Global Warming Affects Farmers

After a very cold and snow-less winter, the United States warmed up almost instantaneously. As temperatures soared into the low 20s (in Celsius), millions of farmers started their growing season nearly 6 weeks early, in hopes for a better growing season. For almost two weeks, the weather was perfect. Winds from the South brought adequate heat and moisture. Moreover, the jet stream moved upwards, thus removing the stream of cold air. Unfortunately, this spell of utopian weather stopped this week. Without a moment's hesitation, cold high-speed winds came in from the North, bringing dry, freezing air. Snow started to fall in some regions of the Mid-West while most of the country was trapped in a cold air bubble. This sudden malignant change destroyed saplings and crops mercilessly. In a week, estimates state that farmers seem to have lost millions of dollars with the death of most of their plants. Officials blame the melting ice in the North, which keeps the ocean temperature cool, which in turn lowers the temperature of the air. The melting of ice in the North Pole is, obviously, due to global warming. People release an abnormal amount of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide and methane, thus increasing the average world temperature gradually. Thus, the ice on the North pole starts melting. The situation explained above is just one of the ways that global warming is harmful. It is important for humans to stop it, regardless of the cost.

The Battle for Jeju Island: How the Arms Race is Threatening a Korean Paradise | OnEarth Magazine

The Battle for Jeju Island: How the Arms Race is Threatening a Korean Paradise | OnEarth Magazine

Illinois no.1 in wind energy

In Korea, alternative energy related companies are struggling and so do many American companies. However, in Chicago,  at least 50 wind energy companies are doing great according to environmental advocates. They have been creating jobs and helping environment.

In 2011, Illinois topped the nation in the number of new wind turbines installed and ranked no.2  behind California in the total amount of the turbines' power capacity, according to a report by the American Wind Energy Association.

The industry has grown 80% last four years since President Barack Obama's approval of $2.3 billion in tax credits for advanced energy manufacturing. The tax credit of 2.2 cents per kilowatt hour produced goes to wind energy developers.

Still the skepticism for the long-term survival of alternative energy companies remains;however, the recent leakage of nuclear power plants in Korea and Japan leads to believe the usage of wind energy as an alternative energy power.

Switzerland: The World's Cleanest Country

According various international reports, Switzerland has constantly placed in the top three places, making it one of the cleanest, if not the cleanest countries in the world. Switzerland has been admired by many countries of the European Union. They have tried to model after Switzerland's economic, education, and preservation system. Switzerland is indeed one of the richest countries in the world. An average citizen in the nation has over $90,000 on average. That number is nearly twice the average wealth of an American. It is natural for a rich country to rely on hydrocarbon-based fuels and damage the environment for the sake of the economy. However, this is not the case with Switzerland. The country has a very unstable ecosystem because of the altitude and location of the nation. Fortunately, because the government is pouring money into the environment and science sectors, the country is coming up with ingenuous ways to protect those fragile ecosystems. Switzerland is a country that must be modeled after by many of the richest nations. It is the closest nation to an environmental utopia.

Sam Suds and the Case of PVC: The Poison Plastic

This animation campaigne tries to alert bad plastics in our living.
It's funny;however, I was so sad to see my lubber ducky turned out to be bad.....-.-;;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpmE_b90XTU&feature=player_profilepage

