By Shawn Dell Joyce

Phthalates, called “plasticizers,” are chemicals used to make polyvinyl chloride (PVC) plastic soft, pliable, and in the case of water bottles; clear. This chemical is as American as apple pie, and is present in all of our households through things like toys, food packaging, shower curtains, vinyl flooring, lubricants, adhesives, detergents, and most cosmetics. Phthalates make baby’s teething rings soft, give your car that new car smell (by off-gassing), are in almost all perfumes and nail polish. They make medical tubing and IV bags flexible.
   

Here’s the bad news. Phthalates are also endocrine disruptors, which means they interfere with normal brain development. Children’s brains are always developing which makes them particularly susceptible to damage from phthalates. Our children are also most likely to come into contact with them because plastics are widely used in children’s toys, foods, and in most things they with which they come into contact.

Researchers have found that children suffer permanent damage from phthalates because their cells depend upon hormones to determine how they should develop. Phthalates resemble estrogen in the body and send signals to cells that may result in autism, breast and testicular cancer and reduced sperm counts. Adult exposure to endocrine disruptors is not as harmful because the effects are temporary, similar to taking a birth control pill.

Recently, phthalates have been linked to autism in a study by Dr. Philip J. Landrigan, professor of pediatrics at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York. He found that autism and other ailments “are, in part, the result of the impact of environmental chemicals on the brain as it is being formed.” In another study, researchers measured phthalate levels in the urine of pregnant women, and found those with higher levels had children more likely to display disruptive behavior.
 

Phthalates are highly profitable, bringing chemical companies over $1.4 billion a year. Exxon Mobil is a major manufacturer of phthalates. Many countries have banned phthalates — the EU, Canada, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and even China. The United States demands a level of proof that many scientists consider impossible and hasn’t acted to protect the American people from harmful toxins. The Environmental Protection Agency is slow to react and has only banned a handful of chemicals in its history, while allowing millions more to be used without any safety testing at all. 
  

Many savvy mothers are already protesting te ue of phthalates and urging others to boycott manufacturers. Because of lax regulation, phthalates aren’t listed on product labels and are so widely used it’s difficult to avoid them.  The best way to protect your family is to look at the number in the recycling triangle located on the bottom of the container:

•  Don’t buy or use and plastics with the numbers 1, 3, or 7 because they contain endocrine disruptors. Safer choices are numbers 2,4, or 5.
• Don’t buy any product that contains n-butyl benzyl phthalate (BBzP) or di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP), or any other ingredient that starts with “phth” which is a dead giveaway for phthalates.
• Avoid any soft, flexible or pliable plastic, especially for use around children. Polymer clays contain up to 14 percent phthalates by weight. These phthalates enter children’s bodies through hands and by breathing fumes produced when the clays are baked. A child playing for five minutes with small amounts of the tested clays would be exposed to levels of phthalates that exceed the maximum daily exposure standards set in Florida and Minnesota.
• Use all natural cosmetics, personal care products, home cleaners, and adhesives. Synthetic fragrances in hair sprays, antiperspirants and deodorants, adhesives in nail polishes, and fume-bearing chemicals expose children to airborne phthalates. 
   
   Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning columnist and founder of the Wallkill River School in Orange County, N.Y. Shawn@zestoforange.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce

As you read this column, we’re poised on the brink of yet another snow storm, with a few inches still piled up from the last one. Many people have taken this opportunity to wag their fingers at me and say “What global warming?”

 Pulitzer prize-winning columnist Thomas Friedman coined the term “global wierding” last week to replace the misleading phrase “global warming.” While the earth has warmed a degree, and is projected to warm quicker than natural over the next century, we are anything but warm today.

 Our weather is indeed weird with massive snow just south of us and rain at the Winter Olympics in Canada. Australia is having a record 13-year drought , and Texas ended a drought this winter with massive snow storms. As a matter of fact, Texas got snow this year before we did.

What does all this prove or disprove? Nothing really. “Climate is what we expect and weather is what we get,” according to NASA. We have only been collecting data on weather for the past 100 years, and trends in climate are measured in thousands of years. A single weather event; like a hurricane, or a spell of unusual weather; like snow in Texas, may be unprecedented; but still within the “normal” range.

