Recycle Crisis Sweeps Across America After China Halts Plastic Waste Imports 

The green movement of the 1970s formed the modern American recycling industry, although there is some concern today that it could be collapsing in many parts of the country, The New York Times warned.

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“The sooner we accept the economic impracticality of recycling, the sooner we can make serious progress on addressing the plastic pollution problem,” said Jan Dell, an engineer who leads Last Beach Cleanup.

The report cited Philadelphia, Memphis, and Sunrise and Deltona, Florida, as metropolitan areas where the economics of recycling are not feasible anymore.

“We are in a crisis moment in the recycling movement right now,” California state treasurer Fiona Ma told the Times.

The major dilemma, per the Times, is China’s ban on imported plastic waste.

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Recovered plastic shipments to China collapsed by 99.1% in 2018 versus 2017. The government halted mixed paper and post-consumer scrap plastic on Jan. 1, 2018.

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“Recycling has been dysfunctional for a long time,” nonprofit Recycle Across America Executive Director Mitch Hedlund told the Times. “But not many people really noticed when China was our dumping ground.”

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It seems like Americans are recycling more than they need too, blending trash with recycled items, which triggered the Chinese to ban plastic waste shipments from abroad.

With China no longer a buyer of American post-consumer plastics, recycling and waste companies are now slapping municipalities with higher service fees.

“Amid the soaring costs, cities and towns are making hard choices about whether to raise taxes, cut other municipal services or abandon an effort that took hold during the environmental movement of the 1970s,” the Times reported.

Sunrise, Florida is now burning its recycled waste and transforming it into energy.

Philadelphia has also resorted to burning its recycled waste.

Just north of the Columbus metropolitan area, Ohio, Sims Brothers Recycling in Marion reports it lost 10-15% of its plastics business since China cracked down on plastic waste imports.

“We’ve had to tell a lot of customers we cannot accept materials that we used to be able to bring in and bale and process and ship overseas,” said Jeff Clark, head of non-metallics recycling at Sims Brothers Recycling.

Clark warns that China’s ban on imported plastic leaves fewer options to recycle. He said some shipments had been diverted to Canada, but it looks like most plastic waste will end up in landfills.

“We’ve got to find more markets here in the United States to process this material or it’s just going to continue to go back into the landfill, which a lot of it has done that,” Clark said.

Now that China has refused to be the dumping ground of America’s recycled waste, where on Earth will it all go?

Biosludge giant Synagro filed for bankruptcy in 2013 following huge bribery scandal

(Natural News) Following the shocking revelation that the largest “recycler of organic waste in the United States” had been engaging in illegal bribery schemes to boost corporate profits, Synagro, the nation’s largest manufacturer of toxic “biosludge,” ended up having to file for bankruptcy protection upon determining that the company could no longer meet its debt…

“Pollution Panic” Strikes US Cities As Officials Face Consequences of China’s Waste Blockade

Beginning in Feb 2017, as part of China’s broader “National Sword” campaign, the largest buyer of recyclables from the US, banned 24 types of solid waste from being imported and placed tougher restrictions on the ones it continues to accept.

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The move left the recycling industry and authorities in a number of US cities struggling with the disposal of plastic, paper and glass trash, and as RT reports, US officials say it creates pollution, negatively impacting the health of residents.

“Communities around trash incinerators have experienced elevated levels of certain cancers,” environmental activist Mike Ewall told Ruptly video agency in Chester, outside Philadelphia, where a large incinerator is located.

It burns around 200 tons of recyclable materials every day.

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Ewall noted that burning trash releases “28 times more dioxin pollution” than burning coal, emitting “the most toxic chemicals known to science,” like mercury and lead.

The residents complain that the incinerator affects house prices as well.

“It destroyed the sense of community, because people that were here moved. You cannot sell the house. It has destroyed the foundations,” local activist Zulene Mayfield told Ruptly.

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Finally, some have suggested Beijing’s move to crack down on waste imports may be part of the ongoing trade war with Washington:

“I have to take off my hat to China: it’s a very clever trade move,” Jeffrey Tucker, the editorial director at the American Institute for Economic Research, told RT, adding that Beijing “would never admit that this is part of the trade war.”

For some context, U.S. plastic waste exports to China plummeted by 92 percent between the first part of 2017 and the first part of 2018. 

Infographic: China Won't Accept U.S. Plastic Waste. Now What? | Statista

You will find more infographics at Statista

“It’s a way of putting a huge tariff or a blockade on the worst of American exports to China. If it is a tactic, it’s a brilliant one.”

Consuming apple peel powder can significantly improve joint function and range of motion, says study

(Natural News) You might already know that the skin is the most nutritious part of the apple, but it is still discarded surprisingly often. In fact, when it comes to applesauce production, significant amounts of apple peel end up heading for compost. Instead of letting all this nutrition go to waste, however, applesauce makers are…

Are organized clean-ups really saving the world’s beaches?

