Budget time is never for the faint of heart. After all, when you've set the budget, you have made manifest what you really intend to do. Thus, the unveiling of President Bush's budget for Fiscal Year 2003 generated some serious gnashing of teeth. It should not be a surprise that a very important environmental law was, once again, at stake. The particular law in question was the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, usually called CERCLA or Superfund. This law, passed in 1980, has been an object of vigorous debate for twenty-two years. President Bush has now made it clear that he, too, is happy to engage the game: Super-fund Superbowl XXII.

This will be my last message as President of NAEP. The last two years have been extremely rewarding for me professionally to see the growth we have experienced. As I look through the various issues of Environmental Practice, the quality of the journal is quite evident. Furthermore, the future issues will prove to be consistent with the level of quality that has been provided to you as a member of the organization.

The following article was taken from a Keynote Talk given by Dr. James A. Roberts at the 4th Conference on Protected Areas of East Asia and the Working Session of the World Conservation Union, World Commission on Protected Areas, in Taipei, Taiwan, on March 19, 2002, and is part of the proceedings of the conference. The theme of the congress was “Benefits Beyond Boundaries in East Asia.”

In his famous essay on “The Tragedy of the Commons,” Hardin (1968) derived predictions of environmental disaster from the proposition that people are entirely selfish by nature. The article has had two important effects. In regard to public policy, it has lent intellectual support to approaches based on Hardin's idea that natural resources can be sustained only if management responsibilities lie in a single place. Policymakers in many countries took this advice in one of two directions—giving responsibility to government agencies to act on behalf of all, or devolving responsibility to individual resource users in campaigns of privatization intended to empower markets.

Gaps often exist between scientific findings and the actions taken by policy makers. In the case of global climate change, the United States has chosen not to act to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. This is despite warnings from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that “most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities,” and that these forces are expected to cause an additional 1.4–5.8°C rise in temperature by 2100.

Where were you on September 11, 2001? I was at the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) Emergency Management Institute, Emmetsburg, Maryland, preparing to teach a Debris Management Course to over 50 state and local emergency managers. Needless to say, I never expected to have to put into practice what we were teaching at the time.

“For American Indian people, and for most indigenous people worldwide, the view of a healthy environment encompasses and supports our vibrant and ancient indigenous spirituality and culture.” Lori Lambert, PhD, enrolled Abenaki, Winds of Change Magazine, Summer 2001.

Lebanon is a relatively small developing country with an area of about 10,400 km2 and a population estimated at 4.005 million people, with an annual population growth rate of 1.7% (United Nations Development Programme, 2001). Lack of statistical data is one of the major limitations when attempting to study both demographic profile and infrastructure services in Lebanon. One important and known demographic characteristic, however, is the high rate of urbanization. The urban population constitutes more than 80% of the total population. Population agglomeration in coastal regions has led to the shifting of agricultural land into dwelling cities and a growing demand for infrastructure that exceeds the provisions of basic environmental services, such as the provision of safe water and adequate sanitation (United Nations Development Programme, 2001). After 17 years of civil strife, a myriad of environmental problems has emerged, which range from water contamination and air pollution to soil degradation and haphazard dumping of wastes.

Phytoremediation, the use of plant systems for contaminant cleanup, is among the fastest growing areas of environmental remediation research, technology development, and implementation. The practice is facilitated by a number of plant adaptations. First, selected plant species can take up and accumulate certain metals in their shoots at levels that are toxic to ordinary plants (hyperaccumulation). The phenomenon is an evolutionary adaptation of specific plant species to natural metal enrichments; consequently, its occurrence is geographically restricted, and the plant species involved are highly specific with respect to types of metals tolerated. Other plant species can take up, metabolize and thereby detoxify certain organic contaminants in their shoots, or cause their transformations through substances released into their root zones (rhizospheres). The extent to which an organic contaminant may be translocated in plants is determined largely by its partitioning into lipid phases (its lipophilicity), while rhizo-sphere transformations are determined largely by types and amounts of plant exudations, and microbial populations that are stimulated by these exudates. Interactions between plant systems and contaminants that can facilitate phytoremediation are complex, and complicated further by strong influences of climate, particularly temperature, and matrix factors such as nature and reactivity of surfaces, pH, and oxidation-reduction statuses. The ways in which the various factors interact to render a contaminant more or less susceptible to phytoremediation are discussed, with the objective of providing information needed for decision making when considering phytoremediation for the cleanup of particular contaminants.

Environmental regulators and other stakeholders prefer cleanup technologies that are successful, cost effective, and not disruptive to a site. Phytoremediation offers an appealing in situ option to managers of remediation projects. Remediation project managers and teams must be experienced and work closely together. For moderately water soluble organic contaminates, it may be possible to utilize plant species that can translocate and metabolize a contaminant within their shoots. For highly lipophilic compounds, a phytoremediation strategy would best focus on stimulation of biodegradation within the root zone of plants. Metal hyperaccumulator plant species have demonstrated successful growth under high enrichments of specific metals. However, while there is promise for hyperaccumulators concentrating metals, their low biomass suggests total uptake may be low. Genetic manipulations of potential plants may possibly overcome this difficulty, but there are inherent societal concerns and risks. Matrix manipulation may enhance phytoremediation by improving the availability of metals, but care must be taken to not impair plant growth and prevent off-site migration of metals. A thorough site characterization is required to properly design a strategy. Costs associated with phytoremediation are competitive with other remediation technologies and cost recovery can be realized when metals have a high enough value to be recycled following harvesting from the plant biomass.

Michigan is widely recognized as having one of the most innovative programs for converting brownfields into productive uses. The state provides a number of financial incentives along with suspension of retroactive liability for prospective developers. Michigan also has among the greatest number of brownfields of any state. The sheer number of sites and locations throughout the state, the cost of acquisition and cleanup, and the amount of information needed to make a reasoned decision and complete the necessary permits can make the choice of candidate sites difficult. A method to differentiate among potential sites for selection is clearly necessary. In this paper, a Brownfield Site Ranking Model is proposed for selecting sites for potential redevelopment. This process identifies 11 siting criteria derived from the review of general siting factors that can be evaluated in locating a business on a formerly used site. Such factors include commercial marketing guidelines, financial incentives, environmental regulatory compliance requirements, regional infrastructure and labor resources, and local community acceptance. These factors were integrated into a conventional, step-by-step, site identification and selection process using a multi-tiered, weighted procedure. The process was developed in cooperation with the Brownfield Redevelopment Authority of Jackson County and was tested on several prospective commercial and industrial sites. Results suggest a high degree of correlation between site characteristics and likely end uses and argue for a selection process that allows participation by local governments. The complete process, which can be computerized and adapted to a geographic information system, provides a model for commercial developers, real estate brokers, siting consultants, and local communities in selecting target sites for redevelopment.

Many environmental professionals are reluctant to interact with the media, often because of a negative experience and the perception that poor coverage can affect environmental programs and policies. Using a case study of media coverage related to the Albuquerque, New Mexico, water supply, this research documents that indeed, the media can influence public opinion and this can have policy and program implications. This research compared media coverage about various water customers (residential, commercial, institutional, industry) to public perceptions about who uses the most water and to actual use levels reported by the city. The results show that coverage in terms of numbers of articles, article content and language, as well as page placement, correlates with public perceptions about which customers use the most water, and that these perceptions do not well match actual use levels. A key point for this work is that although the information presented within the individual articles was largely accurate, it was the pool of coverage assessed as a whole that misrepresented water use levels. This report also provides key steps that environmental professionals can take to help improve overall coverage and help raise the potential for public perception to better match actual data.