HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Subject: Re: Nature's Revenge (toll booths vs. cars)
Organization: LLNL
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 03:51:11 GMT

In article <JMC.92Aug14165324@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>The original purpose of the tolls was to pay off the bonds that were
>used to finance the construction of the road and bridges.  Almost all
>the bonds for almost all the toll roads have been paid off, but the
>road authorities and the states can always find uses for the money.

	Like maintaining all the other roads that they have to take
care of.

	And maintaining the bridges. John McCarthy, do you think that
that can be done for free?

	I've checked all the Bay Area bridges, and they are all toll
bridges.

	Those who drive across the bridges also drive on a lot of
other roads, but that does raise the issue of whether or not frequent
bridge-crossers should subsidize those who rarely or never cross
bridges.

>Therefore, they celebrate the paying off of the bonds by raising
>the tolls.

#sarcasm ON

	Oh, isn't that just too bad. John McCarthy doesn't want to
have to pay for using the roads and bridges he drives on.

#sarcasm OFF

>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
                                             ^^^^^^^^

	Well, the next time you get stuck in a traffic jam near the
CalTrain line, I won't waste any sympathy on you.

>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

	Same to you, bud.
From: Wanda Ballentine <wandab@igc.apc.org>
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Date: 19 Aug 92 22:37 PDT
Subject: Ozone ordinances?
Nf-ID: #N:cdp:1466601741:000:386
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!wandab    Aug 19 22:37:00 1992


We're seeking examples of local ordinances passed to limit or
halt the use and production of ozone-depleting chemicals.  We do
have San Jose, CA's, have heard Irving, CA, has a good one.  They
would be too much to input here, but if anyone has samples, we'd
appreciate receiving them by mail:

Wanda Ballentine
c/o Oregon Research Institute
1899 Willamette
Eugene OR 97401-4015

Thanks.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Newsgroups: sci.environment,ba.transportation,rec.railroad
Subject: The Rebuilding of the Wrecked West Oakland I-880 Segment
Date: 15 Aug 92 03:28:31 GMT
Organization: LLNL


	During the _Loma Prieta_ earthquake of 1989, much of the West
Oakland segment of I-880 collapsed and [some rather gross gallows
humor coming up] made big news out of itself as a sizable number of
drivers on it became the meat of a "Highway Sandwich" with the
metallic wrapping on the inside instead on the outside.

	Now, it will be rebuilt, as I have learned from recent
newspaper stories (for example, _The San Francisco Examiner_, Aug. 13,
1991, p. A4)

	The original 1.25 mi. stretch will be rebuilt for about $695
million. The job will be started in January 1994, and the rebuilt
freeway segment should open in 1998.

	30 buildings will have to be demolished for it, and the
six-lane freeway will go through 75 acres of Southern Pacific railroad
yard. I have learned from elsewhere that the SP line that now goes
around West Oakland will be rerouted along the freeway's old route.
Amtrak's West Oakland station is due to be demolished as part of the
construction; Amtrak will be getting a new station at Jack London
Square at Alice St.

	I estimate the new route's length at about 1.75 mi, which
gives a cost of about $400 million/mi.

	Though the new freeway will not be a double-decker, some parts
of it will soar very high, like a part that connects to the part of
I-80 that is headed for the Bay Bridge. It will go 80 ft. up, unlike
the 60 ft. of the old double-decker. But this time around, the
structure will be made of steel and built on deeply sunk piles to make
it more earthquake-resistant.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: u020@csx.cciw.ca (I. Wong)
Subject: Monte Carlo Approach on Water Quality Modelling
Organization: Canada Centre for Inland Waters
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 19:06:19 GMT

I am interested in Monte Carlo Method on Water Quality Modelling. If
anyone can help me, please e-mail to u020@csx.cciw.ca.