(Natural News) In response to the increasing amounts of plastic trash that are washing up on the shorelines of the world, many concerned groups are rallying people to gather up the beach litter for proper disposal. But these organized clean-up efforts are only a drop in the world ocean-full of plastic waste. The beaches of…

The Fourth Turning & The Case Against Cities

Via HardScrabbleFarmer.com,

Historians spend a great deal of time on the subject of cities. Rome, Athens, Constantinople, London, Tokyo, Cairo, New York and Moscow. It is as if the stuff that is most worthwhile is the density of the population, those locations where people lived closely packed together rather than the substance of the people who lived everywhere in between. It would appear that all the significant events and accomplishments of a people throughout history are focused on urban centers and as a result we have convinced ourselves that it is and has always been the cities that define a society.

Our perception of urban living versus rural is often defined by the culture shapers — politicians, academics, corporations and media. Rarely are the populations who inhabit the different regions asked about the impact of those decisions on their quality of life. They accept the paradigm into which they were born or they convince themselves that the alternatives are much worse than what they face living in densely populated urban centers.

We seem to readily accept that economic advantages of living in a city far outstrip the opportunities of living in the country, that the benefits of culture — museums and symphonies, for example — are unavailable to anyone who does not live where these attractions are located. There is an almost equal enthusiasm for certain benefits of urbanity, like diversity, that manifest as many, if not more drawbacks to a good life depending on how the effects of that mix manifests itself in good times and in bad. What one gains in access to a varied selection of cuisines is offset by what one must deal with when communication between diverse groups is not possible due to language or cultural differences. While the former are often cited as beneficial, the latter is never mentioned except where it can be used to shame or ridicule anyone who objects. Under social and economic stresses those features such as clannish or tribal behaviors emerge and create fractures along a number of fault lines.

In reviewing the challenges of a stressed and divided society like America in the 21st century, we must consider which behaviors and choices bear the greatest responsibility for those problems. While experts most often point the finger at those who are resistant to change, as if change itself is always beneficial and stasis is always a negative, it doesn’t mean that they are correct in their estimation. While it is difficult to prove that there is a net benefit to de-urbanization, it is very easy to prove that there are far more negatives associated with increased urbanization.

Let’s start with a few basic facts concerning the variables between the two.

According to the US Census nearly two-thirds of Americans live in an urban environment. That area represents less than one fiftieth of the inhabitable land available for habitation and when we look at the numbers, it becomes far more stark. The population of large cities with over one million inhabitants is over 7,000 per square mile, while in rural areas that figure drops to 35.

200:1 is a variable that presents quite a few challenges, most of which are environmental.

Everyone who has ever visited or seen a CAFO where livestock are kept prior to slaughter for fattening can tell you that the single most recognizable factor is the waste. In rural areas where a single family inhabits the same amount of space that would fit 150 inhabitants in a city, there is adequate drainage and soil to accommodate their waste with little or no effect on the environment. In a city there exists no spare land to accommodate any waste disposal and so virtually all excess waste must be treated at an extremely high cost with an even greater amount of material that must be relocated away from the urban source. This goes for solid wastes as well as human waste. Urbanized setting cannot dispose of their detritus without reliance on rural areas to distribute those accumulated wastes. Because of the volume produced, there is virtually little chance of any of that being dealt with organically, i.e. allowing for nature to metabolize the wastes, rather they must be buried in landfills creating huge toxic storage issues that will take centuries rather than days to dissipate.

Cities likewise are incapable of producing even a fraction of what they consume. Urban farming accounts for at best 5% of their total needs making them dependent upon their rural counterparts for 95% of their nutritional requirements. Cities, quite simply, cannot feed themselves nor dispose of their own waste while rural areas have close to zero dependence on urban enclaves for either of the two.

Rural areas of the United States of America enjoy a much higher quality of life than urbanized area by a large margin. Crime rates are three times higher in cities, while tax rates are doubled. The income necessary to maintain a standard of living in a city is 35% higher than someone living in a rural area. In terms of pure economics whatever advantage higher salaries provide to urban dwellers, it is offset by a factor of almost 3 to 1 and this is based only on six raw data points; energy, housing, food, medical care, taxes, and public services. It fails to take into account the radical differences in what urban people must spend on additional factors associated with urban dwelling, like additional security, fees, and medications (urbanites have a 40% higher incidence of anxiety and psychological issues than their rural counterparts as well as an STD rate over five times higher.

Overall the quality of life for rural inhabitants scores fifty percent higher than those who live in the city. While none of these are definitive proof that rural life is objectively better — there are people who thrive in high anxiety, isolation and close proximity to strangers at a higher cost, most human beings seem inclined to live in a peaceful setting with higher ratio of income to expenditures. Proponents of urban living will often point to areas that rural environments do not possess, such as public transportation, diversity (higher percentage of non-natives), and cultural institutions, they do not factor in the costs as opposed to their uses. For example people will tout the fact that the NYC Metropolitan Opera features a valuable resource for those who live in NYC. The truth is that with their 3,800 seat capacity and 200 performance season, less than 1 in 15 New Yorkers would ever have the chance to attend a single performance even if they wanted to, far less when you subtract season ticket holders and out of town ticket buyers. Just because a resource exists in an area does not mean that it will ever be utilized except by a small fraction of the urban population. And in no way are those from the rural regions unable to travel into the city for expressly those purposes, so such claims of urban advantage are specious at best.

