What It’s Like on the Back Page

Hidden behind the grander story of the recent BP oil well disaster in the Gulf of Mexico was another environmental catastrophe that did not gain much attention. A pipeline owned by Canadian-based Enbridge Energy Partners ruptured on July 25 in southern Michigan, pouring an estimated 1 million gallons of crude oil into the Kalamazoo River and devastating the natural environment along at least a 30-mile stretch of once-pristine marshes. Environmental officials predict long-term damage to the habitat for ducks, geese, swans, herons, muskrats and frogs, and the insects and mussels that are the base of the food chain, which have been suffocated by the oil.

The 206 million gallons of crude in the Gulf of Mexico spewed by the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster was much more extensive, of course, but a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Great Lakes official said the Michigan spill could be the largest in this part of the country in decades, possibly ever. Yet, as the Toledo Blade noted in an excellent article in Sunday’s newspaper, “the Kalamazoo River disaster is historic in its own right, even if it only registers a blip on the nation's radar.”

Anyone who reads or listens to the daily global news knows that coverage of such events is sporadic, especially when there are bigger, oilier fish to fry. I was in line at a fish market the other day where I heard two people behind me discussing the BP oil disaster, chiefly what it will cost the oil conglomerate to address all of the environmental issues stemming from the calamity.

“I’m sick of hearing about all these environmental disasters,” one of the men stated flatly. “If it’s not the Gulf oil spill, it’s global warming or something else.”

“I know,” the other gentleman commiserated. “Why can’t there ever be any happy environmental news?”

His rhetorical question could apply to most any news topic, from politics to the economy, as it’s much more newsworthy to report a disaster than something less tragic. That’s just the nature of news or, more to the point, the nature of humanity’s interest in the news.

During the past several years, I’ve become increasingly frustrated by the lack of news coverage of the environmental disaster we’re trying to head off at Redemtech. E-waste news often comes in oily spurts only when some news organization suddenly "discovers" the problems associated with end-of-life electronics, rather than the other environmental gushers that often carry important warnings to the world.

I know I preach endlessly about the dangers of e-waste, how so many of our discarded computers and other electronics are still dumped in landfills, or shipped overseas for dismantling by children. I don’t mean to sound like a curmudgeon on the topic, but it remains a serious problem.

If there is a happy side to the e-waste crisis, it must be that more people are aware that the disposal of electronics requires more care than businesses and the public realized in the past. While still a small minority in the U.S., the number of those who see the value of extending the life of their computers or properly disposing of them so that the toxic materials inside do not harm anyone is growing.

With a few exceptions two or three times a year when a major news outlet picks up on the topic and arouses public interest, our battle to stop e-waste from being mishandled is still relegated to the inside pages of both print and online publications. The logic of reusing what we have for longer periods of time still is hidden from view from a lot of people.

But like the recent Michigan oil disaster that will haunt the region for years, there simply are some issues that cannot be hidden.