I. Wong
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: bp938@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Jeffrey G. Thomas)
Subject: Re: Software for modeling air and water quality
Reply-To: bp938@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Jeffrey G. Thomas)
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 92 16:58:03 GMT


In a previous article, biondo@sep.Stanford.EDU (Biondo Biondi) says:

>I'm interested in finding out if there is the possibility to
>download from an anonymous ftp or from a bbs several
>regulatory and other suggested EPA models, in the field of
>air and water quality. At the moment I'm particularly interested
>in finding an electronic way to take (or buy) WASP and QUAL2 water      ,
>quality models. Any help or info is appreciated.
>
>-- 
>  	Biondo Biondi 	
>	Consulting Assistant Professor
> 	Dept of Geophysics, Stanford University 
>	biondo@sep.stanford.edu 
>
Reply:  Tel. 1-513-569-6410 (8-1-N).  This is the EPA-ORD bulletin
board (+CERI too).  The bulletins on this board describe the 
air and water bbs in rtp, nc and athens, ga. and the means of 
access.  You can download from the air and water boards.  I don't know
if they support 9600 baud though.

J.T.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: jmc@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (John McCarthy)
Subject: Re: Different Transit Plans for Different Population Clusters
Reply-To: jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University
Date: 19 Aug 92 18:54:43

In article <1992Aug19.150702.29920@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bl713@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Lev Tarasov) writes:


   Just for interest, Vancouver has faced lawn-watering bans this 
   year. The states have a lot of water, but a lot of it is wasted.
   Some of the dam projects in Alberta(such as the OLDMAN river) 
   seem to make more sense for setting up a large-scale water-
   diversion system to the states. The premier of Quebec has
   long been associated with the grand-canal scheme: to dam up
   Hudson's bay and blast a canal down to the great lakes for 
   US water usage. Wouldn't it make a lot more sense to conserve
   our resources than mutilate our watersheds?###
   ####

Mr. Tarasov likes words like "mutilate" that prejudice the issues he
purports to discuss.

How about "develop" instead?  Then the answer wouldn't be obvious
and would actually be subject to discussion.
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
From: raana@athena.mit.edu (MEHRAN ISLAM)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Environmental Project
Date: 18 Aug 92 19:12:17 GMT
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology


	HI!! I am an undergraduate student from Bangladesh and have just
completed my first year of education here at MIT.  Next summer, I want to go back
home for the entire summer break but I don't want to just not do anything at
home.  What I am planning on is to work for one of the many NGOs (Non-Government
Organizations) that exist in Bangladesh.  My major is going to be
Environmental Engineering and so it would be perfect if I could find a project
related to environmental issues.  But I am not sure exactly what I can do -- do
any of you have any suggestions about how I should go about and decide what I
want to work on?  Any ideas about any environment project in a country like
Bangladesh.   
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: houle@nmt.edu (Paul Houle)
Subject: Re: Mary Jane has a great Biomass
Organization: New Mexico Tech
Date: Tue, 11 Aug 1992 20:56:15 GMT

In article <1992Aug11.201901.11082@crd.ge.com> ebstokes@maxwell.crd.ge.com (Ed Stokes) writes:
>In article <1992Aug11.033600.13943@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bj368@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Mike E. Romano) writes:
>>
>>What we need and right away is to start growing the nonpotent strains
>>of hemp in commercial farming.

	The very potent stains of hemp would probably be horrible as
fiber plants.  The plants don't grow very high and form a kind of conical
bush that is dripping in resin.  This probably would be an inefficient use
of land area (at least for producing biomass).

>
>The problem, of course, is that the lumber, paper, and
>petrochemical industries do _not_ desire to relinquish
>their tremendous political and economic power to the
>American farmer. In the book "The Emperor Wears No Clothes",
>hemp activist Jack Herer elaborates on the Hearst/DuPont
>"reefer madness" scam which originally made hemp illegal
>in the 1930's. I have a bibliography of information
>on hemp which I will post under the subject header "hemp
>bibliography".

	I think there is some truth in this.  But also,  cultures tend to be
xenophobic about drugs coming from "the outside".  Coffee was outlawed when
it was introduced to the middle east,  with the local authorities coming
into houses and smashing coffee pots in the street;  dragging known users
through town to humiliate them.  All resembling the implemented and
proposed "solutions" to the illegal drug "problem" today.  Hemp intoxicants
were freely availible in most drugstores in the late 1800's and the turn
of the century.  Use of hemp products didn't become an issue until marijuania
became popular with blacks and other "low-life" groups.

>The Bush administration is so paranoid about it that they
>won't even let doctors prescribe marijuana to terminally
>ill patients. Synthetic THC yes, marijuana no. The reason ?
>Pharmaceutical companies can patent a synthetic process
>and resulting drugs, but they cannot collect royalties
>on a plant that anyone can grow in their garden.