It should also be noted that there are significant demographic aberrations in urban versus rural areas, especially in regards to age. Urban populations are much younger than rural ones and skewed to the advantage of younger females. Anyone who has ever made it to adulthood understands what draws young men to a specific place and that is available young females. As old courtship rights were eroded over the last century, especially in regards to the rise of feminism, and loosened standards in terms of sexual availability cities have acted as a magnet for unattached men and women. Similarly the numbers of in tact families is equally skewed with far more living in rural areas than their equal aged cohort in the city. Urban divorce rates are twice that of the country and people who live in the country are ten times as likely to live with a multi-generational extended family than in a city. In addition the number of newly arrived immigrants found in cities dwarves the number located in the countryside as well as second and third generation immigrants. To find someone who speaks the same language, shares the same values, and believes in the same principles you are far more likely to encounter them the further you move from the cities. There are few other considerations that show any of the correlating demographic idiosyncrasies than those demonstrated by the urban/rural divide.

Of course we can try to do what most economists would do in looking at this issue and most of them would point to the productivity and dollar value of each particular region. Cities, they will say, create more dollars per square foot than the rest of the country combined, but they never mention the difference between the source of those dollars. The country produces the ores that become raw materials to fulfill the demands of industry, they produce the overwhelming majority of sustenance, they produce the majority the energy that propels the engine of the economy and the vast majority of the tradesmen that build and maintain the infrastructure. Cities produce an overwhelming majority of those on various kinds of relief, government employees, attorneys and those who work in the financial service sector, none of which create anything of tangible value. One cannot survive long without nourishment but no lives are dependent on notional trading of derivatives or arcane regulations regarding tort law. Cities are the centers of specialization while the countryside is the seedbed of the generalist. Those who live in the city are five times more likely to call a plumber, electrician or tradesmen to perform basic tasks than a rural resident. The majority of all US Patents are held by someone who was born and raised in a rural environment and most of the greatest developments of the past two hundred years were the result of people reared on farms; Whitney, Deere, Bell, Edison, Ford, Browning, Eastman, Farnsworth and Howe are but a fraction of the names of those whose roots and generalist approach to life allowed them to create innovative and groundbreaking technologies, while most of what takes place in the cities is a form of refinement of those creations. Specialists have their place, especially in areas like surgery and engineering, but the origin of their fields always have their roots in the soil.

Human beings possess an innate and powerful drive towards concern for their fellow man. In the country if some sees an accident or a fire the first impulse is always to stop and render aid. It is a rare time when someone in need is ignored in a rural community. In the streets of most major cities the population has inured itself to the sight of human suffering and want. They step over the homeless, pretend they don’t notice the piles of human waste or puddles of urine, blithely stare off into space when someone exhibits signs of mental illness or emotional instability and walk away from random acts of violence. The internet is full of videos of beatdowns, assaults, meltdowns in public places, destruction of businesses, flash mobs and every other form of delinquency but only rarely do these occur in rural settings. It is the desensitized population that makes most of these acts possible despite the fact that the perpetrators are almost always far outnumbered by passerby. Their ability to compartmentalize the vast numbers of human interactions they have every day leaves them numb to their genetic predisposition towards altruism and empathy. People who lack empathy and concern for their fellow human beings cannot be expected to make decisions that would benefit anyone other than themselves. Part of the demographic slant in elections — the majority of Democratic voters live in urban areas while the majority of Republican voters live in rural areas with income, sex and age playing a distant second, third and fourth in terms of political affiliation. Interestingly enough the more dependent upon others someone is, the more likely they are to live in a city, thus the need to vote for increasing government involvement in their lives.

There are certainly more areas where the distinctions between the urban and the rural can be observed, but perhaps none more important than the disconnect between human beings and their natural environment. Human beings were adapted to live in accordance with the seasons and the environment in which they lived. The very advance of human civilization rested almost entirely upon his ability to create surplus food stores in order to survive in year round settlements. These centers became the hub of both agriculture and the domestication of animal species and from that came every conceivable advance and achievement we have ever made since then. The development of mathematics, written language, metallurgy, construction, engineering, medicine, all of them were a direct result of living in tune with the observable world of nature. Urban living divorces human populations of everything from the source of their daily nourishment to the elimination of their wastes. They turn on their lights without knowing where the source of that energy comes from, running in the rivers or buried in the coal seams of some distant wooded hillbillyville, they turn on their tap for their water unaware of its origins in the distant mountains of flyover country.

