Search Results for: Environmental health

BY KEITH NUTHALL
AWARDS have been made to 20 companies across Europe by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work for groundbreaking schemes that have effectively reduced workplace stress, reducing the risk of psychological problems developing in employees. Hans-Horst Konkolewsky, the agency’s director, said the schemes were examples of good practice that should be followed across the European Union.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A COMMERCIAL ferry is being fitted with optical sensors by two universities to conduct an environmental survey of the surface of the Irish Sea, which will provide comprehensive data to improve the management of its ecosystems.

The University of Wales’ School of Ocean Sciences, Bangor, and the National University of Ireland are using Irish Ferries’ Ulysses for the experiment.…

KEITH NUTHALL
INNOVATION is important in the provision of water services, whether that be to prevent the contamination of supplies by a return of this summer’s floods, or to source drinking water for arid areas where ground reserves are running dry.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
HALF-HEARTED efforts by European Union Member States to impose controls on shabby shipping have been blamed for the disastrous sinking of the ill-named Prestige oil tanker, off Galicia, Spain. Placing on record their disgust at the environmental tragedy, the Council of Europe’s environment committee deplored “the negligence of governments and their lack of any real determination to provide themselves with the means of preventing such disasters – or at least minimising their impact.”…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE TOTAL phasing out of nuclear energy being carried out by a number of EU countries is not justified according to the EU’s internal market commissioner Frits Bolkestein (CORRECT SPELLING). In a speech headed “Nuclear energy needed more than ever” given to the Institute of Economic Affairs, London, Mr Bolkestein said nuclear energy provided the technical capacity to increase energy diversification which was needed to reduce external dependence.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Union is to lift a ban on another two Chinese food imports, which was imposed over concerns about the misuse of anti-biotics. The EU Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health has approved the health of Chinese crayfish and surimi.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
ENVIRONMENTALISTS have gained significant new access rights to information held by public authorities and others under legislation agreed by the Council of Ministers of the European Union (EU) and the European Parliament. In what was welcomed by environmental campaigners as a victory over some EU member governments, the agreement goes well beyond the United Nations’ 1998 Aarhus Convention on information, decision-making and redress in environmental matters by widening the range of what can be accessed and simplifying the procedures.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A EUROPEAN Union (EU) commissioner has called on EU governments to reconsider the phasing out of nuclear energy, which he says has been approved on the basis of “the moral high ground and….of often unjustified emotions.”

Internal market Commissioner Frits Bolkestein (CORRECT SPELLING) said that technological advances were tackling the environmental difficulties surrounding nuclear energy and although problems still exist, “they do not justify the total phasing out of nuclear energy now carried out by a number of Member States.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
MINING companies planning projects in the tropics should conduct detailed assessments of potential disruption to indigenous peoples, before going ahead, the United Nations has said. Klaus Toepfer, executive director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) said that the same legally binding standards regarding environmental impact assessments should apply to anthropological checks on the “life-styles and cultures of indigenous peoples.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
US poultry producers have slaughtered 9,600 chickens after an outbreak of Newcastle Disease in California, which health officials have been trying to prevent infecting large-scale commercial poultry producers. They have reported that outbreaks were discovered in 25 smallholdings in Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.…