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California sues ExxonMobil and says it lied about plastics recycling

Janie Har, APNEWS

California sued ExxonMobil Monday, alleging the oil giant deceived the public for half a century by promising that the plastics it produced would be recycled.

Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office said that less than 5% of plastic is recycled into another plastic product in the U.S. even though the items are labeled as “recyclable.” As a result, landfills and oceans are filled with plastic waste, creating a global pollution crisis, while consumers diligently place plastic water bottles and other containers into recycling bins, the lawsuit alleges.

“‘Buy as much as you want, no problem, it’ll be recycled,’ they say. Lies, and they aim to make us feel less guilty about our waste if we recycle it,” said Bonta, a Democrat, at a virtual news conference, where he was joined by representatives of environmental groups that filed a separate but similar lawsuit Monday, also in San Francisco County Superior Court.

“The end goal is to drive people to buy, buy, buy and to drive ExxonMobil’s profits up, up, up,” he said.

ExxonMobil, one of the world’s largest producers of plastics, blamed California for its flawed recycling system.

Read more at https://apnews.com/article/california-exxonmobil-lawsuit-plastic-8c5830696ffb02031c53c3077457ebc5

Posted on Categories Sustainable Living, Water, WildlifeTags , , ,

California governor signs law banning all plastic shopping bags at grocery stores

APNEWS

“Paper or plastic” will no longer be a choice at grocery store checkout lines in California under a new law signed Sunday by Gov. Gavin Newsom that bans all plastic shopping bags.

California had already banned thin plastic shopping bags at supermarkets and other stores, but shoppers could purchase bags made with a thicker plastic that purportedly made them reusable and recyclable.

The new measure, approved by state legislators last month, bans all plastic shopping bags starting in 2026. Consumers who don’t bring their own bags will now simply be asked if they want a paper bag.

State Sen. Catherine Blakespear, one of the bill’s supporters, said people were not reusing or recycling any plastic bags. She pointed to a state study that found that the amount of plastic shopping bags trashed per person grew from 8 pounds (3.6 kilograms) per year in 2004 to 11 pounds (5 kilograms) per year in 2021.

Blakespear, a Democrat from Encinitas, said the previous bag ban passed a decade ago didn’t reduce the overall use of plastic.

“We are literally choking our planet with plastic waste,” she said in February.

Read more at

Posted on Categories Agriculture/Food System, Climate Change & Energy, Forests, Habitats, Sustainable Living, WildlifeTags , , , , , ,

A look at the $10B climate bond (Prop. 4) California voters will decide on in November

Manola Secaira, CAPRADIO

In November, California voters will decide whether to approve of a bond that would fund state climate initiatives.

Proposition 4 on Ballotpedia

Legislators announced the $10 billion bond will appear on the November ballot as Proposition 4 earlier this month. Dozens of environmental groups advocated for it, especially in light of state budget cuts made earlier in the year that impacted climate programs.
Fred Greaves for CalMatters
Big cuts, no new taxes: Gov. Newsom’s plan to fix California’s budget deficit

Many advocates are optimistic voters will approve of the bond, citing a PPIC survey published earlier this month that found 59% of California voters would likely vote “yes.”

Assembly member Lori Wilson was one of the legislators who introduced the measure. Before it came together, she said she’d been working to introduce a bond measure that would focus on agriculture. But she and other legislators eventually decided they’d see a better chance of success if they pooled their bond proposals.

“Once we started to see the cost of inflation, just the impact that the voters were feeling, we knew there really wasn’t an appetite for multiple bonds on the ballot and there would have to be consolidation,” Wilson said.

The bond would be paid off by California’s general fund, which is supported, for the most part, by tax revenue. The state’s legislative analyst’s office says the estimated cost to repay the bond would be $400 million a year over the course of 40 years.

Supporters say the bond would provide much-needed funds to accomplish California’s ambitious environmental goals, like its commitment to conserving 6 million acres of land by 2030.