They are as dependent as babies on the material resources of the places they make fun of, incapable of feeding themselves or of cleaning up their own mess. They make more waste, use more resources, produce fewer necessities, consume more luxuries, have greater disparities between the economic classes, fewer intact families, experience far more crime and pay a higher price to adjudicate it, then ship off their offenders to prisons in the hinterlands where the rubes are hired as custodians to the human effluent of the cities. You can hear sirens 24/7 but you cannot see the stars at night. There is no such thing as silence, privacy is almost nil, personal space is reduced, self-reliance almost unknown. In most cities you do not have the right to arm yourself for defense against the criminal population that far exceeds that of the rural regions. Virtually every transaction in the city is economic with very few people doing business outside of their own very small circles. For all of their cosmopolitan posturing their social circles are 30% smaller than the average inhabitant of a town with 2,000 or fewer inhabitants. They are, in fact, the most provincial of peoples despite living in the most crowded environments.

I have lived in a multitude of places over the course of my life and have seen far more of the United States than the most seasoned travelers. I’ve lived in the center of the largest metropolis on the east coast and now choose to live in a New England village with a seasonal population that never exceeds 2,500 residents in an area twice the size of Manhattan. Our choice to live this way was predicated not upon an economic necessity, nor on an historic attachment to place, but rather as a deliberate choice based on what we wanted to best experience a better way of life. Our economic standard dropped significantly but so did our expenditures. Our physical health improved markedly, our relationships with each other and our children has been greatly enhanced, and our connection to those who live around us, friends, neighbors and the community at large has been nothing short of miraculous. Peace is plentiful, crime is not a concern, freedom to do what we want when we want to has increased and we feel like we have lost nothing in the exchange. Try as I might there are only a few things I can think of as being a loss to us; a good pizza, variety of restaurants, and the friends and family we left behind. Beyond that there is nothing I can think of worth noting and under no circumstance would we ever consider moving back.

The historians rarely concern themselves with life in the provinces, where the toil and sweat of the creator classes accumulated the surpluses that allowed cities to exist in the first place, to flourish and become the centers of civilization we think of today. Paris, Berlin, Los Angeles, Bangkok, Shanghai and Baghdad. They focus on the remnants of collapsed citadels, shrines and fortresses. Those places that served both to celebrate the accomplishments of the nations and principalities that gave birth to them, and their glory are all ruins today. As much as they were lighthouses to the young and the ambitious of each generation, so too were they the fire that drew attention from afar. Eventually the complex business of moving paper and money, of accumulating wealth and building shrines to their hubris always runs its eventual course. And as the lines of supply are cut off, either through inattention or rebellion, the dependent urban centers begin to feed on themselves, leaving them vulnerable to the predations of those who hunger for a taste of their flesh. And all that endures and comes to life amongst the derelict bones of an extinct metropolis are the sons and daughters of those who preserved their independence and traditions in the far flung country of the rural world.

Nothing lasts forever and the accelerating pace of domestic instability demonstrates just how fragile our social fabric is. As we enter the maelstrom of the Fourth Turning anything can happen. The Empire and its narrative struggle to maintain legitimacy in a time of universal corruption. All declines follow a similar path and once the collapse occurs events pick up speed leaving everyone who has failed to prepare caught unaware. The cities are the least secure location during such periods and only those who manage to find a place out of the reach of those who tear down the walls of our civilization will be safe.

Take everything into consideration, but prepare for anything. Your life may depend upon it.

Green New STUPID: Liberal U.S. cities now just burning recyclables because no one wants to accept the raw material

(Natural News) Millions of Americans have been led to believe that they’re helping the environment by separating plastic, glass, and other “recyclables” from landfill waste whenever they roll their trash bins out to the curb. But the truth of the matter is that the United States currently lacks the capacity to effectively process the sheer…

Ecologists warn that water-dwelling creatures are being inundated with antidepressants from human waste that gets flushed out to waterways

(Natural News) Australian researchers warned that Melbourne’s waterways contain high levels of dozens of different pharmaceutical drugs. These chemical antibiotics, antidepressants, and painkillers have not just contaminated the water itself, but have also tainted the local aquatic animals. According to their survey of creeks in Victoria, animals in the most heavily contaminated creek could accidentally…

New material made from recycled plastic bottles could help reduce water pollution

(Natural News) Singaporean researchers have come up with a new incentive for people to recycle disposable PET plastic bottles instead of just throwing them away. They can turn the plastic waste into a group of very useful materials called aerogels, which would make the disposable bottles well worth the effort of holding on to or…

Green New Deal’s false scientific premise exposed: Physicist rips cow farting climate fears: ‘Worrying about methane emissions is the greatest waste of time’

New research finds methane virtually irrelevant as a greenhouse gas 

Physicist Dr. Tom Sheahen: “Worrying about methane emissions is the greatest waste of time in the entire lexicon of global warming fanaticism. Converting methane to CO2 is done by the process of “flaring” — setting fire to the stack gas coming off from an oil well, as is done daily throughout the middle east, where the oil is valued but the CH4 is not…The number ‘Global Warming Potential’ is completely false, a nonsense calculation thought up by the IPCC to drum up more concern beyond just CO2.”

