What will historians and future generations learn from this turbulent period of world history? What did the leading nations do or not do to address the serious problems that threaten the future life on the planet?
Amidst the increasingly difficult and dire circumstances, we are now in April 2022. One thing is clear: it’s not an April Fools joke.
Study results are not something to be laughed at.The Environmental Integrity Project recently released these documentsOn the 50th Anniversary of The Clean Water Act. Ex-EPA enforcement attorneys published the report to promote effective enforcement of environmental laws. It found alarming results in water quality tests across all 50 states. Pollution has affected more than 700,000 miles (roughly 51 percent) of the stream and river miles. This is in addition to the 55 percent of lake acres, and 26 percent of estuary mile. The term impaired refers lake, river, and stream that are too polluted to meet minimum standards for swimming, recreation, aqua life, or as drinking waters sources.
Although the statistics are shocking enough, it is worth questioning the efficacy and effectiveness of laws that are passed with great fanfare. These laws often promise to achieve goals that, as with the Clean Water Act (which was never met), The truth is that once legislation is signed into law, those in the regulatory area go to work reducing, obfuscating and expanding the science-based standards that would guarantee sustainable clean water in the future.
There are also industry lobbyists, who have their fingerprints on the legislation even before it becomes law.
There are also municipalities and local governments that refuse to make the investment necessary to ensure that clean water flows out of their sewage treatment plant pipes. They have been pushing that can downhill for the past half century, begging for variances from complying with regulations. Even in Montana, local governments supported changing numerical water quality standards to narrative standards in order to dump nutrients into already-overloaded waterways.
In a country that spends more than $2 billion per day on the military, the excuse we can’t afford to clean up our wastewater is absurd. The subsequent effects for future generations are unavoidable, cumulative, and inexcusable.
Worse, government agencies ignore science because of political and corporate pressure. This is evident in the rush to log national forests to reduce wildfires. AAn increasing number of scientific studies is being conductedIt was found that thinning and logging are ineffective at stopping large wildfires. In fact, they may increase them by removing shade, drying the forest floor, and allowing for more wind to drive the flames.
A study last week found that wildfires are not primarily caused by Forest Service lands. In fact, more fires travel from private lands onto National Forest lands than from National Forest lands into communities. It is not a joke to cut down our national forests in order to prevent wildfires, when it actually destroys one the most efficient ways of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Future generations might not be able to see the light and say that they didn’t do what was necessary. They may also find fault for doing the opposite and making things worse.