900m people suffer globally due to lack of access to clean water; and
globally people are as likely to be reliant on water originating outside
their own country’s borders as within them – hence the centrality of
international water law in a world of rising population and scarce water
resources.

“The future economic welfare of nation states will depend upon how
they manage their water, especially across national borders – and there
will be conflicts-of-use right across the spectrum”, said Wouters.

The current Copenhagen talks failure to adequately focus on this issue
adds up to what Professor Wouters said was a “serious – and dangerous
- blind spot”.

“If water is left out of the dynamic, we are undermining the very
foundation of the climate change initiative,” said Professor Wouters.
“This is a daily issue of survival for poor people across the globe
and there are daily reminders of the catastrophic effects to lives,
livelihoods and ecosystems as a result of too much or too little
water.”

Professor Wouters, who heads up the UK’s only UNESCO Centre, and the
world’s only UNESCO Centre combining water law, policy and science, is
concerned about the lack of “connecting up the dots” on matters
related to regional peace and security, and national economic welfare.

“National governments are responsible for ensuring the economic
stability of their populations, and it is clear that water follows money
- there is a clear divide between the haves and have-nots and equitable
and sustainable access to water is a critical measure of health,
prosperity and security”, said Professor Wouters, whose own research
examines the concept of water security within international
transboundary watercourses around the world.

“The future is fraught with uncertainty, apart from the certainty of
competing uses for diminishing quantities of quality water,” she said.

The recently released Mckinsey Report on water forecasts a future water
gap of 40%, with 42% of the global water demand over the next few
decades coming from China, India, South Africa and Brazil. “What is
missing from most of the discourse is the critical role that water law
can play in bringing clarity and transparency to this future filled with
the potential for conflict over water at the user, national, regional
and international levels,” said Professor Wouters.

“Identifying and agreeing the `rules of the game’ brings certainty
to a future filled with confusion and potential chaos. Indeed, the real
challenge is to engage a broad range of stakeholders, across a range of
sectors and beyond boundaries so that we can together find innovative
solutions.”

Professor Wouters endorsed the decision of the Norwegian government to
invest in providing scholarships on climate change, instead of giving
gifts to the participants — the 4 million Danish kroner saved , roughly
700,000 dollars, will be spent on climate scholarships allowing 10-12
candidates from all over the world to carry out 2-year climate related
master’s programmes at Danish universities.

Source: University of Dundee

The report describes the emergence of these new contaminants in the Potomac River system; features the latest research, exploring the potential relationship of these chemicals to the phenomenon of intersex fish; and reviews shortcomings in current federal and local regulations that are leaving this widespread problem essentially unregulated.

A companion document, the 2009 Potomac Agenda, calls on Congress to amend the Safe Drinking Water Act, and seeks better stormwater regulations at the local level. The report suggests other avenues of future action to address these new pollutants, including updated assessment models for chemicals that may disrupt the regulation and development of the endocrine system, advocates for technology to remove these chemicals from our waste water and drinking water supplies, and calls for regulatory action for state and federal government agencies.

Scientists speaking with reporters on a conference call today said the prevalence of the intersex condition in over 80% of Potomac River fish studied is the “canary in the coal mine,” warning of health problems that can because of endocrine disrupting compounds. Since approximately 90% of D.C.-area drinking water comes from the Potomac River and many other nearby municipalities get their water from surface sources, they said it is critical that steps be taken to limit the amount of these chemicals entering the rivers of the greater Potomac basin.

“Endocrine disrupting compounds are major pollutants in the Potomac watershed, and we need to exercise the utmost caution when introducing these compounds into our rivers, streams and, ultimately, our drinking water,” said Dr. John Peterson “Pete” Myers, chief scientist for Environmental Health Sciences of Charlottesville, Va.

“Water treatment facilities are not yet required to screen for endocrine disrupting contaminants, so they end up in our tap water,” Myers said. “We aren’t sure exactly what level of exposure causes harmful effects to human health, but if the intersex fish phenomenon is any indication, there’s a critical need for regulatory agencies and decision makers to start addressing this issue.”

Endocrine disrupting compounds are chemicals that affect growth, metabolism and reproduction in organisms such as humans and fish. They are found in pesticides, veterinary products, pharmaceuticals, personal care products and biosolids. These contaminants have become so widespread in the environment that they have even been detected in the urine of infants.

The State of the Nation’s River report explains that land uses are providing a critical pathway for such chemicals to enter our water supply. Endocrine disrupting compounds are most prevalent in rivers and streams in industrialized, agricultural, and/or urbanized areas, with particularly high concentrations near sewage treatment plants or other sources of wastewater. Virtually every place where water and chemicals combine becomes a potential source of endocrine disrupting compounds entering sources of drinking water.

