Cradle to Cradle recycling of computers by Dell

Electronic waste is hazardous to our health and environment. European countries have required companies to recycle equipment for several years -- and US computer companies are now beginning to offer similar services in the US.

Dell Consumer Recycling Policy will pick up Dell products for free recycling.

Dell's U.S. consumer recycling offer is available at www.dell.com/recycling. Dell's no-charge recycling program for U.S. customers has been launched at www.dell4me.com/recycling.



Dell currently offers consumers no-charge recycling of any brand of used computer or printer with the purchase of a new Dell computer or printer. This service includes home pick-up of the used computer at no charge.

Dell will provide consumers no-charge recycling of any Dell-branded product, regardless of whether a replacement product is purchased. The company launched the service in the U.S. in September, and globally by November. It is currently available in Europe. Dell has been focused on developing market-driven consumer recycling services for several years.

America reaches 300,000

The environmental load of 300 million: How heavy?
In many ways, Americans have mitigated the impact of their increasing presence on the land. Since reaching the 200 million mark back in 1967, they have cut emissions of major air pollutants, banned certain harmful pesticides, and overseen the rebound of several endangered species. Despite using more resources and creating more waste, they've become more energy efficient.

The danger, experts say, is that the US may simply have postponed the day of reckoning. Major environmental problems remain, and some are getting worse - all of them in one way or another connected to US population growth, which is expected to hit 400 million around midcentury.

Some experts put the average American's "ecological footprint" - the amount of land and water needed to support an individual and absorb his or her waste - at 24 acres. By that calculation, the long-term "carrying capacity" of the US would sustain less than half of the nation's current population.

"The US is the only industrialized nation in the world experiencing significant population growth," says Vicky Markham, of the Center for Environment and Population, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization in New Canaan, Conn. "That, combined with America's high rates of resource consumption, results in the largest ... environmental impact [of any nation] in the world."

The changing nature of the population also has environmental consequences.

"Baby boomers - 26 percent of the population - are the largest, wealthiest, highest resource-consuming of that age group ever in the nation's history, and they have unprecedented environmental impact," says Ms. Markham.

Land is being converted for development at about twice the rate of population growth.

Each American produces about five pounds of trash daily, up from less than three pounds in 1960.

More than half of all Americans live within 50 miles of the coasts where population density and its environmental impact are increasing.

The modern environmental movement began about the same time that US population ticked past the 200 million mark 39 years ago.

Increasingly, business is getting involved to reduce global warming.

Faith groups, including typically conservative evangelicals, have also taken up "creation care" through such efforts as the National Religious Partnership for the Environment.

State and local governments have pushed well ahead of Uncle Sam in working to protect an environment from a population that is growing in both numbers and affluence. At last count, 295 mayors (representing some 49 million people) have accepted Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels's "Kyoto challenge," modeled after the Kyoto treaty that the US didn't sign.

Earlier this year, researchers at Yale and Columbia universities constructed an "environmental performance index" comparing 133 countries on the basis of environmental health, air quality, water resources, biodiversity and habitat, productive natural resources, and sustainable energy. The US ranked 28th. (New Zealand, Sweden, Finland, the Czech Republic, and Britain were the top five.) Among 29 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development nations, the US ranked 23rd.

SOURCE: CS MONITOR

US population reaches 300,000

The environmental load of 300 million: How heavy?
In many ways, Americans have mitigated the impact of their increasing presence on the land. Since reaching the 200 million mark back in 1967, they have cut emissions of major air pollutants, banned certain harmful pesticides, and overseen the rebound of several endangered species. Despite using more resources and creating more waste, they've become more energy efficient.

The danger, experts say, is that the US may simply have postponed the day of reckoning. Major environmental problems remain, and some are getting worse - all of them in one way or another connected to US population growth, which is expected to hit 400 million around midcentury.

Some experts put the average American's "ecological footprint" - the amount of land and water needed to support an individual and absorb his or her waste - at 24 acres. By that calculation, the long-term "carrying capacity" of the US would sustain less than half of the nation's current population.

"The US is the only industrialized nation in the world experiencing significant population growth," says Vicky Markham, of the Center for Environment and Population, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization in New Canaan, Conn. "That, combined with America's high rates of resource consumption, results in the largest ... environmental impact [of any nation] in the world."

The changing nature of the population also has environmental consequences.

"Baby boomers - 26 percent of the population - are the largest, wealthiest, highest resource-consuming of that age group ever in the nation's history, and they have unprecedented environmental impact," says Ms. Markham.

Land is being converted for development at about twice the rate of population growth.

Each American produces about five pounds of trash daily, up from less than three pounds in 1960.

More than half of all Americans live within 50 miles of the coasts where population density and its environmental impact are increasing.

The modern environmental movement began about the same time that US population ticked past the 200 million mark 39 years ago.

Increasingly, business is getting involved to reduce global warming.

Faith groups, including typically conservative evangelicals, have also taken up "creation care" through such efforts as the National Religious Partnership for the Environment.

State and local governments have pushed well ahead of Uncle Sam in working to protect an environment from a population that is growing in both numbers and affluence. At last count, 295 mayors (representing some 49 million people) have accepted Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels's "Kyoto challenge," modeled after the Kyoto treaty that the US didn't sign.

Earlier this year, researchers at Yale and Columbia universities constructed an "environmental performance index" comparing 133 countries on the basis of environmental health, air quality, water resources, biodiversity and habitat, productive natural resources, and sustainable energy. The US ranked 28th. (New Zealand, Sweden, Finland, the Czech Republic, and Britain were the top five.) Among 29 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development nations, the US ranked 23rd.

SOURCE: CS MONITOR

El Nino is back -- 2006-2007

El Nino has come back.

Sept. 13, 2006 — Scientists at the NOAA Climate Prediction Center reported today that El Niño conditions have developed in the tropical Pacific and are likely to continue into early 2007. Ocean temperatures increased remarkably in the equatorial Pacific during the last two weeks. "Currently, weak El Niño conditions exist, but there is a potential for this event to strengthen into a moderate event by winter," said Vernon Kousky, NOAA's lead El Niño forecaster.

Some impacts from the developing El Niño are already evident in the pattern of tropical precipitation. During the last 30 days, drier-than-average conditions have been observed across all of Indonesia, Malaysia and most of the Philippines, which are usually the first areas to experience ENSO-related impacts. This dryness can be expected to continue, on average, for the remainder of 2006.

Typical El Niño effects are likely to develop over North America during the upcoming winter season. Those include warmer-than-average temperatures over western and central Canada, and over the western and northern United States. Wetter-than-average conditions are likely over portions of the U.S. Gulf Coast and Florida, while drier-than-average conditions can be expected in the Ohio Valley and the Pacific Northwest.

The term El Niño refers to the large-scale ocean-atmosphere climate phenomenon linked to a periodic warming in sea surface temperatures across the central and east-central equatorial Pacific (between approximately the date line and 120 degrees west). El Niño represents the warm phase of the El Niño/Southern Oscillation, or ENSO, cycle, and is sometimes referred to as a Pacific warm episode. El Niño originally referred to an annual warming of sea surface temperatures along the west coast of tropical South America.