, and there is almost as good of a chance that those mistakes involved purposeful manipulation of information by the environmental contractor as well as by the State Department itself.

I’m not going to try to prove this to you or even summarize the information because it is all well laid out in THIS PDF of a letter from Bold Nebraska, Center for Biological Diversity, Environment America, Friends of the Earth, League of Conservation Voters, National Wildlife Federation, Natural Resources Defense Council, Nebraska Farmers’ Union, Public Citizen, Sierra Club and 350.org. It would appear that the contractor, ERM, failed to disclose its ties to the American Petroleum Institute, TransCanada and other companies that stand to benefit from Keystone. There may be nothing wrong with having those ties but they must be disclosed so they can be looked into and monitored. Also, the State Department employees attempted to cover these ties up during the review process, which implies collusion between the regulatory agency and the contractor.

Go read the letter and learn all the details.

Then, you might want to sign this petition from Friends of the Earth to “Tell Secretary of State John Kerry: Investigate Big Oil’s Influence on the Keystone XL Review.”

Private contractors hire other private contractors to do environmental review, and this process is overseen by regulatory agencies, with the State Department in this case being a regulatory agency. But who oversees that process, to makes sure it stays clean, fair, and legal? Well, you, the citizen. And who helps you do that? Organizations created by citizens, such as those noted above.

So that’s what is happening now. Time to act. Your move…..

NEW YORK and COLORADO SPRINGS, May 16, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — Over half of sustainable, responsible, impact (SRI) investment industry professionals say that retail investors (65 percent) and institutional investors (53 percent) are currently expressing interest in fossil fuel-free portfolios in the face of growing signs of climate change, according to First Affirmative Financial Network’s Fossil Fuels Divestment Survey.

Read the rest here.

See also this:

Securities of fossil fuels firms, as an economic sector, may soon be on the decline.

Predictions as to when oil and gas will become a smaller part of the investment society makes into its total energy mix, in favor of renewables such as solar, wind and ocean energies, vary, ranging from 2060 on the long side (this prediction from oil industry powerhouse Shell) to 2030 or even sooner on the shorter side (as reported by Bloomberg). But so far, markets appear to be mispricing the risk this presents to fossil fuels companies, and their share prices for now remain high. In our opinion, it’s not too soon to consider divesting from fossil fuels while one might still recover significant value.

The rest of that story is here.

On Saturday, May 18, the second international “

Check out this interactive map that shows all of the participating countries.

Here at the University of California, Davis, the renowned Botanical Conservatory will be open from 10am – 1pm on the 18^th of May to celebrate Fascination of Plants Day 2013. The conservatory is home to the titan, or Amorphophallus titanium, a truly fascinating plant that takes 15 years to bloom, and has only been known to flower about 100 times around the world, including 7 times at UC-Davis!

Two more exciting events are plants in California, one at the Plant Biology Department at the Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford and the other at the Livermore Art Association. At Stanford, middle school students from East Palo Alto will use advanced imaging technologies to observe fluorescence and luminescence in plant materials. Further details about this event can be found here on the Fascination of Plants Day website. At the second event in Livermore, local artists and children will celebrate the impact of plants on our lives by decorating bicycle wheels with creative plant themes. On May 18th the wheels will be displayed by participating businesses in downtown Livermore along the path of the Amgen Tour of California. Details about this event can be found here.

The Fascination of Plants Day has attracted a lot of attention all over the world, with the Ministers of Agriculture in the Czech Republic, Norway and Slovakia officially serving as national patrons. The nearly 1000 events internationally will showcase about 250,000 plant species! Details about the various events and lots of fun facts and information can be found on Twitter.

Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree: #climate change is real, man-made and dangerous. Read more: OFA.BO/gJsdFp

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) May 16, 2013

The residents’ quest for answers took the form of a petition delivered in late 2009 to the Board of County Commissioners of Garfield County, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, and the Colorado Oil & Gas Conservation Commission.  The residents’ group, called Battlement Concerned Citizens, urged the government officials:

“to defer any permitting decisions related to natural gas exploration and/or production within the Planned Unit Development of Battlement Mesa until a thorough study of public health, safety and welfare concerns associated with urban natural gas development has been completed.”