‘GREEN NEW DEAL’ LOOKS TO TACKLE THE SCOURGE OF ‘FARTING COWS’

Efficient and eco-friendly: Growers are using discarded coffee straw as mulch to great benefit

(Natural News) Food waste is a huge problem in the global food supply chain, but it remains overlooked. A possible reason for food waste is that it’s easier than the alternative: Discarding food lost in the production process is much more convenient than dealing with them in an eco-friendly way. But it’s also partly because there just…

Learn about these weeds that can be used to treat disease or provide nutrition when things go sour

(Natural News) If you have a garden, you’ve probably encountered some weeds growing in your carefully cultivated space. These commonly undesirable plants are typically seen as a nuisance or a waste of lawn space by both gardeners and non-gardeners alike. However, a prepper with a keen eye might find some beneficial use for these plants….

California not only has needles, trash and feces across its cities; the same filth is now appearing across SoCal beaches

(Natural News) California used to be known for its beautiful cities and landscapes, but it seems liberal ideologies have turned the “Golden State” into the “Garbage State.” While Californian cities have long been mocked for their street-pooping problems, the coastal state is now seeing its beaches destroyed by waves of refuse and human waste. Home…

We’ve all heard to eat the peel on nutritious fruit; now you can drink it: Wine from fruit peels offers health benefits and eliminates food waste

(Natural News) While fruits may be considered as nature’s candy, they contain far more than just sugar and empty calories. Indeed, eating fruits can give you many health benefits, most of which you’ll be able to see or feel immediately. But did you ever consider that the fruit peels that you tend to just throw…

Where Is the One Million Tonnes of Toxic Tyre Dust and Particulates Discharged into the Environment Each Year in the US and Europe?

An estimated 1.1m tonnes of toxic tyre waste including highly dangerous, polluting particulates are discharged into the environment/atmosphere each year from a combined total of about 590 million cars currently in the United States and Europe.

In the US, there

The post Where Is the One Million Tonnes of Toxic Tyre Dust and Particulates Discharged into the Environment Each Year in the US and Europe? appeared first on Global Research.

Radioactive Plutonium Secretly Shipped From South Carolina To Nevada

The US government secretly shipped a large amount of weapons-grade plutonium from South Carolina to Nevada months ago despite the states vehement opposition and without their consent.

Federal officials have disclosed that they shipped radioactive plutonium across the US to Nevada despite safety concerns raised by state officials and worries that the state would become a dumping ground for nuclear waste

Press TV reports: The US Department of Energy revealed on Wednesday that 1,100 pounds (500 kg) of plutonium was shipped from the K-Reactor at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, which had produced the radioactive metal for nuclear bombs during the Cold War.

The radioactive material was sent to the Device Assembly Facility at the Nevada Nuclear Security Site, about 70 miles (113 km) north of Las Vegas.

The United States built the Savannah River Site during the 1950s to produce basic materials for nuclear weapons, mostly tritium and plutonium-239.

The Energy Department did not reveal when the shipment was made, other than it occurred before November 2018, before Nevada had sued to stop the proposed shipments. It said due to security reasons no public notice was given ahead of the shipment and the highway route was not revealed.

The US Justice Department, on behalf of the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration, said in a notice filed with a US court in Reno, Nevada, that it could reveal the shipment because sufficient time had elapsed after the transfer to protect national security.

The US court in Nevada has been considering an effort by the state of Nevada to stop planned shipments of Plutonium that the Energy Department announced last August.

The revelation angered politicians from Nevada, a sparsely populated state where the federal government has long wanted to store nuclear waste.

Nevada Governor Steve Sisolak said he’s “beyond outraged by this completely unacceptable deception.” He announced at a hastily called news conference in Carson City late Wednesday the state is now seeking another court order to block any more shipments of plutonium as it pursues “any and all legal remedies,” including contempt of court orders against the federal government.

US Senator Jack Rosen, a Democrat from Nevada, said the Energy Department misled a federal court “in a deceitful and unethical move, jeopardizing the health and safety of thousands of Nevadans and Americans who live in close proximity to shipment routes.”

She said she and other state politicians were prepared to take action against the department.

Dina Titus, another Nevada Democrat and a member of the US House of Representatives, said the administration of President Donald Trump has repeatedly tried to use Nevada as a dumping ground for nuclear waste.

Trump revived a decades-old proposal to store the nation’s nuclear waste at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain after the project was essentially halted by former President Barack Obama.

Hundreds missing in Brazil, 34 found dead, after Vale dam burst

January 26, 2019

By Gram Slattery

BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – Brazilian rescue workers searched for hundreds of people missing and feared dead under a sea of mud after a tailings dam burst at an iron ore mine owned by Vale SA <VALE3.SA>, killing at least 34 people and halting mine operations.

The dam ruptured on Friday, releasing a torrent of mud that tore through the miner’s offices and cut through a nearby town, leaving a roughly 150-meter-wide (500-foot-wide) wake of destruction stretching for miles (km).

The Minas Gerais state fire department, which gave the latest confirmed death toll, also said 23 people had been sent to hospitals. Some 250 people remained missing, according to a list released by Vale.

Firefighters focused their hopes for finding survivors on a bus, a train, offices and nearby homes that were buried after the dam break at Vale’s Corrego do Feijao mine in Minas Gerais state.