 What is actually happening to our climate is right in line with predicted climate change models; some parts of the earth are experiencing drought while flooding happens elsewhere. Storms are more severe, summers are hotter, spring comes earlier, and polar ice is diminishing.

Many old timers in our region remember waist-high snow drifts and ice skating to school on the Wallkill. We haven’t seen a REAL severe winter in a while if you talk to those who actually lived through them. Some of us tourists (residents who haven’t lived here 20 years yet) quake in fear at the thought of a N’oreaster.

 Whether one actually believes in human-driven climate change or not has become irrelevant. The truth is that we all have to eat, and breathe, and both things are becoming more difficult as our population swells, and resources become tight. If you care about clean air, water, and food security, than we have enough common ground to rebuild our country with green energy and localized economies.
We sorely need industry in our region, and unfortunately, most of it has been outsourced overseas. Renewable energy, energy efficiency, Cultural Tourism, and other similar industries are the only ones that can’t be completely outsourced — because they are place-based. You can’t wrap up an historic Victorian house and send it to China for weatherization. That is something that has to be done here, by a local person.

Friedman writes: “I suspect China is quietly laughing at us right now. And Iran, Russia, Venezuela and the whole OPEC gang are high-fiving each other. Nothing better serves their interests than to see Americans becoming confused about climate change, and, therefore, less inclined to move toward clean-tech and, therefore, more certain to remain addicted to oil.”

Let’s stop debating each other and actually do something for a change. Let’s get America back on her feet and into the green millennium so that our kids and grandkids stand a chance.

Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning newspaper columnist and director of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery.
Shawn@zestoforange.com

“Hoeffner’s Farm,” pastel by Shawn Dell Joyce. One of my favorite local farms.

By Shawn Dell Joyce

Small family farms, once on the endangered species list in the American landscape, are making a huge comeback, thanks to a new model of agriculture. Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) offers farmers a guaranteed income during these uncertain economic times, and gives communities food security.

The way it works is the consumer (that’s you) pays up front the yearly cost of a weekly share of the farm’s harvest. During the growing season, you visit the farm each week, and pick up an assortment of fresh, locally grown produce. The benefit for farmers is that they know exactly how much to grow and can cover the cost up front. The benefits to your family are improved nutrition, food security, and the knowledge of exactly where your food came from, whose hands touched it and how it was grown.

Becoming a CSA member is also good for the environment. In our country, the typical forkful has traveled 1,500 miles from the farm to your mouth! When you join a farm, you avoid all those diesel emissions from transporting the food. Plus, the produce hasn’t been commuting for the past week, so it’s much fresher and tastier.

Never buy food from strangers! Many conventional meat-farming practices are cruel and unhealthy. When you buy locally, you can see how the animals live. Local farms are small-scale producers who generally allow animals access to open pasture. They graze on grasses (much healthier for them and us), nurse their young, and live a good life. Unless you see for yourself how the animals live, you can’t know for sure how they are treated.

Being a member of a farm helps build a closer community. When share members come to the farm to pick up their weekly box of produce, they inevitably end up swapping recipes, chatting with the farmer, and discussing the weekly bounty. CSAs often become gathering places, hosting potluck dinners, special events and even classes.

You connect your children to the land. Many of our children suffer from NDD (Nature Deficit Disorder) and can recognize more than 1,000 brand names of processed foods, but can’t recognize 10 fresh vegetable growing in the field. When you take your children to a farm, they make the connection that their food comes from human hands working the earth. 
 
Connect yourself to the land and the season. Nothing tastes quite like a crisp apple on a cool fall day, or hot buttered corn off a summer grill, or baked squash in midwinter. When your family is a member of a farm, you are treated to seasonal produce. Produce naturally tastes better in season.
Get to know your region! Farms are beautiful and it’s fun to visit them. Be a tourist in your hometown! Many of our small farms rely on agro-tourism. Visiting a working farm gives your family a taste of your region’s history and local flavor.

