"The Cloud of Unkowing"

After reading Nando Parrado's "Miracle in the Andes," my eyes were opened to a new dimension: that of God within us.

My friend Peter is translating "The Cloud of Unknowing" from the King James-type passages into contemporary English. It stunned me. Here you go:
http://pedromitchell.blogspot.com/

Red Lobster Endorses Fish Farming

Red Lobster Exec Endorses Fish Farming

The president of the nation's largest seafood restaurant chain on Tuesday said consumers are willing to pay more for locally produced catches of the day and he endorsed expanding the U.S. Fish farming industry. via Forbes ...

U.S. Considers Aquaculture Plunge

WASHINGTON (AFP) — US government and industry leaders are urging a headlong plunge into ocean fish farming to meet surging global demand, even as environmental activists call for a go-slow approach.

A two-day Washington aquaculture summit hosted by the US Commerce Department in June brought together advocates of a broader push into fish farming as lawmakers push to facilitate ocean farms similar to those used in Asia, Norway and Chile.

Backers of aquaculture point out that with wild fish stocks declining around the world, nearly half the seafood on people's tables comes from farms. About 90 percent of farmed seafood comes from Asia.

The United States accounts for less that two percent of the 70 billion-dollar global business, said Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, noting projections of a global shortfall of 40 million tons of seafood by 2030.

"We have an eight billion-dollar seafood trade deficit," Gutierrez said.


"We need both a strong commercial fishing industry and a robust aquaculture industry. Given the projections, there is plenty of room for both industries."

In the United States, most fish farms are on land-based tanks, with a few ocean operations for shellfish such as oysters, clams and mussels.

Legislation introduced in Congress would allow the US government to issue offshore aquaculture permits, provide incentives for research and set environmental standards.

Backers of aquaculture say it can also be a blessing for coastal communities hurt by cutbacks in fishing due to new quotas to prevent depletion of fisheries.

The push for more aquaculture has posed a dilemma for environmentalists, who worry about pollution from farms, diseases from escaped fish and other potential impacts on wild species. At the same time, most activists recognize that overfishing of wild species is a problem that can only be alleviated through increases in farming of fish.

"If it happens we want to make sure its done in the most sustainable way," said the Ocean Conservancy's Tim Eichenberg, who attended the Washington summit.

Eichenberg said strong US environmental standards could help encourage better practices in other countries.

"We don't have any jurisdiction in foreign countries, but if we're not regulating it here, we can't ask other countries to do it in a sustainable way," he said.

"Additionally, if we don't have strong standards in the US, we can't keep products out of our country that are not produced in a sustainable way."

Andrea Kavanagh of the National Environmental Trust's Pure Salmon Campaign said the proposed legislation needs tougher environmental standards.

"The bill only makes a passing mention to environmental standards," she said. "That's not good enough."

Kavanagh said better practices include farming of fish lower on the food chain instead of carnivorous species -- which are generally fed with ground-up meal from wild-caught fish. "For species like cod and halibut, you have to feed them fish and you get the fish from the wild -- and that contributes more to the problem of overfishing," she said.

She said some salmon farms use floating concrete tanks, which she said offers more protection against fish escapes than open-net tanks used by others.

"We think you can raise fish in an environmentally sustainable way and you can still make a profit," she said. "It requires a shift away from wild-caught feed and a move away from open-net cages."

Michael Rubino, aquaculture program director for the Commerce Department's National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, said he believes US operations can compete against those from other countries, including China.

Rubino said 60 percent of the cost of farm-raised fish comes from feed, and another 20 percent from hatchery operations.

"There are investors ready to go to three miles and beyond" once the proper regulations are in place, he said.

"We're lacking a regulatory framework for federal waters."

Others say aquaculture represents a potential for enormous growth.

David Tze, managing director Aquacopia, a venture capital firm with holdings in aquaculture, said some investors who were looking at the Internet and computer technology a decade ago are now looking at fish farms.

"This is really a technology business," Tze told the summit participants. "It is an undervalued sector and is attracting increasing (investor) attention."

© 2007 AFP
Copyright © 2003-2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved.

Let the Water Wars begin...

Idaho Press-Tribune
US Water News

BOISE, Idaho -- The state's top water official has given hundreds of farmers, dairymen and other groundwater users in southern Idaho until July 6 to quit pumping or satisfy the demands of two trout farms that say they've been forced to slash fish production because they aren't getting water they're legally due.

The order from Dave Tuthill, state Department of Water Resources director, covers 591 water rights over 16,638 acres, fewer than the 771 water rights on 33,000 acres discussed when Tuthill announced a proposed curtailment in April.

Lynn Tominaga, director of the Idaho Ground Water Appropriators:["...The problem that you run into is the lending institutions," he told The Associated Press. "If a bank knows that you don't have the water to finish out your crop and harvest, are you going to get a loan to farm?"

Great Seafood Choices...sustainably!

from the Chicago Sun-Times
BY JENNIFER OLVERA


Seafood choices for healthy oceans
Your consumer choices make a difference. Support fisheries and fish farms that are healthier for ocean wildlife and the environment.