Reuters witnesses saw homes knocked over, roadway washed out and a rail bridge demolished by the wave of mud.

Frantic family members of the missing crowded into a warehouse set up by Vale for those affected, next to a stretch of river erased by the sludge. More than a dozen helicopters helping to survey the area took off and landed from a soccer field nearby.

“Unfortunately, at this point, the chances of finding survivors are minimal. We’re likely to just be recovering bodies,” Romeu Zema, governor of Minas Gerais, told local media.

During a news conference, Zema said the mining complex had all its permits in order and it was unclear what caused the collapse of the dam, which had been inactive for years.

German auditor TUV SUD said on Saturday it had inspected the tailings dam last September and found it to be operating well.

The National Mining Agency ordered Vale, the world’s largest producer of iron ore, to halt operations at the Corrego do Feijao mine, located near the town of Brumadinho.

State courts in two separate actions froze a total of 6 billion reais ($1.59 billion) in Vale’s accounts to eventually pay for damages. Environmental agency Ibama fined Vale 250 million reais for regulatory violations, while state environmental agency Semad fined the miner 99 million reais.

‘IN THE MUD’

The death toll was expected to rise sharply, according to Avimar de Melo Barcelos, the mayor of Brumadinho.

Inside Vale’s center for families of the victims, Carolina Oliveira Damaceno said her husband was missing. When a rescue worker came to tell her they were still searching, she fainted and had to be carried away on a stretcher.

“Vale is not telling us anything,” said her mother, Lívia.

Israel offered to send search equipment that could be used to find victims in up to 10 meters (33 feet) of mud, Zema said. Search dogs were being flown in from Rio de Janeiro to aid in the rescue efforts.

All of those missing are Vale employees or contractors, a police spokesman said.

“I know a lot of the affected people: Two sisters-in-law, a cousin, many friends there in the community. They’re in the mud,” local resident Carlos Jose dos Santos told Reuters.

Minas Gerais is still recovering from the 2015 collapse of a larger dam that killed 19 people in Brazil’s worst environmental disaster. That dam, owned by the Samarco Mineracao SA joint venture between Vale and BHP Group Ltd <BHP.AX>, buried a village and poured toxic waste into a major river.

The latest dam burst could undercut new President Jair Bolsonaro’s promise to cut regulation in the sector and could make investors already wary of investing in Brazil’s mining sector even more hesitant.

Bolsonaro visited Minas Gerais and flew over the disaster area on Saturday morning. He also dispatched there three ministers, who addressed reporters along with Zema.

Vale Chief Executive Fabio Schvartsman said on Friday the dam that burst was being decommissioned and its capacity was about a fifth of the total waste spilled at Samarco. He said equipment had shown the dam was stable on Jan. 10 and it was too soon to say why it collapsed.

The Corrego do Feijao mine is one of four in Vale’s Paraoeba complex, which includes two processing plants. The complex produced 26 million tonnes of iron ore in 2017, or about 7 percent of Vale’s output, with Corrego do Feijao accounting for 7.8 million tonnes, according to the company’s website.

Operations at Samarco, near the town of Mariana, remain halted over new licensing, while the companies have worked to pay damages out of court, including an agreement that quashed a 20 billion reais civil lawsuit last year.

Federal prosecutors have suspended but have not closed an even larger lawsuit against Samarco as they negotiate a settlement.. The latest dam collapse “may completely change the course of those talks,” federal prosecutor Jose Adercio Sampaio told Reuters.

“The company will account for all the damages it has caused,” Sampaio said, adding that the state and federal government also had tighten safety regulations.

“To maintain the current policy on dam safety is to ask for another Mariana, to ask for another Brumidinho, to ask for more cases, because there is a lack of state oversight … we will see one tragedy after another.”

(Reporting by Gram Slattery; Additional reporting by Marta Nogueira in Rio de Janeiro and Marcela Ayres in Brasilia; Writing by Jake Spring; Editing by Brad Haynes, Paul Simao and Sandra Maler)

Seven bodies found after dam burst at Brazil mine, hundreds missing

January 25, 2019

By Anthony Boadle and Marta Nogueira

BRASILIA/RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – Brazilian rescuers were searching for some 200 missing people after a tailings dam burst on Friday at an iron ore mine owned by Vale SA, with seven bodies recovered but the death toll expected to rise sharply.

Avimar de Melo Barcelos, the mayor of the town of Brumadinho where the dam burst in Brazil’s mining hub of Minas Gerais state, said seven bodies had been recovered by nightfall.

However, Vale Chief Executive Fabio Schvartsman said only one-third of the roughly 300 workers at the site of the disaster had been accounted for. He said a torrent of sludge tore through the mine’s offices, including a cafeteria during lunchtime.

U.S.-listed shares of Vale tumbled as much as 10 percent after the incident, the second major disaster at a Brazilian tailings dam involving Vale in just over three years.

Both hit Minas Gerais, which is still recovering from the collapse of a larger dam in November 2015 that killed 19 people. That dam, owned by a joint venture between Vale and BHP Billiton called Samarco Mineracao SA, buried a nearby village and devastated a major river with toxic waste in Brazil’s worst environmental disaster.