Money spent on a local farm stays local and grows! British researchers found that money spent at local farms multiplied because the farmer used a local bank, bought seed and supplies locally, advertised in local papers, and paid local employees. These “farm dollars” had twice the economic impact of the same amount of money spent at a chain grocer.  Farmers tend to help and support each other rather than compete. As a result, CSAs often offer produce grown on other farms to their share members as well.

You acquire a taste for new flavors. Broaden your palate by joining a farm! The farm gives you a bit of everything it grows, which often includes a few things you might not have heard of. This is a great way to find your new favorite vegetable! Mine is spicy hot daikon radishes, long as your arm and white as potatoes!

Eat your view! When you join a CSA, you support a farming family. This helps preserve the farmlands, as well. The only way our farmers can afford to pay the taxes on those picturesque views is if we support the farms!

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure! Eating fresh, (ideally) organic vegetables makes your family healthier, and saves you sick time and medical expenses.
The fresher your vegetables, the higher the vitamin content, according to nutritionists.
Where to find a local C.S.A.?
www.LocalHarvest.Com locates farms within a radius of your address that retail directly to the public.

www.Eatwild.com  is your source for safe, healthy, natural and nutritious grass-fed beef, lamb, goats, bison, poultry, pork, dairy and other wild edibles.

www.SlowFood.com  is a non-profit, eco-gastronomic member-supported organization that was founded in 1989 to counteract fast food and fast life, the disappearance of local food traditions.

Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning columnist, artist, and director of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery.  Shawn@zestoforange.com

“Chamber’s Tractors” is a pastel by Shawn Dell Joyce of the tractor dealership on the road into Montgomery. This painting, along with many others depicting the Village of Montgomery, will be on display at the Wallkill River School in March. See my work, along with fellow-Zester Carrie Jacobson at our reception March 15, from 5-7pm. www.WallkillRiverSchool.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce

At some point today, you will probably be faced with the choice to use a disposable cup or not. Here are some factors to consider about how disposable that cup really is.

If we were to look at how much energy it takes to produce cups made from paper, polystyrene and ceramic, most people would automatically think the ceramic cup is the greenest choice. You’d have to use the ceramic cup 640 times before it would equal a polystyrene cup, and 294 times to equal a paper/cardboard cup, in terms of the energy it takes to produce the cups, according to Treehugger.com.

     In terms of air pollution, polystyrene produces the least amount of emissions to manufacture one cup. It also takes more water to manufacture a ceramic cup than the entire life cycle water consumption of the other two. Before you toss out all your ceramic cups and replace them with Styrofoam, Treehugger went on to find the ceramic vessel much more functional and durable with up to 3,000 uses compared to single-use paper, plastic or polystyrene foam.

If you go by just the energy expenditures, Styrofoam cups seem like the way to go. However, there is much more to a cup than its function. What happens to these five cups after their useful life is over?

Glass takes over a million years to decompose, but it is recyclable and when recycled it reduces pollution by 20 percent according to California’s Project New Leaf.

Paper can be recycled, but most paper cups are coated with plastic or wax and cannot be recycled. Even coated paper will biodegrade in five years, while uncoated and unbleached paper will be gone in a few days according to Worldwise.com 
 

Styrofoam and plastic do not biodegrade. Instead, they photodegrade, breaking down into smaller and smaller particles that will eventually wind up in our bodies.

Scientists are just now learning the effects of photodegrading plastics and polystyrene on the environment. These substances have only been around about 50 years and are just now breaking down into microscopic sizes. As plastics get smaller, they are eaten by smaller creatures. As these creatures are eaten by larger creatures up the food chain, these plastics (and toxins) get concentrated inside living bodies, even in humans.
 

“Except for a small amount that has been incinerated,” says Tony Andrady, a Senior Research Scientist at North Carolina’s Research Triangle, “every bit of plastic manufactured in the world for the last 50 years or so still remains. It’s somewhere in the environment.”  

Nothing is really disposable. Many of the things we consider disposable, will probably outlive humanity as a species.  The greenest choice is to cup your hands and drink out of them as our ancestors have for millennia.  That may not go over to well in the school cafeteria, so get in the habit of bringing your own cup.

 Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning columnist and founder of the Wallkill River School in Montgomery. www.WallkillRiverSchool.com

Painting of the ubiquitous watertower in Montgomery. This pastel painting is one of a series of paintings depicting Montgomery on it’s 200th anniversary. Celebrate the bicentennial with me and Carrie Jacobson at our art show at Wallkill River School and Art Gallery on March 13, 5-7pm. www.WallkillRiverSchool.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce    

Recently, we heard President Obama recommit to creating green jobs in our country after we watched in horror as China surpassed us as the world leader in green technology. But there’s positive movement on the local green front. Last week, Congressman Maurice Hinchey  announced that he’s bringing many green jobs to our area with a project at Stewart Airport. Meanwhile, municipalities have the opportunity through a new state law to create green jobs at a level that this year’s high school graduates can take advantage of, and that will benefit individual taxpayers as well.

 Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) is a state law that allows local governments to help homeowners finance upgrading their homes’ energy efficiency and add solar hot water, solar electric, wind turbines, or whatever green energy is appropriate. The beauty of the program is that it makes green technology affordable and within reach of average middle-class homeowners.

Here’s an exampe of how it work. If a homeowner decides he wishes to upgrade his home to solar hot water he can “opt-in” to the PACE program through the local town or village board. The cost of the retrofit and solar installation is financed through a mortgage company tied to the property taxes. What that means is that you don’t have to put any money down on the system (in most cases) and it is paid for through your property tax bill over the next 20 years. If you sell your house, the system — and the cost — goes with the house.

The benefits are immediate. The savings on utility bills is far greater than the amortized cost of repaying the loan through property taxes. An average solar hot water system costs about $5,000 installed, after rebates and incentives. Spread that out over 20 years and you notice a rise of $250-$300 in your property tax payment compared to the dramatic savings on your electric bill (18 percent and more in most cases.)

This makes pricey solar panels within the reach of average homeowners and protects mortgage lenders because the payment is secured through the municipality. It lowers the homeowner’s cost of living and raises property values.

PACE programs are planned or already under way in Albuquerque, NM; Athens, OH; Austin, TX; Babylon, NY; Berkeley, CA (which pioneered the concept); Boulder, CO; Palm Desert, CA; San Diego, CA; San Francisco, CA; and Santa Fe, NM; and at the state level in California, Connecticut, Maryland, Oregon, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, and Wisconsin. New York recently passed PACE as well, and is offering municipalities the possibility of implementing the program.

Under the State Energy Program, the Department of Energy has received approximately $80 million worth of applications that could potentially use a PACE financing structure, out of $3.2 billion in total funding. The Department of Energy is also issuing a Funding Opportunity Announcement of $454 million under its Competitive Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant program. This “Retrofit Ramp-Up” program will pioneer innovative models, including PACE loans, for rolling out energy efficiency to hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses in a variety of communities.

Orange County Planning Commissioner David Church is setting up grant opportunities for municipalities to implement PACE. What is your municipal government doing about it? Most of our local elected officials run on a platform of lowering taxes. While that has been proven difficult at best, what they could do is lower our cost of living instead for the same net effect.

There’s another benefit. If only 15 percent of residential property owners nationwide took advantage of clean energy community financing, the resulting emissions reductions would contribute 4 percent of the savings needed for the U.S. to reach 1990 emissions levels by 2020 according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

This one program could do more to generate green jobs in our area than anything coming down the federal pike. Imagine the resulting boom this legislation would have in the building trades. We would immediately see a rise in jobs for energy auditors, insulators, plumbers, solar installers, and many other local jobs that our children could do with a little training.

Shawn Dell Joyce is an award-winning, nationally syndicated columnist, artist, and director of the Wallkill River School in Orange County. Shawn@zestoforange.com

By Shawn Dell Joyce
Heirloom Peppers, a pastel of all the varieties of peppers grown on local farms. Notice how brilliant and colorful our fresh produce is. These local peppers are in season in the late summer. Check out more from my Heirloom Series at www.ShawnDellJoyce.com. Come take a class with me at the Wallkill River School in Montgomery. www.WallkillRiverSchool.com