Environment Watch

Department of Environmental Protection released its baseline report on offshore wind power following a two-year scientific study. The findings of the report indicate that wind energy can be produced with minimal environmental impact.

A groundbreaking, two-year research project led by the DEP shows minimal environmental impact would occur at sites proposed for several wind energy projects off the coast of New Jersey, which is a national leader in an effort to develop offshore wind-to-energy power.

Designed by scientists from the DEP, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Minerals Management Service, the study will help identify optimum sites off the Jersey coast for wind energy projects that would have the least impact on the environment.

The draft final report unveiled today shows there would be negligible impacts to bird, fish and marine mammal life caused 밽reen energy뮃 turbines which could be located from 3 to 20 miles out to sea, from Barnegat Bay to Hereford Inlet off the coast of Atlantic, Ocean and Cape May counties.

According to a report by the Los Angeles Times, many sunscreens involve ingredients, inadequate sun protection and application methods.
In a study released last month, the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit public health advocacy group, recommended only 8 percent of 500 sunscreen products it evaluated for effectiveness and safety.

The LA Times reports while one in six products now features SPFs higher than 50, EWG research analyst Nneka Leiba contends that most people never put on enough to reach the intended protection level.  Nor, she says, do most people reapply every two hours as recommended. The amount of sunscreen manufacturers use in testing is four to five times what people normally use, Leiba added.

“They have a false sense of security of how much protection they’re getting and stay out in the sun a lot longer,” Leiba said.  Her recommendation to consumers on the amount of sunscreen to apply: “Just use two or three times what you think would be enough.”

The industry defends the labeling on sunscreens and says the EWG report had serious shortcomings because of questionable scientific methodology.

According to a Reuters report, “GasLand,” which premiers on cable’s HBO on June 21, fuels the debate over shale gas and the extraction process known as hydraulic fracturing, which involves blasting millions of gallons of water, sand and diluted chemicals into shale rock, breaking it apart to free the gas.

It comes at a time of heightened environmental awareness and scrutiny of the energy industry due to the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

“Gasland” is one man’s attempt to educate himself about the six-figure offer he received in 2009 for the drilling rights beneath the hippy-dippy Catskills/Poconos farm where he was raised, near the Delaware River — which, as it happens, sits on a potential swath of gas deposits, which are deep, deep underground.

Advocates promote shale gas as an abundant and relatively clean source of energy within the United States but critics including “GasLand” director Josh Fox assert there are environmental and health risks.

Fox, a Pennsylvania playwright, calls the industry’s contention that such drilling is harmless too good to be true. He started asking questions about when his family was offered $100,000 plus royalties to allow hydraulic fracturing, also known as “fracking,” on their property.