Operations at Samarco remain halted over legal disputes relating to damages even after the companies settled a $5.28 billion civil lawsuit last year.

Schvartsman said the dam that burst on Friday at the Feijao iron mine was being decommissioned and had a capacity of 12 million cubic meters – a fraction of the roughly 60 million cubic meters of toxic waste released by the Samarco dam break.

“The environmental impact should be much less, but the human tragedy is horrible,” he told journalists at Vale’s offices in Rio de Janeiro. He said equipment had shown the dam was stable on Jan. 10 and it was too soon to say why it collapsed.

Fire brigade spokesman Lieutenant Pedro Aihara said the torrent of mud stopped just short of the local Paraopeba river, a tributary of Brazil’s longest river, the Sao Francisco.

“Our main worry now is to quickly find out where the missing people are,” Aihara said on GloboNews cable television channel. Scores of people were trapped in nearby areas flooded by the river of sludge released by the dam failure.

Helicopters plucked people covered in mud from the disaster area, including a woman with a fractured hip who was among eight injured people taken to hospital, officials said.

The Feijao mine is one of four in Vale’s Paraoeba complex, which includes two processing plants and produced 26 million tonnes of iron ore in 2017, or about 7 percent of Vale’s total output, according to information on the company’s website.

Feijao alone produced 7.8 million tonnes of ore in 2017.

(Additional reporting by Marta Nogueira in Rio de Janeiro, Ricardo Brito and Jake Spring in Brasilia; editing by Daniel Flynn, Sonya Hepinstall and Chris Reese)

Pentagon Climate Change Report Ignores Its Own Role in Fueling the Crisis

The U.S. Department of Defense produces more hazardous waste than the five biggest U.S.-based chemical companies combined and is the biggest contributor to global pollution in the world.

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This week, the Department of Defense released a report to Senate …

The post Pentagon Climate Change Report Ignores Its Own Role in Fueling the Crisis appeared first on Global Research.

‘The trash never stops’: Indonesia battles to clean up rivers

January 23, 2019

PISANG BATU RIVER, Indonesia (Reuters) – Boys played and chatted on a rickety wooden ramp under a baking sun in West Java, while just below their feet flowed one of Indonesia’s most horribly polluted rivers, clogged with hundreds of tonnes of smelly trash.

Authorities in the nation of 260 million are battling a lack of recycling culture or environmental awareness to achieve an ambitious target of a 70 percent cut in marine plastic debris by 2025, despite having devoted $1 billion a year to the task.

“Every time it rains and floods, the whole village goes down to help with the trash and clean the river,” said Marzuki, a resident of Tarumajaya, on the banks of the Pisang Batu river that carries along waste from villages upstream.

“We never get tired of it, but the trash never stops coming.”

Yet the river is just one of many thickly carpeted with trash formed mostly of plastic waste, of which Indonesia churns out about 3.2 million tonnes each year, with nearly half ending up in the sea, a 2015 study in the journal Science showed.

The archipelago of more than 17,000 islands is estimated to be the world’s second-largest contributor of plastic pollutants in the oceans after China, the study added. 

“Even though we’ve brought an armada of 25 garbage trucks that take three turns every day, the reality is…we haven’t cleared even half of it,” said Suseno, the village security chief in Tarumajaya.

As Java struggles with its rivers, the resort island of Bali this year banned the use of plastic bags by large supermarkets and grocery stores, a measure it aims to widen to smaller shops.

Yet that caused its own backlash.

“I’ve seen people protest because they didn’t get plastic bags after they shop,” said one supermarket shopper, Thomas Wibowo, while adding that he understood the need to cut back.

“But if we are suddenly forbidden from using plastic, as Indonesians, we’d be shocked.”

The risks to marine life were graphically highlighted last November, when a dead sperm whale on a beach was found to have 6 kg (13lb) of plastic waste in its stomach.

“I think this is also a global issue, not just a national problem,” said Ida Bagus Rai Dharmawijaya Mantra, the mayor of Bali’s capital of Denpasar.

“I’ve seen that a lot of citizens are accepting and helping of this movement, including tourists. They too want to help replace plastic bags.”

(Reporting by Yuddy Cahya at Pisang Batu River and Sultan Anshori and Wayan Sukarda in Denpasar; Writing by Clarence Fernandez)

Creator of “The Daily Show” says unborn human babies are “medical waste” … did her own mother think the same of her?

(Natural News) Far-left lunatic and pro-abortion death cultist Lizz Winstead, creator of “The Daily Show,” recently went on a hate-filled diatribe on Twitter, where she referred to unborn babies as “medical waste,” as well as shared a video accusing those who support human life of being “real bats**t extremists.” Winstead’s demonically-possessed rant was triggered by…

Turn Trash Into Treasure: The Easy Way To Make A Compost Pile Or Bin

This article was originally published at Tess Pennington’s ReadyGardens.com

Tess is the author of The Prepper’s Blueprint: How To Survive ANY Disaster

Composting not only reduces trash in landfills but also improves your backyard at home. Your garden will produce healthier vegetables and more beautiful flowers with just the addition of a compost pile. Composting doesn’t have to be difficult and although it may seem like a daunting task to get started, this helpful guide should help walk you through any rough patches.