At present, there are no water quality standards for endocrine disrupting contaminants. “The federal government has already taken steps to limit so-called legacy pollutants from damaging the natural environment and human health,” said Potomac Conservancy President Hedrick Belin. “It now needs to employ 21st-century scientific testing and update the regulatory framework to deal with the emerging threat of endocrine disrupting compounds found in the Potomac River and its tributaries.”

Potomac Conservancy views the following actions as opportunities to break the cycle of allowing endocrine disruptors to enter our environment unchecked:

• Enforce and strengthen water quality regulations

• Call on EPA to incorporate health and exposure data from drug and chemical manufacturers into the agency’s chemical testing profiles

• Provide funding to develop treatment technology, retrofit our wastewater treatment plants, and upgrade drinking water treatment facilities

• Resolve the problem of agricultural biosolids, which are implicated in the problem as well

• Introduce legislation to establish and implement programs to recover unused prescription drugs rather than having them enter drinking water sources

FOR MORE INFORMATION, please visit www.potomac.org

Source: PRWeb

The Africa Factbook 2009 reveals that while Africa’s population grew from 287 million to 902 million people between 1961 and 2005, the amount of biocapacity (resources that are available on a renewable basis) per person decreased by 67 percent during this same time span. Though this is reflective of a global trend, it is particularly alarming for Africa, a region where ecological deficits can translate most directly into resource conflicts and shortages of food, fuel and other basic necessities for survival.

The Factbook, which reports key indicators on human development and ecological performance for 24 countries, is a culmination of two years of research by Global Footprint Network, the Swiss Agency for Development and local experts, and is published in partnership with UNESCO, the Luxembourg Development Corporation and the Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ).

The Ecological Footprint (the amount of productive land and sea area required to produce the resources a person or population consumes and absorb the carbon dioxide emissions) of the average person in Africa is extremely low, in many cases too small to meet basic needs for food, shelter and sanitation, the Factbook states. If large segments of the population are to move out of poverty, they will require greater access to resources to provide for their basic well-being.

Yet Africa’s natural resource stock, which contains 12 percent of the world’s biocapacity, is under increasing pressure both from within the region, by expanding population and the impacts of climate change, and from abroad, as other nations deplete their own resources.

“Development that ignores the limits of our natural resources ultimately ends up imposing disproportionate costs on the most vulnerable,” said Mathis Wackernagel, Global Footprint Network president. If Africa’s countries are to make advances in human development that can endure, they will need to find approaches that work with, rather than against the Earth”s ecological budget constraints.

Download the Africa Factbook at http://www.footprintnetwork.org/images/uploads/AfricaFactbook_2009.pdf

To see press release go to http://myprgenie.com/2755

Qteros has entered into a joint development project with Applied CleanTech (ACT), a commodities recycling company based in Israel, to use ACT’s Recyllose™-based feedstock, produced from municipal wastewater solids, for even more efficient and low-cost ethanol production. ACT’s Sewage Recycling System (SRS), a revolutionary solution for recycling wastewater solids, produces high-quality alternative energy sources for the production of electricity or ethanol, while reducing sludge formation and lowering wastewater treatment plant costs and increasing plant capacity.

The companies said they are the first to demonstrate commercial success in creating ethanol from the cellulose in municipal and agricultural liquid waste, and to offer a process that all municipalities can use to help reduce expenses.

“Our customer is every municipality that has a wastewater treatment plant,” said Jeff Hausthor, Qteros co-founder and senior project manager. “It will provide a value-added product for municipal waste water plants, thereby making treatment plants much less expensive to run and helping local governments throughout the world with their constrained budgets.”

Israel Biran, ACT’s CEO, added, “It also helps answer the question of what municipalities can do with their sewage sludge, a major challenge now facing every wastewater treatment plant operator.”

ACT has spent six years developing its integrated sewage recycling solution. Its high quality Recyllose™-based feedstock offers high cellulose content and low moisture, facilitating more efficient ethanol production. The SRS is already in commercial use, with facilities in Israel and the United States currently making Recyllose™-based products from sewage sludge and other cellulose-rich waste while reducing sludge output and wastewater treatment plant costs.

By using ACT’s proprietary feedstock, Hausthor said Qteros and ACT’s researchers have found that an ethanol production plant can produce 120–135 gallons of ethanol per ton of Recyllose™.

Since Recyllose™ is low in lignin (a major component of plant cell walls that is difficult to degrade), and lignin can be inhibitory to efficient conversion to ethanol, Hausthor said the material improves cellulosic plant operational efficiency 20 percent over higher lignin content feedstocks.

Qteros’ CEO William Frey said that with previous technologies, a cellulosic ethanol plant would have to produce roughly 20-30 million gallons per year (MGY) in order to be profitable. With the proposed Qteros-ACT process, Frey said, production with these economics could be viable at a smaller scale.