Read more at https://www.capradio.org/articles/2024/07/23/a-look-at-the-10b-climate-bond-california-voters-will-decide-on-in-november/

Posted on Categories Local Organizations, Sonoma Coast, Sustainable LivingTags , ,

Marty Griffin dies at 103, leaving legacy of land conservation, environmental leadership

Mary Callahan, PRESS DEMOCRAT

Marty Griffin was among a generation of pioneering conservationists who fought off development pressure and paved the way for protection of large swaths of the Marin-Sonoma Coast.

He didn’t do it alone. But the vast, open landscape of rolling hills and coastal waterways that draws nature lovers to the Marin-Sonoma coast might have looked a whole lot different had Marty Griffin not been around.

Imagine a freeway, whole communities, housing for tens of thousands, a mall, coastal villas, even a nuclear plant on the huge swath of coastline now dominated by nature preserves, public parks and agriculture.

Griffin and other early conservationists mobilized during the 1960s and ‘70s―as intense development pressures threatened to alter the North Bay landscape profoundly―and fought to thwart that outcome, shifting the region’s culture in ways that are evident in the lands now protected.

Since his death at home in Belvedere on May 22 at the impressive age of 103, Griffin has been remembered not just for his commitment to the cause but for his passion and leadership, the “clever,” “wily” manner in which he approached each challenge and his refusal to back down.

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/marty-griffin-conservation-leader-environmentalist/?pupeml=202864

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Number of Sonoma County farms affected by proposed ‘factory farming’ ordinance is in dispute

Phil Barber, PRESS DEMOCRAT

Sometime this year, an initiative aiming to curtail factory farming will appear on local ballots. Its authors frame it as a ban on cruel and unsanitary industrial farms. The local agricultural industry calls it a backdoor attack on the consumption of meat.

The ballot measure, which would be the first of its kind in any American county, raises huge questions relating to financial cost, regulation and Sonoma County’s appetite for animal flesh. The Board of Supervisors will listen to presentations from department heads on the potential economic fallout Tuesday.

For now, the two sides are at odds over a seemingly simple question: How many Sonoma County farms would be directly affected if the measure passes?

Six months ago, Sonoma County Farm Bureau Executive Director Dayna Ghirardelli said on KRSH Radio’s “From Farm to Table” show that it would affect “most of our local dairy and poultry operations.”

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/chicken-farms-dairy-factory-animal-activists-farmers/

Posted on Categories Habitats, Sustainable LivingTags , , , ,

Fulton nursery a go-to spot for native plants

Jeff Cox, PRESS DEMOCRAT

Cal-Flora Nursery in Fulton
California Native Plant Society – Milo Baker Chapter

The showy lady’s slipper (Cypripedium reginae) that grows east of the Rockies is a large wild orchid that reaches up to 30 inches tall, with 3- to 4-inch-long, slipperlike flowers of rose pink. They don’t grow around here. But their distant cousins do, and they look very different.

Our Sonoma County summer fog calls forth these plants where the redwoods grow tall and human activity is at a minimum. In these conditions, the forest floor may be sprinkled with them. The jewel-like pink fairy slippers (Calypso bulbosa) grow only 2 to 4 inches tall and produce 1- to 2-inch “slippers” that only fairy feet could fit.

Why such a difference among woodland orchids? You might think that our mild climate and rich woodland soils would yield orchids even larger than those back east where winter locks up the soil in ice for nearly half the year.

The answer is our summer drought, where it rarely rains from June to October. Plants native to our Mediterranean climate, as it’s called, have evolved to deal with the dry season. Some, like the California fuchsia (Zauschneria californica) have amped up drought tolerance to astonishing levels, blooming furiously in late summer despite not having a drink for months. Some simply shut down their green, vegetative parts and turn dry and brown, sending their roots to sleep until rain returns, or overwinter as seeds fallen to the ground.

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/lifestyle/california-native-plants-cal-flora-nursery/

Posted on Categories Agriculture/Food System, Sustainable LivingTags , , , ,

Sonoma County may have a new commercial composting site at the county airport

Mary Callahan, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

About 100,000 tons of green waste have been hauled out of county since Sonoma County’s last centralized compost facility closed in 2015.

A yearslong search for a new site to process much of Sonoma County’s yard and food waste may finally be over, potentially ending the need to haul almost 100,000 tons of organic materials to neighboring counties for composting each year.

