This week’s Sierra Club “Currents” newsletter is chock full! Let’s get started.
Gender Bending Chemicals: Is that a Male or a Female?
Male fish with eggs? Cases of such “intersexed” fish have now been documented from the Potomac River to the Pacific coast. Today the Sierra Club, along with a coalition of environmental and public health organizations, commercial fishermen, and laundry workers demanded that the EPA take action to protect our waters from the toxic chemicals that cause these fish to mutate. Though the human health impacts of these chemicals are still largely unknown, gender changing and sexually deformed fish are a danger signal we should take seriously.
The chemicals causing the problems for indicator species are nonylphenol and nonylphenol ethoxylates. NPEs are used mainly as a cleaners and detergents, as well as for manufacturing processes and in personal care products. When NPEs degrade they break down into more toxic substances that remain in the environment. Currently, NPEs are used to manufacture about 400 million pounds of products each year. NPEs negatively affect such species as rainbow trout, winter flounder, salmon and oysters by hindering their reproduction, growth and survival. Research indicates the NPEs “disrupt the endocrine system and interfere with the hormones of fish and shellfish. Exposure to NPE breakdown products causes organisms to develop both male and female sex organs; increases mortality and damage to the liver and kidney; decreases testicular growth and sperm counts in male fish; and disrupts normal male to female sex-ratios, metabolism, development, growth, and reproduction.”
Proctor & Gamble and Unlilever state publicly that they do not use NPEs in their products because of environmental concerns. Walmart is asking its vendors to replace NPEs with wafer chemicals. The Sierra Club and its partners are petitioning the EPA to upgrade its testing facilities and “use its authority under the Toxic Substances Control Act to require manufacturers and processors to provide information to fill gaps in toxicity data which the EPA has acknowledged, including data on effects on laundry workers and the general population. In addition, the petition requests labeling of products containing NP and NPEs, restrictions on discharging these chemicals into poorly operating wastewater treatment plants, pollution prevention planning for facilities using large quantities of these chemicals, and a ban on their use in industrial and commercial detergents.”
READ LABELS, PEOPLE. It matters.
Also on the Sierra Club’s to-do list: “Asking an Idaho federal district court to restore the “threatened” status of the Yellowstone grizzly population because of ongoing habitat destruction caused by global warming, insufficient bear numbers, and inadequate legal protections. Environmental groups say leaving the bears unprotected now would be premature.
The modest recovery of the Yellowstone grizzly bear shows how effective the Endangered Species Act can be, but Yellowstone’s bears now face their biggest challenge ever in the form of global warming.” Earlier the Sierra Club asked its members, myself included, to send comments to U.S. Fish & Wildlife about this ill-advised intention. They got 150,000 comments!
Please read more about the Club’s actions, along with its partners, to restore important protections to the grizzlies. While you’re at it, sign up to become a Grizzly Guardian and get the newsletter, action alerts and photos of grizzlies. BEARS RULE!
I wrote in an earlier post that we need a stronger energy bill because the one we got from the Bush Administration favors big oil and gas companies. If you haven’t contacted your Senators yet, WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?
While we’re on the subject of energy, the Club needs your help to urge the House of Representatives to pass legislation that requires a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from electric utilities and vehicles. “These steps are crucial to reducing greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by 2050 — or 2 percent a year — the level scientists say is necessary to avoid the worst effects of global warming. “
Get busy. Don’t make me come down there.
s.
Filed under: conservation, endangered species, global climate change, wildlife conservation
