Environmental Police Officer?

[DonMirabito]

All,
Hmmm... What does an EPA Officer look like anyway? Just this morning went by a job site where a company had been re-painting an old farm house. I had been watching them for a week or so now. I never saw anything they appeared to do that followed the RRP rules - no containment, no plastic, used grinders and paint shavers, etc. Anyway, I went by the house today and there was a pickup truck in the driveway that said Environmental Police on it. It was just leaving when I went by. Everything I have been hearing lately is that they are holding back on enforcement. I wonder what is up?

Don

[Lavrans]

Quick Google for Massachusetts Environmental Police brought up the Massachusetts Environmental Police.

Is Massachusetts self managing now? If so, their EP would be in charge of that. Even if not, if they are polluting, I'd expect them to check in on what looks like poorly managed job sites.

[Dick Seibert]

Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, and Stalin all rolled into one could never have envisioned this.

[Lavrans]

Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, and Stalin all rolled into one could never have envisioned this.

You know, Dick, your aversion to Environmentalists reminds me of my Dad's antipathy toward Vegans. From his perspective to be Vegan means that you've decided man is apart and above all of the natural universe, that because we are next to God there is a moral imperative that makes eating the flesh of animals a sin. It is a religion to him and, as a religion, means they haven't thought through what their beliefs are, that they must have that religious arrogance to believe that their preferences are the tenets by which all people must live.

I've always wondered what it was that caused him to place so much anger at that one group that he couldn't see any vegan as anything but the worst possible example of that group. So we just argue about it; it's really an argument about how society and belief are constructed.

[Dick Seibert]

Lavrans:

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin.

At this point environmentalism has become a national joke.

As one who wondered how the Germans could have given up their freedoms to the Nazis in WWII, as one how then worked with and talked about life in Nazi German and Fascist Italy to two former Italian soldiers and one former German soldier, and as one who (during college) took morning walks with Alexander Kerensky, I'd say form what I've heard that we are giving up more freedoms that they ever did.

[always-learning]

Don,

Have not one clue at what they look like in Mass, but here's one taking care of one of Dick's friends in England. I think it's Tom Bainbridge on the receiving end (left side) of an environmental fine for not capturing his paint chips.... although, I think he's a little overdressed for the party he was going to...




Psssssst.... Hey Tom. A little much on the makeup. Might want to tone it down a little bit.

;-)

[ThingOfBeauty]

We have a natural right to poison kids by grinding toxic paint into their bedrooms! Away, jackbooted thugs of reason!

[Dick Seibert]

We have a natural right to poison kids by grinding toxic paint into their bedrooms! Away, jackbooted thugs of reason!

Of course contractors have been doing that forever, now do the environmentalists have a natural right to require poisoning people with OSB? I've posted Sim's Palo Alto addition several times wherein the Green Code required OSB rather than plywood, California's CARB regulations required a reduction of formaldehyde (just wait, the EPA is giving California's requirements to the rest of the nation), I met with an air quality guy last week, he now tells me he's got a development with OSB full of mold, the remediation company stripped the sheetrock, insulation, and carpeting out and found the mold in the OSB, he went to the warehouse and tested the OSB and no mold. The best theory is that there is mold naturally in the wood chips, the formaldehyde was stopping the mold from activating, take the OSB to a jobsite and it takes in moisture starting the growth of mold. So now we've got the Green Police requiring people to live in moldy homes and getting sick to clean up the forest floor, to say nothing of the lawsuits against the contractors who install the phony wood, contractors whose insurance doesn't cover them for mold. This is stupider than The USGBC's LEED buildings consuming 29% more energy than non-LEED buildings.

Isn't it becoming obvious that everything the Greenies are doing is counterproductive, toxic, and beyond stupid?

[MarkMc]

Focus Dick. Ican show you a home build entirely of OG redwood, Port Orford cedar and dougie fur that is a mold heaven too. Kinda shoots a whole lot of your spouts in mid air were one to make certain assumptions....

[Dick Seibert]

Mark:

The point is that apparently the formaldehyde in OSB was inhibiting mold growth, the Greenies have made us take the formaldehyde out but are still making us build with OSB.

How come old homes built from first growth lumber aren't showing mold? Could it be that the walls are allowed to breathe? The Greenies make us seal up our walls to save the earth.

[ThingOfBeauty]

I've never demo'd a house of any age that had no mold. Anyone else?
PS we cut down over 97% of the old growth, how many houses could we build with it even if we decided to mow the national parks?

[ThingOfBeauty]

Of course contractors have been doing that forever, now do the environmentalists have a natural right to require poisoning people with OSB? I've posted Sim's Palo Alto addition several times wherein the Green Code required OSB rather than plywood, California's CARB regulations required a reduction of formaldehyde (just wait, the EPA is giving California's requirements to the rest of the nation), I met with an air quality guy last week, he now tells me he's got a development with OSB full of mold, the remediation company stripped the sheetrock, insulation, and carpeting out and found the mold in the OSB, he went to the warehouse and tested the OSB and no mold. The best theory is that there is mold naturally in the wood chips, the formaldehyde was stopping the mold from activating, take the OSB to a jobsite and it takes in moisture starting the growth of mold. So now we've got the Green Police requiring people to live in moldy homes and getting sick to clean up the forest floor, to say nothing of the lawsuits against the contractors who install the phony wood, contractors whose insurance doesn't cover them for mold. This is stupider than The USGBC's LEED buildings consuming 29% more energy than non-LEED buildings.

Isn't it becoming obvious that everything the Greenies are doing is counterproductive, toxic, and beyond stupid?

I'm happy to be less bored with this post than usual, because you added one new misunderstanding to the normal five lies you put in here for the millionth time.

So, back to lead paint...it's cool to poison the kids or no?

[Dick Seibert]

Doug, what lies? Are you denying that the newly formulated OSB is growing mold? I can't substantiated it because the developer is trying to keep it under wraps, but it will come out, did you see the picture I posted the other day of mold growing out of spray foam?

If I had my choice of allowing a child to grow up exposed to toxics my preferences would be from worst to least destructive:

1) Urethane
2) Formaldehyde
3) Polyisocyanurate,
4) PVC
5) Mold
6) Lead

[MarkMc]

Mark:

The point is that apparently the formaldehyde in OSB was inhibiting mold growth, the Greenies have made us take the formaldehyde out but are still making us build with OSB.

How come old homes built from first growth lumber aren't showing mold? Could it be that the walls are allowed to breathe? The Greenies make us seal up our walls to save the earth.

I realize there are "issues" and as I said I can show you several moldy "first growth" [whatever...] that have issues with mold. Maybe folks with older homes are more liberal when it come to having other life forms in their houses, I don't know. What I do know is that it is possible to bulid a clean home with modern materials and that some folks have become hypersensitzed to many of our modern, [free] market driven [no oil pun intended, but I'll take what I can get....]. Formaldehyde is bad, there is no doubt. So too are the by products petroleum. Yo u have been a bit prideful and defensive of the refinery you worked on and I can go across the hills and find whole towns proud of their chipped wood products. When I get a choice to not breath your hummer exhaust, call me.... we can do some sniffing then )

[Dick Seibert]

California Hummer exhaust is pretty clean for sniffing now, at first the Greenies made them put MTBE in the gas, it worked but an unintended consequence was that it poisoned the wells, watersheds, and reservoirs, so they made them take it out. At this point California Hummers are cleaner than other states' Priuses, but an unintended consequence is that they now have no power, but the addition of a supercharger fixed that.