Officials are now exploring the possibility of using a small piece of county-owned land in Windsor adjacent to the Sonoma County-Charles M. Schulz Airport to collect and compost green bin materials and commercial food waste to produce organic soil amendments in high demand by the local agricultural community.

The roughly 15-acre site at 5200 Slusser Rd. is part of a one-time county landfill decommissioned in 1971 and covered over with 9 feet of compacted soil.

Though its conversion to a commercial composting facility is still years off, an initial feasibility study of the site determined in 2022 there were no disqualifying physical or environmental hurdles.

If successful, selection of the site would put an end to a string of bad luck that has plagued local officials and their partners in providing a destination for organic waste just as an aggressive push is underway to keep as much as possible out of landfills, where they contribute to planet-warming greenhouse gases.

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/sonoma-county-may-have-a-new-commercial-composting-site-at-the-county-airpo/

Posted on Categories Climate Change & Energy, Sustainable LivingTags , ,

Petaluma gets $1 million to plant more trees

Jennifer Sahwney, PETLUMA ARGUS-COURIER

The city of Petaluma announced it has received a $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service to expand its tree canopy over the next three years.

The plan is to plant about 2,550 trees, said Wendy Jacobs of ReLeaf Petaluma, a local nonprofit that will undertake much of the day-to-day project management.

The tree-planting initiative is part of the Petaluma Canopy Project, a collaborative partnership between the city and local nonprofits including ReLeaf Petaluma, Daily Acts, Rebuilding Together Petaluma, Point Blue Conservation and Cool Petaluma.

The project will “plant trees around parks, schools, residential areas, and our riverbank, with the aim of restoring native species,” according to a news release.

Part of the strategy is to prioritize areas where the city’s low-income residents live and gather, “which typically have fewer trees than other parts of the city,” the release said.

More trees support the city’s climate goals, reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and decrease noise, water and air pollution. The shade they provide also lowers ambient temperatures, the release said.

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/city-gets-1-million-to-plant-more-trees/

Posted on Categories Climate Change & Energy, Sustainable LivingTags , , ,

This 100% solar community endured Hurricane Ian with no loss of power and minimal damage

Rachel Ramirez, CNN

Anthony Grande moved away from Fort Myers three years ago in large part because of the hurricane risk. He has lived in southwest Florida for nearly 19 years, had experienced Hurricanes Charley in 2004 and Irma in 2017 and saw what stronger storms could do to the coast.

Grande told CNN he wanted to find a new home where developers prioritized climate resiliency in a state that is increasingly vulnerable to record-breaking storm surge, catastrophic wind and historic rainfall.

What he found was Babcock Ranch — only 12 miles northeast of Fort Myers, yet seemingly light years away.

Babcock Ranch calls itself “America’s first solar-powered town.” Its nearby solar array — made up of 700,000 individual panels — generates more electricity than the 2,000-home neighborhood uses, in a state where most electricity is generated by burning natural gas, a planet-warming fossil fuel.

The streets in this meticulously planned neighborhood were designed to flood so houses don’t. Native landscaping along roads helps control storm water. Power and internet lines are buried to avoid wind damage. This is all in addition to being built to Florida’s robust building codes.

Read more at https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/02/us/solar-babcock-ranch-florida-hurricane-ian-climate/index.html

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‘It’s not profitable’: Another Sonoma County recycling center closes

Marisa Endicott, THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

It soon will get even harder to score a bit of extra cash in Sonoma County for turning in bottles and cans.

One of the few remaining recycling redemption sites in the area, Brogard, in Windsor, will end its operation Aug. 26 after 19 years. The scrap metal site at the same location, West Coast Metals, will continue to run.

“We’re not really happy about it because we have been a service to the community for so long,” owner Linda Gardner told me, “but just dollar-wise, we cannot keep open losing money every month.”

This is more bad news for consumers already struggling to recoup the 5- or 10-cent fee on containers as California Refund Value redemption centers and retailers have dwindled in recent years. California has lost almost half its container recycling operations in the past decade.

In Sonoma County, 85% of sites have shuttered in the past decade, and in some other Northern California counties, there are none.

Read more at https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/news/another-sonoma-county-recycling-center-is-closing-leaving-consumers-with-e/