World Environment Day (WED).

Campaign Report, Spring 2005

Taking Action for Health and Environmental Justice

Bayview Hunters Point, San Francisco, CA: Campaign to Shut Down PG&E power plant escalates!

The fight to close the polluting and unnecessary PG&E Hunters Point power plant is escalating. Greenaction, residents and supporters demonstrated March 23rd at PG&E headquarters in San Francisco, and a big action at the power plant is scheduled for early June during World Environment Week being hosted by the City of San Francisco. Our goal is to shut this plant down once and for all, and to replace it with clean, renewable energy. In late spring 2005 Greenaction and residents will start new campaigns targeting other big air polluters in this neighborhood that suffers high rates of asthma and cancer.

Stanislaus County, San Joaquin Valley, California

Greenaction and the Grayson Neighborhood Council are escalating our campaign against the Covanta garbage incinerator in Crow’s Landing. We held an exciting protest at the County Board of Supervisors meeting on March 15th. We are also launching a new campaign against pesticide drift. We have a training program to teach leadership and organizing skills to women and youth. We participate in the Central California Environmental Justice Network helping to support and unite communities across the Valley.

Resisting the Onslaught of “Incinerators in Disguise”

Greenaction has launched an all-out campaign to defeat the waste industry’s attempt to site incineration-like technologies such as gasification, pyrolysis, plasma arc and catalytic cracking for treatment of hazardous, solid, medical waste and tires. While the industry claims these are “recycling” and “renewable energy,” these “incinerators-in-disguise” burn toxic waste gases, have toxic air emissions and are not a safe solution for the landfill crisis or energy needs. We support pollution prevention, increased recycling and real renewable energy instead of incineration technologies.

Sierra Vista, Arizona: No incinerators in disguise!

Greenaction alerted Cochise County residents about the threat posed by Global Energy Resources’ proposal to build a “plasma arc” incineration facility to treat garbage at Sierra Vista. Greenaction’s visit to the area, and our technical critique of the proposals, received front page newspaper coverage and sparked community concern and grassroots organizing.

Red Bluff, Stockton and Los Angeles facing plasma arc incinerator proposals for medical waste!

We alerted residents in these three communities that Inentec/Integrated Environmental Technologies wants to build commercial medical waste facilities using plasma arc incineration technology to treat medical waste. Greenaction is helping residents with technical expertise so they understand the potential toxic threat, and we are helping with organizing to defeat these proposals.

Hanford, San Joaquin Valley, California

Greenaction brought plans by Plastic Energy LLC for a plastics catalytic cracking incineration plant to a halt in November after alerting the public to the potential dangers and forcing the San Joaquin Valley Air District to rescind the company’s permit. We will continue our campaign until the company drops their plan once and for all. Greenaction and allies have filed a request with the California Integrated Waste Management Board calling on the agency to rescind the company’s two million dollar loan.

West Oakland, California: AMCO Chemical Superfund Site

We are working with the Chester Street Block Club Association to make sure the USEPA does a thorough, safe and prompt cleanup of the AMCO Chemical vinyl chloride Superfund site. We are pressuring EPA to use the safest possible technology for remediation of the toxic site.

White Mesa Ute Reservation and Moab, Utah: Protect Colorado River and sacred Indian lands!

We are working with White Mesa Ute and Navajo tribal members, the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe, other area residents and the City of Moab to demand the Department of Energy (DOE) move the uranium tailings and toxic waste from the defunct Atlas Mill that is leaking into the Colorado River in Moab. We are also working together to demand that the DOE reject International Uranium Corporation’s request to take the radioactive and toxic tailings to the IUC Uranium Mill located next to the White Mesa Ute reservation. We want to close the IUC plant that pollutes the environment and desecrates the ancient sacred sites located at and next to the facility. Greenaction spoke at the DOE public hearings in Moab and White Mesa January 26-27, 2005, and helped tribal members file an administrative complaint charging the DOE with violating the civil rights of the White Mesa Ute Community.

North Salt Lake City, Utah: Shut the Stericycle incinerator!

Greenaction and residents are stepping up our campaign to close Stericycle’s incinerator that burns medical waste and non-medical waste from across the west. We work with the Health Care Without Harm coalition to encourage hospitals to use non-toxic materials and non-incineration treatment for medical waste.

Defending the Sacred Ward Valley Film Project

Greenaction and the Mohave Cultural Preservation Program (of the Colorado River Indian Tribes) have launched this project to distribute the new film “Defending the Sacred” that tells the story of the successful fight by the five tribes of the Colorado River Native Nations Alliance, Greenaction and a broad coalition that saved Ward Valley, the Colorado River and sacred Indian lands from the proposed nuclear waste dump. Speakers from the tribes and Greenaction are available to show the film and educate the public about the victorious campaign and issues. The video can be purchased from Greenaction for $22.

Colorado River Indian Tribes, Arizona: Shut down Westates Carbon!

Greenaction is helping Colorado River Indian Tribes (CRIT) members oppose the continued operation of the Westates/US Filter hazardous waste facility on tribal lands. Westates emits dioxin and many other hazardous pollutants, but EPA has allowed the company to operate without proper permits and without divulging the fact that toxic pollution was emitted. In December Greenaction convened a meeting with top USEPA officials and tribal members from CRIT and the Gila River Indian Community to discuss concerns.

Gila River Indian Community, Arizona: Shut down the Romic hazardous waste plant!

Greenaction and tribal members in the Gila River Alliance for a Clean Environment won a huge victory in November when Romic, a hazardous waste company operating on the reservation without proper permits and a terrible track record of violations, announced they stopped handling the most toxic solvents. We are continuing our support for the campaign by tribal members to evict this polluter off the reservation.

Environmental Justice Air Quality Coalition

Greenaction is working with community groups across the Bay Area to pressure the Bay Area Air Quality Management District and other agencies to protect air quality and uphold environmental justice.

http://www.greenaction.org/org/chronology/index.shtml

IT'S PLASTIC!
Americans seem to have a love––hate affair with plastic. We look down on plastic imitations of natural products and fibers. They are cheap, we say. We all want real leather, for example, rather than imitation plastic.

Yet we are using plastic products more than ever before. We cover our food in plastic wrap, drink coffee from Styrofoam® cups, wear clothes made from man-made fibers like nylon, polyester, and rayon, and even buy our plastic things with plastic credit cards! We use plastic hundreds of times every day.


WHAT IS PLASTIC?
Plastic is a versatile product. Plastic can be flexible or rigid; transparent or opaque. It can look like leather, wood, or silk. It can be made into toys or heart valves. Altogether there are more than 10,000 different kinds of plastics. The basic raw materials for plastic are petroleum and/or natural gas. These fossil fuels are sometimes combined with other elements, such as oxygen or chlorine, to make different types of plastic.

Plastics are not the waste and energy culprits that some people think they are. Plastics are really very energy efficient. It takes less energy to manufacture a plastic ketchup bottle than a glass ketchup bottle. And since plastics are lightweight, it takes less energy to transport a truckload of plastic ketchup bottles than a truckload of glass ketchup bottles.

take your idle threats and your bucko-crap to some right-wing, jingoistic site where everyone is scared. You really aren't intimidating anyone here, keyboard warrior.