BCC specifically asked County and State officials to conduct a Health Impact Assessment (HIA) before any special use permit for natural gas exploration and development was approved within the Battlement Mesa community.  BCC had done their research on HIAs, knowing they are a systematic tool for assessing the potential health consequences of a proposed policy, program, or project.  Some of the gas wells would be about 500 feet from homes.

Within a few months, the Garfield County Department of Public Health was collaborating with the Colorado School of Public Health (CSPH) to develop the HIA.   Funding was provided by Garfield County and a $150,000 grant from the Pew Charitable Trusts.  A forthcoming paper in the American Journal of Public Health written by the CSPH team reports the findings of the assessment, and then the fallout.

First the findings.  Based on extensive input from the community and other stakeholders, eight major areas of public health concern were identified:

• health effects from air emissions
• water contamination
• truck traffic
• noise and light pollution
• accidents and malfunctions
• strain on healthcare system
• psychosocial stress associated with community changes, and
• housing value depression

Based on the research team’s review of the available data, they concluded that

“air pollutant levels were likely to increase in Battlement Mesa as a result of the natural gas development project.”

They noted that residents in an adjacent community with current gas-well development have reported short-term symptoms (e.g., headaches, upper respiratory irritation) during “odor events” that occur with gas well operations.  In addition, they projected a substantial increase in vehicle traffic.  Based on information provided by the gas developer, residents could expect an additional 40 to 280 truck trips per day to each gas well pad.  In addition, about 120 to 150 workers would commute into the community.  The authors write:

“Because Battlement Mesa does not house other industrial activities and commercial activities are minimal, this change in traffic patterns would represent a consequential change.”

The CSPH researchers also projected that noise levels would increase during the well-development period and could result in health impacts, such as sleep disturbances, fatigue, mood changes, and impaired condition.  Residents’ concerns about property value declines were found to be grounded in fact.  The researchers referred to a Garfield County specific study which reported an average 15% decline in property values during well development, which persisted for two years after completion of the wells.  “Declining land values,” the CSPH authors wrote, “could cause residents psychosocial stress,” and its health effects “should not be discounted.”

In contrast, they did not think exposure to contaminated drinking water was likely given the community’s source water is located upstream of the project.  The researchers concluded that industry-related chemical or waste spills would be unlikely, as would fires and explosions.  They did not project measurable increases in crime, sexually-transmitted diseases, or school enrollment that could be attributed alone to the gas development project.

Second, the fallout.

A first draft of the HIA was available for stakeholder input in Fall 2010.   Interest in the document was intense, not just from the Battlement Concerned Citizens’ group or residents of Garfield County, but nationwide.   The HIA was the first of its kind related to natural gas development.  A broader group of interests, including an industry trade group, “caused the focus of the HIA to shift from addressing possible exposures to parties sparring over risk assessment methods,” as the CSPH authors write in their paper.  A process and document that was supposed to help local officials make an informed decision turned into a battle before the Garfield County Commission.

NPR’s Elizabeth Shogren reported in May 2012 on the HIA fallout.  The West Slope Colorado Oil & Gas Association said the CSPH researchers “used what we believe was questionable data, at best.”  A long-time Garfield County Commissioner told Shogren:

“this is a football in the arena of global warming and anti-oil and gas, or anti-environment. We said enough is enough, people.”

The County Commission voted to leave the HIA as an unfinished document and to end the project.  Regardless, the information contained in the draft HAI is valuable.  It illustrates a site-specific and systematic way to evaluate potential health impacts of a proposed policy.  I’ve no doubt that the residents of Battlement Mesa are better informed about the magnitude and severity of the likely health impacts related to natural gas development in their community, than they were before the HIA was developed.  To their credit, the Garfield County Department of Environmental Health has the draft HIA and other project documents on its website.