Category Archives: Risk Communication

Are Gas Stoves Really Responsible for 12.7% of Current Childhood Asthma Cases in the US?

Posted on January 12, 2023 by Blair

The news has been full recently with stories about the risk of childhood asthma caused by natural gas stoves. As someone who specializes in risk assessment and has experience with indoor air chemistry this seemed like it was right up … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate Change Politics, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 12 Comments

Understanding Risk Assessment as a form of Sustainable and Green Remediation

Posted on January 2, 2023 by Blair

One of my New Year’s resolutions is to write more posts that explain, in plain language, how our environmental regime in BC protects the public with respect to contaminated sites and to help clear up common misconceptions about contaminated sites. … Continue reading →

Posted in Chemistry and Toxicology, Risk Assessment Methodologies, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Why you needn’t fear the “Dirty Dozen” fruits and vegetables

Posted on April 14, 2022 by Blair

There are certain things you can count on with the coming of spring. Two of the earliest are the arrival of the first Mexican and Californian strawberries in the produce aisle and the Environmental Working Group’s (EWG) annual “Dirty Dozen” … Continue reading →

Posted in Chemistry and Toxicology, Risk, Risk Assessment Methodologies, Risk Communication | 1 Comment

How understanding Type I and Type II errors and p-values helps in assessing the conclusions of the Ramazzini Institute 13-week pilot study on Glyphosate

Posted on March 24, 2019 by Blair

As regular followers of this blog know, my graduate research involved developing systems to allow data collected by researchers to be evaluated for reliability and made available for subsequent re-use by other researchers. I carried out my research in an … Continue reading →

Posted in Chemistry and Toxicology, Risk, Risk Assessment Methodologies, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 3 Comments

Understanding the difference between a “hazard” and a “risk” or why scare stories about glyphosate and pesticides in your food shouldn’t frighten you

Posted on March 21, 2019 by Blair

I have written a lot at this blog about how chemical risks are communicated to the public and so I am often asked about news stories depicting the latest science scare story. Sometimes they are handled badly, like the CTV … Continue reading →

Posted in Risk, Risk Assessment Methodologies, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Why sample design matters or Why that “Insects are Vanishing Paper” does not tell us much about world insect populations

Posted on March 11, 2019 by Blair

As followers of this blog know, one of my big interests is evidence-based, environmental decision-making. I care that good scientific data is being used to make informed policy decisions. As such the recent “insects are vanishing” meme that is spreading … Continue reading →

Posted in Environmentalism and Ecomodernism, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Academics getting it wrong about the role of private sector consultants in BC’s Environmental Assessment processes

Posted on January 3, 2019 by Blair

On November 19th a group of “scientists based in British Columbia” produced an open letter to Premier John Horgan, and several of his cabinet colleagues, about improving British Columbia’s Environmental Assessment (EA) process. The letter, was from the Earth to … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Environmentalism and Ecomodernism, General Politics, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

What are the real marine risks of the Trans Mountain Pipeline Expansion?

Posted on February 12, 2018 by Blair

Every morning, starting around 7 am, the Spirit of Vancouver Island leaves its berth in Swartz Bay for its first run to Tsawwassen. On-board the Spirit are tens of thousands of liters of diesel fuel to run the ship for … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Pipelines, Risk Communication, Trans Mountain, Uncategorized | 26 Comments

Flu shots save both money and lives

Posted on January 10, 2017 by Blair

The New Year is upon us and with the New Year comes an event as expected as the swallows return to Capistrano. What would that event be you ask? Well it must be Bill Tieleman’s annual articles against BC’s flu … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | 5 Comments

On pipelines, oil-by-rail, and the relative risk of catastrophic spills in the aquatic environment

Posted on July 25, 2016 by Blair

As my regular readers know besides this blog I also write a blog at the Huffington Post. It typically consists of shorter versions on my pieces here. Well my most recent post on the Trans-Mountain Expansion project has received a … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Energy East, Oil Sands, Pipelines, Risk, Risk Assessment Methodologies, Risk Communication, Trans Mountain | 16 Comments