	Although plant products are rarely used in medicine today,  the use
of MJ instead of marinol is easily justifiable.  Users of hemp products know
that it is much easier to control the dosage of THC when the drug is smoked
rather than taken orally.  The advantage of using smokable THC is that a
patient gets to set the dosage to be high enough to control the symptoms
but low enough not to get severely intoxicated or "stoned".



-- 
Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.econ
From: szabo@techbook.com (Nick Szabo)
Subject: Re: --CO2 Emissions Trading?
Organization: TECHbooks --- Public Access UNIX --- (503) 644-8135
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 07:14:28 GMT

In article <1466601737@igc.org> Tom Gray <tgray@igc.org> writes:
>
>In general terms, an emissions trading agreement could be global in
>scope or could be reached among the industrial nations.  In either
>case, businesses would be given a fixed number of "permits" (called
>"allowances" under the Clean Air law) to produce emissions of CO2,
>the leading "greenhouse gas" associated with global warming.  In
>future years, the total number of permits would be gradually
>reduced.

I've suggested this idea before and I'm glad the OECD et. al. are
taking it seriously.  CO2 credits trading is far superior to 
"carbon" taxes which end up being motivated by side issues (raising
government revenue, punishing political enemies, etc.) instead of
addressing the specific problem at hand.  In addition to trading permits, 
we need to think about how the volume of CO2 permits should be determined.  
Instead of that level being set by politically motivated treaties, I 
suggest that it should be set by combining the following methods:

* A CO2 futures market, which allows investors in fossil and non-fossil
plants to hedge against future CO2 levels.  As expected CO2 levels go up,
fossil plant investors pay more.  Speculators have incentive to 
accurately predict levels and invest in research and measurements of
the global climate to enable accurate prediction.  The market then reflects 
a consensus opinion which can be used to plan and hedge investments in energy
technology.  (This proposal is based on the "Idea Futures" proposal from
the Foresight Institute, Palo Alto CA).

* A market to allow the benefits of CO2 fertilization effect on
bioindustries to be reflected in the volume of permits (ie farmers and
lumber companies collectively determine how much extra CO2 they want and 
pay for it).

* A market to allow owners of real estate lost to rising sea levels
to be reimbursed, and those losses accurately reflected in the volume
of CO2 permits.

* Markets to internalize any other significant costs or benefits of
changing CO2 levels.

Some of these are not straightforward, and many details remain to be
worked out, but the effort is worthwhile.  We need to build a system 
that can mitigate or prevent negative impacts of rising CO2 levels 
with minimal economic impact and without turning the problem into 
a political circus.


-- 
szabo@techbook.COM  Public Access User --- Not affiliated with TECHbooks
Public Access UNIX and Internet at (503) 644-8135 (1200/2400, N81) 
Newsgroups: sci.environment,alt.politics.clinton
From: benda@dove.egr.msu.edu (James Benda)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Paper Manufacture
Date: 17 Aug 92 20:52:04 GMT
Organization: College of Engineering, Michigan State University

Does anyone have the access to or know where to find the data dealing
with material and energy balances of Paper Manufacturing?
Info would be greatly appreciated!
thanks,
 moe.
From: Ecology Center Fund <ecologycntr@igc.apc.org>
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Date: 17 Aug 92 09:00 PDT
Subject: Re: Plastic or Paper...which is environ
Nf-ID: #R:1992Aug3.182952.2513@informix.co:824583727:cdp:1466601739:000:1501
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!ecologycntr    Aug 17 09:00:00 1992


We get the paper versus plastic question asked of us here at the
Ecology Center pretty often.  Our reply is usually that neither is
good, and that a cloth bag is marginally less harmful in the real
world (where you have to make the cloth bag from something and
most people won't use it all the time, or will buy more groceries
than will fit.

But the whole emphasis on the shopping bag conveniently relegates
thought about the environmental impacts of your shopping lifestyle
to the END of the process.  We'd rather people ask:

How did you get to the store?  How are the products you are buying
packaged?  How was the stuff inside the package produced?  Do you
need what you're considering buying?

