Daily Archives: December 18, 2006

Tomorrow’s Child

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Ray Anderson in his wonderful and inspiring book, Mid-Course Correction, provides a poem by one Interfaces’ employee – Glenn Thomas. This poem best lays out the need to work towards Sustainability.

Tomorrow’s Child
Without a name; an unseen face
and knowing not your time nor place
Tomorrow’s Child, though yet unborn,
I met you first last Tuesday morn.

A wise friend introduced us two,
and through his shining point of view
I saw a day which you would see;
A day for you, and not for me.

Knowing you has changed my thinking
for I never had an inkling
That perhaps the things I do
might someday, somehow, threaten you.

Tomorrow’s Child, my daughter-son
I’m afraid I’ve just begun
To think of you and of your good,
Though always having known I should.

Begin I will to weigh the cost
of what I squander; what is lost
If ever I forget that you
will someday come to live here too.

Glenn Thomas, © 1996

Is 1 Million Years Enough?

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In what can be said the biggest acknowledgment of the dangers of Nuclear Energy, the EPA is considering regulations for nuclear waste for the next 1 million years.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is preparing to issue a regulation that will govern the disposal of power plant nuclear waste in the United States for the next 1 million years. “This will be the only rule that applies for such a long duration into the future,” said Elizabeth Cotsworth, the EPA director of radiation and indoor air, in an interview with National Public Radio. “Most EPA rules apply for the foreseeable future — five or six generations. This rule is for basically 25,000 generations.”

Opponents of the Yucca Mountain plan countered with a lawsuit, arguing that the 10,000-year regulation did not extend far enough into the future. The courts agreed, so the EPA extended the regulation to 1 million years—100 times longer than the period covered by the original regulation.

Increasing concerns about the acceleration of global warming have helped to renew interest in nuclear power generation—even among some environmentalists—a development that has also raised new concerns about the best way to dispose of nuclear waste that can remain toxic for 100,000 years or more.

Even as the US EPA is considering this, Westinghouse won a deal to estimated at USD 8 Billion to build China’s new nuclear plants. Just considering the need for a regulation like this puts the risk of nuclear energy far higher than anything else.

Livestock endangered

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The AFP reports that 20% of livestock are in danger of extinction.

Some 20 percent of the world’s livestock species — cattle, pigs and poultry — are threatened with extinction, with one breed disappearing each month, the Food and Agriculture Organization warned.

Over the past five years alone, some 60 breeds of cattle, goats, pigs, horses and poultry have become extinct, the Rome-based UN agency said in a draft document, blaming globalization as the “biggest single factor” in the erosion of livestock biodiversity.

“Maintaining animal genetic diversity will allow future generations to select stocks or develop new breeds to cope with emerging issues, such as climate change, diseases and changing socio-economic factors,” said Jose Esquinas-Alcazar, secretary of the FAO’s Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.

Rearing livestock contributes to the livelihoods of one billion people in the world, the FAO says.

Livestock are the mainstay of human species. Reading livestock is one of the most important aspects of survival and growth in the world for man. Biodiversity is important in generally for a variety of reasons and in this case of global diseases it is far more important.

Business need to understand that like diverse portfolio investments in various financial assets, it is important to have a wide variety of species for overall benefit.