Green Journal

When you buy anything "to go" the person at the counter, waiter in the resto or even the ordinary carinderia will put your food in a styrofoam. I get tired telling people-- please do not put my food in styrofoam. I do not use styrofoam. I get these stares as if I am an alien from Mars or whatever. Then I slowly explain about the growing Payatas trash that I do not want that because that is the easiest way for them to recognize why I opt not to use styrofoam. Well in fact as I hope most people know that styrofoam contributes to greenhouse gas, that contributes to global warming and thus might be causing all these super typhoons. For more expert opinion please click The Green Office . just to quote from that website: Styrofoam, or polystyrene, engenders a host of environmental and health detriments. It’s made from non-renewable fossil fuels, and its production releases the harmful greenhouse gas HCFC-22 into the atmosphere. Heavy exposure to polystyrene is linked to headaches,...

"usok, usok" as the song of Noel Cabangon goes "usok na nakamamatay" . I hate smokers. I hate inhaling second-hand smoke. It is unfair for those who doesn't smoke that the air is actually getting dirty and un-breathable when you are with people who smoke. This is fact: Second-hand smoke is actually more dangerous than directly inhaled smoke. It’s harmful even when you cannot see or smell it. Here’s why: * Second-hand smoke releases the same 4,000 chemicals (50 are known to cause cancer) as smoke that is directly inhaled, but in even greater quantity. Second-hand smoke contains: o 2 times more tar which gums up lungs and breathing passages o 5 times more carbon monoxide, which reduces the amount of oxygen in the blood * Cigarettes burn for approximately 12 minutes, but smokers usually only inhale for 30 seconds. As a result, cigarettes are spewing second-hand smoke into the air for non-smokers and smokers to breathe. * Even after ...

After Typhoon Milenyo, Paeng, Reming and now Seniang. I am really alarmed at how our old house in Alaminos will stay in tact. The roof is almost falling down crumbling to be exact the last time I saw it. Then this leads me to recall climate change and global warming. I visited some blogs to look up on this issue and I was led to Grist Blog Environmental News and Commentary discussing about Al Gore. Then I remembered Elnora raving about the film An Inconvenient Truth . So guys what do you think about all these Super Typhoons in relation to Climate Change?

EcoGeek - Technology for the Environment - The Single Most Important Environmental Innovation "Condoms aren't solar powered or reusable or even recyclable, but they've made the environmental revolution possible. As simple birth control continues its spread across the globe, it leaves behind happier healthier societies with significantly less impact on the planet. That is the power of true innovation." crossposted here

Amazon Indians use Google Earth, GPS to protect forest home "South America, Amazon Indians are using Google Earth, Global Positioning System (GPS) mapping, and other technologies to protect their fast-dwindling home." “Google Earth is used primarily for vigilance,” Vasco van Roosmalen, ACT’s Brazil program director, said in an interview with mongabay.com. “Indians log on to Google Earth and study images, inch by inch, looking to see where new gold mines are popping up or where invasions are occurring. With the newly updated, high-resolution images of the region, they can see river discoloration which could be the product of sedimentation and pollution from a nearby mine. They are able to use these images to find the smallest gold mine.”

I just want to say that I was really sad about Guimaras. sometimes...there is so much to say but you can't even imagine where to begin. "We can only watch in horror how an oil spill can undo in a few days our initiatives which have taken decades to implement. We need all the support we can get."- Joaquin Nava, Governor of Guimaras I will let others tell the story here . what can we do (hairdo)? see here .

the la mesa watershed is in peril. a 58-hectare MWSS housing project is being proposed to be established inside the watershed. this will lead to groundwater contamination endangering our water supply. please join the campaign to oppose the proposed project and ensure clean water for metro manila and for the future generations! please log on to www.lamesaecopark.com or click here . click save the la mesa, view the manifesto and sign in your petition! help us save our water, our environment! you can also print out the attached manifesto and sign-up sheet and fax the completed forms to the numbers indicated.

From Yahoo News "A brightly plumaged parrot and a long-tailed forest mouse unique to the Philippines have been discovered in the vanishing rainforest of a tiny tropical island, U.S.-based researchers said on Thursday. Camiguin, a volcanic island in the southern Philippines, is a treasure trove for fauna, and already had an endemic species of rodent and frog before the discovery of the rusty brown mouse and the green hanging parrot, known among locals as "Colasisi."" Bonus Cartoon from the Washington Post via RealClimate

As a rule, Filipinos dread any increase in oil prices. Higher oil prices generally leads to higher prices for basic necessities like food, transportation and electricity. And with 30 percent of Filipinos living below the poverty line , who can blame us? On the other hand, I always thought that high oil prices can benefit the environment. High oil prices will lead to people cutting back on petroleum use, thus limiting emissions. High oil prices will also make alternative energy sources more competitive . Unfortunately, these are not the only consequences of high oil prices. In Canada, the Asian Wall Street Journal (March 27 edition, pages 22 and 23) is reporting that : "These (oil sand) deposits were once dismissed as 'unconventional' oil that couldn't be recovered economically. But now, thanks to rising global oil prices and improved technology, most oil-industry experts count oil sands as recoverable reserves" But recovering oil from oil sand has environm...

The title for this blog came from my boss who forwarded this legal memorandum by Atty. Neri Javier Colmenares on the proposed amendments to the Philippine constitution prepared by the House of Representatives. The original email she got from another friend was entitled "Read and weep". Indeed, Atty. Colmenares' memorandum noted a lot of things to weep about in the proposed amendments, from the scandalous expansion of the powers and terms of office of the President and legislators, to the deletion or revision of specific provisions that aim to ensure transparency and accountability in the various branches and processes of government. I imagine people who sincerely believe in that thing called "participatory governance" having such terrible fits at the thought of hoodlums in Congress mangling the provisions of the present constitution. The proposed provision for the utilization and management of natural resources is a nightmare for many civil society actors who ar...

In a media advocacy training, a friend who is now the business editor of a major broadsheet here in the Philippines described politics as the fleeting world of alignments, positions, and pronouncements. There was this unmistakable contempt in his voice when he stressed that the realm of politics is essentially nothing but ephemeral phenomena which are just too irrelevant to the lives of ordinary people. Now, what has this got to do with policies in NRM? Nothing too direct. I just thought how this fleeting quality of politics in the country is also very apt in describing the NRM policy arena. Actually, this should apply to policies in other sectors as well. But NRM policies are particularly notorious in this regard. A case in point is the recent cancellation of all Community-Based Forestry Management (CBFM) agreements in eight (8) regions in the country by former DENR Secretary Mike Defensor. CBFMA is supposed to be the national strategy in managing the country's remaining forest re...