Imagine someone who hears tomatoes are "on sale" and gets in the
car, drives 3 miles to the supermarket, (including .25 miles back
and forth in the parking lot), walks into the store and buys 4
polystyrene wrapped HDPE baskets with three tomatoes each.  The
tomatoes of course were grown in soil sterilized with methyl
bromide, were sprayed with diazinon to control hornworm, and were
bred to be resistant to herbicide so that the farmer could spray
his weeds with Roundup.  Taking the tomatoes to his car, the
shopper drives back home and eats a sandwich with one half of one
of the tomatoes sliced onto it, then lets the rest rot in the
refrigerator and throws them out, wrapper and all, three weeks
later.

Making the wrong choice in grocery bags has little effect on his
"ecological karma"

chris

Newsgroups: sci.environment,sci.energy
From: len@math.nwu.edu (Len Evens)
Subject: Re: Nature's Revenge (toll booths vs. cars)
Organization: Dept of Math, Northwestern Univ
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 18:44:13 GMT

With respect to the placement of toll booths.   The problem with
the Illinois tollway system near Chicago is that because of
incoherent, unplanned growth there is too much damn traffic
much of the time.  With that amount of traffic, some people are
going to have to spend a lot of time waiting, no matter where
toll booths are.

With respect to John McCarthy's comment about promises that tolls
would disappear when the tollways were paid for.   Maybe once
upon a time, it might have made sense to take such
promises seriously, but that hasn't been true for quite a long
time.  Few if any toll road, bridges, etc. have eliminated tolls,
and certainly when the Illinois tollways were planned, anyone who
believed in such a fairy tale would have been naive in the extreme.


Leonard Evens      len@math.nwu.edu      708-491-5537
Dept. of Mathematics, Northwestern Univ., Evanston, IL 60208
From: Wanda Ballentine <wandab@igc.org>
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Date: 12 Aug 92 22:27 PDT
Subject: Info Needed for Suit Against EPA
Nf-ID: #N:cdp:1466601735:000:1227
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!wandab    Aug 12 22:27:00 1992


A Portland, Oregon, group has filed a suit against the EPA for
failing to meet the May 15 deadline to meet requirements for
preserving the ozone layer.  Under the Clean Air Act the agency
was to have issued regulations for federal agencies that use
ozone-depleting chemicals.  The U.S. uses 1/3 of such chemicals
worldwide, and the federal government is the largest single
purchaser.

The case was filed in late July, and the group's lawyer, Peter
Sorensen, will meet with the government's lawyer on 8/27.  The
suit calls for a court-ordered deadline to implement the ozone
regulations on 10/8.

INFORMATION NEEDED - the following information would be very
helpful to the case:

Anyone out there ever work for the EPA who could give a general
idea of how long it *reasonably* takes the EPA to develop
regulations?  In other words, what is realistic, and what is
simply delaying tactics?

Does anyone have an idea as to who might be an expert regarding
the kinds and amounts of ozone-depleting chemicals the government
purchases?  Or where to find such information?

Aside from the case, we are also seeking lists of products that
contain ozone-depleters, and alternatives to those chemicals.

Please respond to wandab.

Thanks.
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Suggestibility of environmentalists
Date: 13 Aug 92 09:01:54 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <1992Aug11.032629.13241@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bj368@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Mike E. Romano) writes:
>
>Isn't such a study a waste of time?
>Also the first assumption....that these two professions....toxicology
>and epidemiology are "environmentalist" professions...what about
>medical doctors in general...or engineers in general..they also
>work with the environment?
>Let's take one example, asbestos:  after all the data that has been
>amassed on the hazards to humans of this substance....aren't there
>better things to be doing than analyzing some little quirk in how
>scientists might recognize or evaluate it....sort of blind man's
>bluff?
>Isn't it much more urgent to start curbing the world wide pollution
>of organic solvents, toxics in general, radioactive waste...starting
>with our own efforts in these areas?
>Reminds me of a study I read recently in one of the science journals
>about how dioxin ingested by rats can cause some aberrant sexual
>behavior.
>What's the point?  Dioxin has already been shown to be one of the
>strongest toxics .....most hazardous.... how about doing a study on
>how to get the EPA to do their job?
>Or get large corporations producing toxic waste by products to accelerate
>improvement in these areas?

The point is that even professionals, the people we expect to provide
the expertise to guide wise environmental choices, are easily swayed
by green propaganda rather than by objective evaluation of risks on
their own merits. This has important public policy implications. It
means that public officials are receiving advice from people who are
as subject to hysteria as you so obviously are.