BEST CHOICES

Catfish (U.S. farmed)

Salmon (wild caught from Alaska)

Shrimp (trap caught)

Tilapia (U.S. farmed)

Rainbow trout (farmed)

GOOD ALTERNATIVES

Cod (Pacific)

Crab (imitation/Surimi)

Scallops (Bay)

Tuna (canned light)

Tuna (canned white/Albacore)

AVOID

Chilean sea bass (tooth fish*)

Flounder (Atlantic Groupers*)

Halibut (Atlantic)

Shrimp (imported farmed or trawl-caught)

Soles (Atlantic)

*Limit consumption due to concerns about mercury or other contaminants. Visit www.oceansalive.org/eat.cfm

Got Interviewed by Wall Street Reporter...

They got wind of our oxygen/ozone patent filings, and I got a phone call. This, after after spending a weekend putting together a video clip. I guess once you get the concepts down it's easy, but it's a whole different bag o' tricks. I've got eyestrain, but I couldn't of done the thing at all without a friend. Thanks, Mr. Peter! (I'll post that clip soon).

I guess I prattled on for the reporter a bit about the history of this process of diffusing gas streams into water, as well as the newest trials. Also covered an agreement with a DOD company for licensing this technology.

This interview can now be accessed by clicking: http://www.wallstreetreporter.com/profile.php?id=24910

Camp Lejeune Cancer Link

In Congressional testimony, Jerry Ensminger, a Marine for 24 years, lost his 9-year-old daughter to leukemia.

AP Photo by Susan Walsh

HIGHLIGHTS
• 75,000 Marines, families exposed to toxic tap water, health official said
• Chemicals in water may be carcinogens
• Children on based have had cancer and other disorders
• 850 former Camp Lejeune residents have filed legal claims

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Some 75,000 Marines and their families at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina were exposed to toxic tap water that may have caused cancer and birth defects, a federal health official testified Tuesday.

Results of a new study of the base's water were released Tuesday, the same day lawmakers heard emotional testimony from families who were affected by the water, which contained 40 times the amount of toxins considered safe by today's standards.

Camp Lejeune's water supply was polluted from 1957 until 1987 by TCE, a degreasing solvent, and PCE, a dry cleaning agent. The chemicals apparently came from a dry cleaning store near the base, according to the government.

The substances are possible carcinogens.

Camp kids have cancer, disorders

Jerry Ensminger, a 24-year Marine Corps veteran, said his daughter, Jane, born in 1976 at Camp Lejeune, was diagnosed with leukemia at age 6 and died at age 9.

Jeff Byron, a former Marine air traffic controller, moved with his family into base housing in 1982, three months after his first daughter Andrea was born and two years before his daughter Rachel was born.

Rachel is developmentally disabled, has spina bifida and was born with a cleft palate, he said. Andrea has a rare bone marrow syndrome known as aplastic anemia, according to Byron's testimony.

Dr. Michael Gros, a Navy obstetrician at Camp Lejeune in the early 1980s, was diagnosed with lymphoma after living in Camp Lejeune housing, he said.

Gros said he has had to give up his medical practice and his treatment has cost more than $4.5 million.

Thomas Sinks, deputy director of the National Center for Environmental Health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the reports are anecdotal and that there has been no proven link between specific cases of illness and the contaminated water.

At least 850 former Camp Lejeune residents have filed legal claims. (From CNN.com)

***Executive Fish says: The poison in question was pumped to Marine households from 1957 and 1987, and was discovered in 1982. Why did they not cap those two wells immediately upon discovery, and take action? Test your water. Filter your water.

More on Plastics...

By Jane Akre - Common Ground

Phthalates are plasticizers, chemicals that make our pipes more flexible and our upholstery more comfortable.

But phthalates are also one of about 70 suspected endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) present in products ranging from makeup to detergents to children's toys. EDCs are now present in the bodies of every man, woman, child and fetus in the United States.

Pioneer zoologist Theo Colborn, in her book Our Stolen Future, reported countless examples of reproductive disorders among wildlife. Colborn traced the disorders to chemical exposure, and suggested that EDCs profoundly affect the endocrine system by mimicking natural hormones and blocking their uptake to the receptor sites.

This can disrupt everything from development and behavior to reproduction and immunity.

Even the tiniest hormone variation at certain critical points in fetal development can affect a child's future health. Two years ago, a study showed that pregnant women with higher urine concentrations of phthalates were more likely to give birth to sons with incomplete male genital development, a disorder that previously had been seen only in lab rats.

In December 2006, San Francisco became the first city in the nation to ban baby products containing certain levels of phthalates.

From The Common Ground

Bill Totten - great content!

I just stumbled on a great weblog by Bill Totten, in Japan.

He and I converge on a number of the same points. He too, is a businessperson who remains aware of the environment and our impact on it.

Kudos to you Bill - and a place in my blogroll!

Highly recommended!

I Speaketh...

Saul Albom interviews Brett Swailes, CEO of Shine Holdings, and they discuss the company's patented device works by "smashing" water in a high-pressurized cylinder. The output of this process are bubbles no bigger than 5 microns in size - too small to be seen by the naked eye - which super-oxygenates the water. Naturally, this device is perfect for America's growing aquaculture industry, as well as for wastewater cleaning businesses and even biodefense purposes, where gases such as ozone are diffused into water as a way of examining anthrax. Shine Holdings has executed a formal letter of intent to license its technology to U.S. BioDefense Inc., a Department of Defense Central Contractor developing homeland security and leading-edge biotechnologies. Under the agreement, U.S. BioDefense expects to secure an exclusive licensing agreement from Shine Holdings for an annual fee of $100,000. Listen to this podcast to learn more.