ACT President Dr. Refael Aharon said that a wastewater plant that handles 150 million gallons a day (serving a population of about 2 million people) can be sufficient to supply a smaller-scale ethanol plant with cellulose.

Qteros and ACT said that by applying the proprietary one-step Qteros fermentation technology to ACT’s Recyllose™ feedstock, they have achieved a high-yield, waste-to-ethanol production process that is superior to other industrial-scale processes both technically and economically.

The research has been supported in part by a grant from the Binational Industrial Research and Development (BIRD) Foundation. The BIRD Foundation funds joint efforts between Israel and the United States, and their financial support has resulted in the very successful collaboration of Qteros’ and ACT’s technologies.

The U.S. government has set a goal of increasing annual production of alternative fuels like ethanol from today’s 10 billion gallons to 36 billion gallons by 2022. Qteros predicts that this announcement will move the country one step closer to realizing its goal. “Ethanol is the best next-generation fuel,” said Frey.

More can be found out about this technology at Qteros

Source: PRWeb

It is predicted that UK groundwater will begin to decrease by 2025, with the overall amount of water available in English and Welsh rivers reducing by 15 per cent by 2050.

In London, the issue is a particularly pressing one – the Environment Agency has identified the region as under serious water stress3, highlighting the need for water efficiency measures to be implemented. In addition, many companies could face changes to licences granted to allow water abstraction as result of the Water Act 2003.

Sophie Greenhalgh, Envirowise Regional Manager for London, said: “Water is set to become one of the most dramatically affected resources as the impact of climate change takes hold, but many businesses are not aware of the steps they can take to mitigate against this risk.

“Companies in the capital should explore practical steps including water saving devices and water recovery and reuse technology such as membrane filtration systems, which enable a large proportion of wastewater to be reused for processes such as heating, cooling and cleaning. This can result in major cost savings through lower mains water and disposal charges, as well as an enhanced environmental reputation with customers and investors.

“Taking such action now could not only pay enormous dividends in future years, it can also lead to short-term benefits. In fact, recent Envirowise research5 revealed that UK companies could be missing out on combined savings of up to £10 million per day by failing to make changes in this area.”

UK businesses which pay income or corporation tax can also claim tax relief on recovery and reuse systems and water saving devices through the Water Technology List (WTL), which is managed by Defra and HM Revenue & Customs in partnership with Envirowise as part of the Enhanced Capital Allowance (ECA) scheme for water-efficient technology.

Further information on the benefits of reducing water usage is available at envirowise.gov.uk.

Source: PRWeb

In April 2009, following a five-month investigation, Associated Press (AP) exposed the legal dumping of pharmaceuticals in the waterways impacting at least 41 million Americans. Around the same time, the Chicago Tribune reported that “for more than two decades, the 11,000 or so residents in this working-class community (Crestwood) unknowingly drank tap water contaminated with toxic chemicals linked to cancer and other health problems.”

Recently, New York Times award-winning reporter, Charles Duhigg ran an exposé series on “Toxic Water,” where he uncovered the dangers of weed killers, farm runoff and other pollutants in water supplies. Last week, AOL Health writer Justine Van Der Leun published an interview with James Workman — co-founder of a private venture that secures a tradable human right to water — delving further into the subject of contaminated tap water.

While reporting the presence of many over-the-counter prescription drugs and medicines in drinking water, the April 2009 AP report cited that, ”One technology, reverse osmosis, removes virtually all pharmaceutical contaminants but is very expensive.” The report also noted that, reverse osmosis is only appropriate ”for large-scale use and leaves several gallons of polluted water for every one that is made drinkable.”

Pure Revolution’s patented technology, powered by GE, is an affordable and more water efficient water purification that can be used for the whole-home or whole business: eliminating point-of-use systems, water softeners and lowering maintenance costs. Operating near a 1:1 ratio, Pure Revolution’s PureOFlow system is designed to produce a recovery rate that is 80% more efficient than traditional reverse osmosis. With its water reclaim system, PureOFlow produces can be adapted to produce zero waste. In areas where water conservation is of paramount importance, PureOFlow becomes a natural choice.

In the AOL Health article, Van Der Leun highlights the states with the most Toxic Tap Water causing severe health problems in these areas, ranging from cancer to cardiovascular to skin sensitivity. The PureOFlow reverse osmosis (RO) system removes nearly all of the substances found in tap water both natural — such as hard water salts, and manmade — such as pharmaceutical contaminants and other industrial wastes. As water enters the building it passes through a PureOFlow system containing a series of membranes that work to reduce up to 98% of more well known harmful substances such as arsenic, lead, and radium – neutralizing particles as small as 1,000th the width of a human hair, as well as eliminating any trace-amounts of drugs in drinking water.

Mike Paice, President of Pure Revolution, is concerned that Nevada ranked number seven in the states with the most Toxic Tap Water, with 85.9% of water systems in violation of the health-based drinking water standards. Paice says, “Many consumers and businesses have turned to band-aid solutions to fix the problems with water quality. Water softeners do not remove all contaminants. In fact, the salts from water softeners are polluting the environment.”