Gary
From: Wanda Ballentine <wandab@igc.apc.org>
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Date: 19 Aug 92 22:36 PDT
Subject: Help needed with EPA suit
Nf-ID: #N:cdp:1466601740:000:1227
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!wandab    Aug 19 22:36:00 1992


A Portland, Oregon, group has filed a suit against the EPA for
failing to meet the May 15 deadline to meet requirements for
preserving the ozone layer.  Under the Clean Air Act the agency
was to have issued regulations for federal agencies that use
ozone-depleting chemicals.  The U.S. uses 1/3 of such chemicals
worldwide, and the federal government is the largest single
purchaser.

The case was filed in late July, and the group's lawyer, Peter
Sorensen, will meet with the government's lawyer on 8/27.  The
suit calls for a court-ordered deadline to implement the ozone
regulations on 10/8.

INFORMATION NEEDED - the following information would be very
helpful to the case:

Anyone out there ever work for the EPA who could give a general
idea of how long it *reasonably* takes the EPA to develop
regulations?  In other words, what is realistic, and what is
simply delaying tactics?

Does anyone have an idea as to who might be an expert regarding
the kinds and amounts of ozone-depleting chemicals the government
purchases?  Or where to find such information?

Aside from the case, we are also seeking lists of products that
contain ozone-depleters, and alternatives to those chemicals.

Please respond to wandab.

Thanks.
From: bg055@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Stewart Rowe)
Newsgroups: sci.environment
Subject: Re: Plastic or Paper...which is environmentally correct?
Date: 14 Aug 92 21:26:23 GMT
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, (USA)


Michael  <MKHAN@ESOC.BITNET> says
Mark Wilson states that the fiber length degrades in the recycling process
thus precluding a closed paper loop.
I concur but would like to point out that a prime market for recycled paper
would be applications like tissues, napkins, toilet paper etc where the waste
product is not fed back into the loop and quality or appearance of the product
are not of prime importance. 
 
As one who worked in this area for years, I would suggest some real-world
experience. Try telling the chemists and engineers at Procter and Gamble, 
Kimberly-Clark, or Scott Paper that "quality is not important".
Try telling their customers. Better yet, try selling some of that
European trash in the U. S and try losing your shirt.!
 -Stewart Rowe usr2210a@tso.uc.edu  srowe@igc.org
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: bp938@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Jeffrey G. Thomas)
Subject: Re: USGS stream gauging data
Reply-To: bp938@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Jeffrey G. Thomas)
Organization: Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH (USA)
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 92 16:53:09 GMT


In a previous article, bobh@minaret.hwr.arizona.edu () says:

>
>Well, this is supposed to be a sci. newsgroup so:
>
>Does anyone out there know if USGS stream gauging
>data is available via anonymous ftp? I'm interested
>in data for the western US in particular.
>
>Thanks, 
>
>Bob Harrington
>
Reply:  Try the bbs, 1-703-648-4168 (8-1-N).

J.T.
Newsgroups: sci.environment
From: lip@s1.gov (Loren I. Petrich)
Subject: Re: Different Transit Plans for Different Population Clusters
Organization: LLNL
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 06:37:43 GMT

In article <JMC.92Aug16203921@SAIL.Stanford.EDU> jmc@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:
>In article <1992Aug16.173628.3657@usenet.ins.cwru.edu> bl713@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Lev Tarasov) writes:

:   The US has been a country run by businessmen for the last century,     
:   its the biggest debtor nation in the world now. The rich have the
:   choices, but what about the poor? With your wasting of water 
:   resources, what are you future choices? Major diversion schemes
:   of rivers from Canada? A state run by businessmen would I 
:   presume base their policy on profit. When will that magic faith 
:   that profit maximization guarantee quality of life and environment
:   be seen as the modern equivalent of the belief that the rain gods
:   determine when the rain will come.

:Mr. Tarasov has been paying too much attention to people who
:exaggerate.  There is plenty of water in almost all parts
:of the U.S.  However, if every project to get more is blocked

#sarcasm ON

	I've been to Nevada and all I ever saw was water, water everywhere.

#sarcasm OFF

	John McCarthy, can that statement of yours possibly be taken
seriously, with the drought and all that? Or will you complain only
when all the rivers are drunk up?

:by environmentalists, there will be problems till their objections
:are overcome.  I suppose that the strange pricing situation for
:water also has to be overcome.