Gloria Steinem's article over Jeju Island, NYC Times

August 6, 2011

The Arms Race Intrudes on Paradise

By GLORIA STEINEM

Gloria Steinem is an author, an activist and a co-founder of the Women?s Media Center.
THERE are some actions for which those of us alive today will be judged in centuries to come. The only question will be: What did we know and when did we know it?
I think one judgment-worthy action may be what you and I do about the militarization of Jeju Island, South Korea, in service of the arms race.
Jeju isn?t called the most beautiful place on earth for nothing. Ancient volcanoes have become snow-covered peaks with pure mountain streams running down to volcanic beaches and reefs of soft coral. In between are green hills covered with wildflowers, mandarin orange groves, nutmeg forests, tea plantations and rare orchids growing wild; all existing at peace with farms, resorts and small cities. Unesco, the United Nation?s educational, scientific and cultural organization, has designated Jeju Island a world natural heritage site.
Now, a naval base is about to destroy a crucial stretch of the coast of Jeju, and will do this to dock and service destroyers with sophisticated ballistic missile defense systems and space war applications. China and South Korea have positive relations at the moment. But this naval base is not only an environmental disaster on an island less than two-thirds the size of Rhode Island, it may be a globally dangerous provocation besides.
Residents of Gangjeong, the village that is to be home to this base, have been living in tents along the endangered coastline, trying to stave off the dredging and bulldozing. In a vote several years ago at a village meeting, residents overwhelming opposed the base.
They?ve tried to block construction with lawsuits and pleas for a proper environmental impact study. They?ve been fined, beaten, arrested and imprisoned. They?ve gone on hunger strikes, chained themselves to anything available, invited tourists in to see what?s at stake, established Web sites and won support from global peace organizations. Members of the ?no base? campaign, including children, camp out along the shore behind high walls erected around the site to conceal the protests. Police officers patrol outside. This has been going on for more than four years.
You may be wondering why you haven?t heard more about it. I doubt that I would know, either, if I hadn?t visited Jeju Island nine years ago, and been unable to shake the memory of its beauty, and traditions that may be remnants of an ancient culture of balance. The island itself is said to be the body of the Creation Goddess, and is often called Women?s Island. It is home to the legendary women deep-sea divers known as Haenyeo, as well as sacred goddess groves and shamanistic traditions. For many women especially, it is becoming a symbol of what once was and could be.
But among the half million or so residents, there are also memories of terrible loss. Before and during World War II, Japanese troops stationed there used islanders as forced labor and murdered many. Just before the Korean War, South Korean forces burned villages to the ground and killed perhaps as many as 30,000 islanders because they didn?t support dividing the peninsula into North and South, and so were assumed to be Communists. But with work and old wisdom, Jeju gradually restored its uniquely peaceful culture as South Korea?s only autonomous province. In 2006, Roh Moo-hyun, then South Korea?s president, apologized for the massacre and declared Jeju the Island of Global Peace.
When I was invited in May to again visit Jeju, by friends in the Korean women?s movement, I could see why it attracts peace conferences, honeymooners, environmentalists, marine biologists, film crews, pilgrims and tourists. But I also visited the peace encampment, within sight of harassing police officers and waiting bulldozers. The mayor of Gangjeong, the leader of the resisters, said quietly that he and others would give their lives to stop construction. His 92-year-old mother walks down from the village to the shore every evening to make sure he is still alive.
Still, the South Korean president, Lee Myung-bak, a former head of a construction company who was known as ?Mr. Bulldozer,? hasn?t yet had a change of heart about supporting the naval base. Indeed, he seems to have the same relationship to construction that President George W. Bush had to oil. But I fear South Korea is a tail being wagged by the Pentagon dog. In contrast, his predecessor, Mr. Roh, said before he died that he regretted only two things: sending South Korean troops to Iraq and permitting a naval base on Jeju Island.
Jeju Island is on a very short list of candidates in a public Internet campaign to choose a new seven wonders of the world, and Mr. Lee is campaigning hard for it. He may have to choose. How can Jeju Island be one of the seven wonders when its claim rests on nature about to be destroyed?
Meanwhile, there are more people signing protest petitions on the Web, calling anyone they know in Washington, or going to Jeju Island to support and safeguard the protesters and show that tourists without guns, not military bases, are its economic future. In my daily e-mails with protesters on Jeju, I learned that bulldozers were spreading small rocks in preparation for laying concrete over lava, and living coral that is a distinctive natural habitat. Once the bulldozers are out of sight, children pick up those rocks, pile them into towers and plant a peace flag in each one.
For myself, I am writing this column, putting a petition on my Facebook page, and hoping for enough Arab Spring-like activism to topple one naval base.
I?ve never known less what will happen. I can still hear the dolphins crying as if sensing danger. But somehow, my faith is in the villagers who say, ?Touch not one stone, not one flower.?
Besides, now you know.

Follow up report: Jeju naval base

It has been 4 years since government announced its plan to build naval base in Jeju Island, which is home for nine UNESCO-designated Global Geo Parks, three World Natural Heritage sites and a Biosphere Reserve.

The naval base on Jeju Island will strategically equip South Koreans and their American allies with the capability to strike long-range ballistic missile batteries in southeast China that target Japan or Taiwan. Washington sees this base as a central pillar to its defense system in the Asia-Pacific region. And China sees it as a threat.

On July 6, the government and the Navy filed for a court injunction barring any action opposing base construction and the protesters? entry to the base site.

I think it is really an irony that our government wants Jeju island to be selected as the new seven wonders of the world while destroying its nature on the other hand.

Many residents are opposing the base construction but this project involves global powers. Not just Korean government but American government is also involved so we need more powerful voices to let those government to listen.

Famous women's right activist Gloria Steinem wrote on the New York Times column that both government took the matter really seriously and should reconsider.

I hope many people will see the irony of Jeju's status and work on to bring out unified global voice over the long dragging matter.  Alberta Yoo.