DISPATCHES
Alaska Oil Rush
The Bush administration is relentless in its bid to give away wild lands to the oil and gas industry. On September 27, the Interior Department will hold its lease sale for the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. Yes, the reserve is there to tap in times of need, but it also includes the
Teshekpuk Lake area -- critical wildlife habitat for caribou and migratory waterfowl that Congress intended to protect when it granted the department jurisdiction over the region in 1976. This past summer, NRDC, as well as nearly 100 members of Congress, petitioned the secretary to delay the sale until protections for Teshekpuk Lake are considered.
-- Laura Wright
Surf and Turf
 Cherished by surfers, swimmers, campers, kayakers, birders, fishermen, and cyclists, San Onofre State Beach, about halfway between Los Angeles and San Diego, is one of California's most popular recreation areas. As luck would have it, a local toll road agency has also expressed a fondness for the area -- as the site of a six-lane highway. Proponents say it will ease traffic congestion in Orange County, but building the road also means polluting the park's world-class surf break, degrading endangered species habitat, and, according to state officials, permanently closing 60 percent of the park, including its most popular campground. Engineering studies show that a better option would be to add lanes to the existing highway,
I-5. NRDC filed suit against the toll road agency, arguing that it failed to adequately consider the project's environmental impact as required by the California Environmental Quality Act. The state attorney general filed a parallel suit.
-- Erin Kiley
Come Clean on Katrina
 A year has passed since Hurricane Katrina tore through New Orleans; streets have been cleared, homes gutted, schools reopened. But neither the EPA nor the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which is in charge of the recovery effort, has conducted a public evaluation of the lingering health threats from oil spills, flooded toxic waste sites, and mountains of debris. Nor has either agency provided specific cleanup recommendations. The EPA maintains that the local environmental agency must decide whether cleanup is necessary, even though its own testing of hundreds of sediment samples from the area last year revealed levels of arsenic and diesel fuel in excess of the agency's safety limits. In August, NRDC filed a lawsuit on behalf of local groups, including the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice, charging that FEMA and EPA have violated the Freedom of Information Act by failing to make public documents and data that justify their inaction on sediment cleanup.
-- Kathryn McGrath
Green Hospitality
The endless washing of towels and bed linens, the lights burning 24/7, trash heaps flowing from the kitchen and the business conference center: Hotels leave quite a mark on the environment. Some major hotels are doing something about it, thanks to the likes of NRDC supporter Tedd Saunders, co-owner and executive vice president of the Saunders Hotel Group and president of EcoLogical Solutions Inc., an environmental consulting firm for the hospitality industry. Saunders Hotels, which include Boston's famous century-old inn, The Lenox Hotel, are reducing energy consumption and conserving resources by using energy management systems such as motion sensors for lighting and heat pumps for temperature control; laundry systems that minimize the use of hot water and chlorine; compact fluorescent lighting; and wall-mounted shampoo and soap dispensers that replace the common trial-size plastic bottles.
-- Alba Garzón
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"We should all be concerned about the future because we will have to spend the rest of our lives there."
-- Charles Kettering
Energy was a hot topic this summer: Democrats and Republicans debated how to kick our oil addiction, American farmers talked up biofuels, and Wall Street threw record sums at renewable-energy technologies. So it's especially disappointing that the only major pieces of energy legislation passed by either chamber of Congress before the summer recess were bills that authorized expanded offshore oil and gas drilling. The Senate bill would open 8.3 million acres in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, even though the industry already has access to more than 80 percent of all known reserves in U.S. waters. The House bill goes further, lifting a 25-year moratorium on drilling in coastal areas and making it prohibitively difficult to reinstate protections for coastal waters in the future. The two versions must be reconciled before either becomes law, and NRDC is working to make sure new drill rigs won't add to the threats faced by the battered Gulf Coast region.
Capitol Hill is grappling at last with science-based solutions to global warming. Just a few years ago, it was the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act or nothing. Congress did nothing. The mood on the Hill has changed dramatically: Members of Congress are sponsoring legislation to curb the growth of global warming emissions in the near term, and to reduce them over the coming decades. Jim Jeffords, an Independent from Vermont, and Barbara Boxer, a Democrat from California, sponsored the Senate bill; Henry Waxman, another Democrat from California, was behind the bill in the House. NRDC is working with other members to introduce more new bills this fall.
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