A CNN report titled “Is your bottled water safe?” reveals that bottled water is not safer than tap water. Quoting research findings from Environmental Working Group (EWG), the report adds, “If families can afford it, (EWG researcher Nneka Leiba) recommends a reverse osmosis filter, which will eliminate all impurities.”

Paice adds, “With water forming such an important aspect of our life and economy, it is a sad reality that tap water and bottled water are not subject to the same standards.” The Environmental Protection Agency regulates drinking water quality while bottled water is regulated by the Food & Drug Administration.

It is a well-documented fact that bottles increase our petroleum dependency and end up in landfills. Petroleum dependency and landfills are not the only problems caused by the elite Fiji Water. Anna Lenzer, recently conducted an investigation of Fiji Water, breaking down the façade of their advertising which had made it the darling of the eco-conscious rich and famous. In a new exposé in Mother Jones magazine Lenzer raises alarming questions about Fiji Water’s ties to the nation’s military junta, the company’s environmental record, and its impact on the residents of Fiji.

JOIN THE PURE WATER REVOLUTION

About Pure Revolution
As a company, Pure Revolution envisions a future where the world’s fresh water crisis is addressed and managed through home technologies. With the PureOFlow whole-house/whole-business reverse osmosis water purification system, bottled water, household water softeners and at-sink filters become unnecessary, saving homeowners money and reducing waste. PureOFlow products represents the best solution to address today’s economic and environmental concerns related to greener, cleaner water solutions, as well as offering a valuable solution to water softener bans across the nation. PureOFlow systems satisfy all of these concerns by generating ROI and contributing positively to the environment. It is truly the perfect time for this product.

More than 1,000 businesses have trusted PureOFlow technology to provide purified water efficiently and cost-effectively to their customers. PureOFlow has received more than a 90% satisfaction rating. Hundreds of residential customers have adopted PureOFlow whole house reverse osmosis systems. PureOFlow was selected for Discovery Channel’s Green Planet Series, “Greenovate.” For more information visit www.pureoflow.com, or call (702) 834-6570.

Source: PRWeb

The water situation is already dire and must be addressed right away. The World Bank reported that 80 countries have water shortages that threaten health and economies, and over 2 billion people lack any access to sanitation or clean water.

In what some climate experts are calling the ‘”Century of Drought,” many world regions are suffering from severe droughts, and they are causing widespread wildfires and serious food shortages. Aquifers are drying up in many areas and many rivers are not flowing to the sea during part of the year. Global warming, by reducing rain in some areas and causing severe storms in others, and by causing the rapid melting of glaciers that have been a major source of spring irrigation water, threatens to further deteriorate the situations.

In view of the above facts and more, it is scandalous that about half of the world’s fresh water supply is used to raise animals, largely to irrigate lands growing feed crops. Animal-based diets require up to 14 times the water per person than vegan (completely plant-based) diets require. While estimates vary, according to UNESCO, the production of one pound of beef uses 15,500 liters of water, one pound of apples 700 liters and one pound of potatoes 900 liters.

Making matters worse, animal-based agriculture is a major polluter of water. Farmed animals in the U.S. alone produce over 1.3 billion tons of waste per year, or over 4 tons for every resident. Manure, laden with dangerous chemicals, is the most common pollutant in U.S. waters.

Growing water scarcity poses major threats. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said “water scarcity threatens economic and social gains and is a potent fuel for wars and conflict.”

In addition to its very significant roles in consuming and polluting water, modern intensive ‘livestock’ agriculture is a major contributor to global warming. A UN Food and Agriculture Organization 2006 report (Livestock’s Long Shadow’) indicated that animal-based agriculture emits more greenhouse gases (18 percent in CO2 equivalents) than all the cars, planes, trains and other means of transportation worldwide combined (13.5 percent). Making matters still worse is that the UN report projects that, if present trends continue, the number of farmed animals will double in the next 50 years, adding to global warming and the consumption and pollution of water.

Based on the above alarming facts, it is essential that here be a major societal shift toward plant-based diets. Such a shift would have additional benefits, including improved human health, a reduction in deforestation, desertification, rapid species extinction, soil erosion and depletion and other environmental problems and a reduction in the current massive mistreatment of animals on factory farms.

In view of the above realities, we urge the organizers of the Stockholm World Water Week to put dietary changes on its agenda. It is essential that they and other world leaders help increase awareness that a major societal shift toward plant-based diets is essential to avoid catastrophes from water shortages and other threats to humanity.

Further information:

* about World Water Week: http://www.evana.org/index.php?id=38868〈=en

* about Veg Climate Alliance: http://www.VegClimateAlliance.org

Source: PRWeb