Grizzly Environmental: Jim's Journal

Site hosted by Angelfire.com: Build your free website today!

Grizzly Environmental

Jim's Journal personal Opinions from Grizzly's founder, Jim Riddle

June 23rd, 2001

Soltice has arrived...have a safe and environmentally friendly summer.

Start with the best methods: reduce, reuse, recycle and I mean your water. How?

At my house, instead of letting the laundy rinse water disappear down the drain, I use it to water the roses and they love it!

Carrying buckets of it through the basement can get a little messy, but the phosphate-free soap residue helps keep down the aphids.

At the cottage, I have a large rain barrel and dip into it to water the garden there.

Conserving water at home and at the cottage has been a family tradition for as long as I can remember.

March 3rd , 2001

With the snowpack in the Ottawa Valley in excess of 200cm this year, the potential threat of massive flooding looms large.

Worse yet, Newfoundland and areas of New Brunswick have snowpacks in excess of 400 cm.

Essentially it looks like we'll have a late spring this year.

We may even have snow on the ground in May, as it was forty years ago.

However with global warming the possibility of 20 degrees C in a few weeks, with plenty of snow to yet start melting, will produce lots and lots of water, ground heave and ice floes in the rivers and streams in Quebec, Ontario and the Maritimes.

Let's keep our fingers crossed for a gradual melt with sunny days to enjoy the great outdoors - for spring skiing and snowmobiling.

Be safe and keep your cars off the ice when spring comes this year.

January, 2001

In Canada, the year 2000 saw an outbreak of e-coli in its richest province. The town of Walkerton made headlines around the world when 11 people died due to a tainted water supply.

An inquiry is currently being conducted and many of the town's resident are trying to launch a class-action suit against the provinvial government.

More power to them, I say.
They are rejecting the government's blanket pay-out to the town, so far totalling over 3 million dollars, which would absolve the government of any further liability in the matter.

The defense lawyers for the province said on national newscasts that the original package was "more than adequate. It's speedy. It's no-fault."

Well that's what they would like, isn't it?

Many factors went into the making of the Walkerton tragedy,

. inadequate training for the town's water manager
. inadequate reporting to the Ministry
. non-action from the Ministry
. human error in Walkerton

among them.

But surely one of the most obvious is the Harris government's cut-backs to its Ministry of the Environment in the first place.

Comments?

Click here. It's the direct e-mail link to: grizzlyenviro@hotmail.com