Soil is one of the most important ingredients you need for a productive garden. In order to have a lush garden that grows big, juicy vegetables, you need lots of nutrients in the soil. Over the years, I have read a lot about gardening and came across the Soil Science Society of America and loved their definition of soil. “Soil is not dirt.  It is a complex mix of ingredients: minerals, air, water, and organic matter – countless organisms and the decaying remains of once-living things.  Soil is made of life.  Soil makes life.  And soil is life.” In order for plants to grow to their optimum capacity, they need nine different nutrients present in the soil.  While most of these elements and nutrients are naturally found in soil, sometimes they can become depleted and need to be added to keep the soil healthy. -Ready Gardens

This is where composting comes in. Composting does require a little planning ahead of time. Like planning a garden, you’ll want to take a few things into consideration. But it will make it all much easier as you begin the process.

*Remember, compost is not a replacement for your soil, but rather acts as a natural fertilizer to nurture your soil and plants, so add it a couple of times a year for best results.

The first thing you will want to plan out is the location of your bin. Placing the bin adjacent to or actually in your garden will save some time and labor when it’s time to apply your finished product. One cubic yard of compost can weigh up to a ton! Cutting the space between the bin and the garden will save a few steps pushing a heavy wheelbarrow. The shorter trip will also be helpful when you’re adding clippings and spent plants from your garden into the bin. Make sure you put the compost pile on the actual soil. You’ll want the bugs and earthworms to work their way into the composting material. If you put the compost pile on a concrete pad, it’ll be much more difficult because the compost will be cut off from the ecosystem.

The location of the compost bin should also be near a source of water as it is a key for decomposition. A dry pile takes a lot longer to break down than one that is wet. Look for a place that you can easily reach with your garden hose. Some folks tuck their compost bin in a far corner of the yard so that it’s out of sight, but then have difficulty keeping it adequately watered. You could also consider collecting rain from the roof in a rain barrel to water your compost! Do this by putting your compost bin right under the rainwater runoff.

Now comes the easy part! Decide whether or not you’d like an open or closed compost bin. A closed bin is a good choice if you’re worried about the way your compost pile will look (or smell)! You can easily make a container, (for directions on how to easily build a compost bin out of wood pallets, click here) order one online (try this one from Amazon) or you can buy one locally at a hardware or gardening store. Look for a bin that’s about 3 feet in diameter and not much taller than your waist. If you are going to be starting a compost pile, protect it from animals such as raccoons and your pets by using fencing.

Once you’ve placed your bin in the ideal location, you’ll want to begin collecting scraps to compost! But, first things first.  There are a few things that you should avoid adding to your compost pile. Dairy or animal products (even animal bones) will start to smell and attract pests. The same goes for fats, oils, and pet waste. Also, if you have a diseased or insect-ridden plant, don’t add it to the pile because it could contaminate your compost making it unusable.

But you can begin by adding equal parts of “brown” waste and “green” waste to your compost bin. “Green” waste includes fruits and vegetables and “brown” waste can be items like wood shavings, dry leaves, or even old newspapers. Maintaining a balance between the two is important is because “brown” materials are rich in carbon, feeding the organisms that break down the scraps and “green” materials supply nitrogen, which is the key for building the cell structure of your new soil. Keep in mind your compost will also need to “breathe”. It will need oxygen and some air flow to break down the waste into usable compost. Air flow will also help prevent the smell often associated with composting. If you’ve struck a good balance, your compost bin will smell more like an earthy soil than anything else.

You could also consider a compost tea to have an even more lush garden than last year!

Maintaining your compost bin should be an easy task too. Simply turn your mixture over every week or two with a shovel or a garden fork in order to “mix it up.” If you’re not seeing progress after a few weeks, add more “green” material and make sure you’re keeping the pile moist. If it’s smelly and wet, add more “brown” material and turn the compost more frequently. Also, break apart any big materials (like branches) to keep the air flowing.

Once the compost looks like soil, it is ready to use! Work it into your garden beds, or sprinkle it on top of your garden!

To make your own compost bin out of wood pallets, click here. H/T [Preparedness Mama]


The Prepper's Blueprint

Tess Pennington is the author of The Prepper’s Blueprint, a comprehensive guide that uses real-life scenarios to help you prepare for any disaster. Because a crisis rarely stops with a triggering event the aftermath can spiral, having the capacity to cripple our normal ways of life. The well-rounded, multi-layered approach outlined in the Blueprint helps you make sense of a wide array of preparedness concepts through easily digestible action items and supply lists.

Tess is also the author of the highly rated Prepper’s Cookbook, which helps you to create a plan for stocking, organizing and maintaining a proper emergency food supply and includes over 300 recipes for nutritious, delicious, life-saving meals. 

Visit her website at ReadyNutrition.com for an extensive compilation of free information on preparedness, homesteading, and healthy living.

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