Category Archives: Uncategorized

Questioning the pedagogy of collective punishment – we shouldn’t punish good kids for the behavior of their peers.

Posted on October 22, 2024 by Blair

Imagine you are an employee at a busy office.  You spend your day working hard to meet your deadlines and keep your clients happy. It being the middle of football season, Brad and Janet are off in the corner arguing … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

What does the science say about CAPE’s – Fossil Fuel Ads Make Us Sick campaign?

Posted on March 15, 2024 by Blair

Regular readers of this blog know of my ongoing disappointment with the MDs at the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE). No group has so consistently disappointed me with the variance between the reports they are capable of … Continue reading →

Posted in Fossil Fuel Free Future, Risk Communication, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | 8 Comments

Understanding the asbestos risks associated with any search of the Prairie Green Landfill

Posted on September 25, 2023 by Blair

A lot has been written in the media, and on social media, about the proposal to search the Prairie Green Landfill for the victims of Jeremy Skibicki. It is believed that the bodies of at least two, and possibly more … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Chemistry and Toxicology, Risk, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

A parent’s thoughts on BC’s new K-12 reporting system

Posted on September 8, 2023 by Blair

I am the parent of three school-aged children, the husband of a teacher, a long-time DPAC Representative and am the former PAC President in a school that piloted the new grading and report card system in the Langley School District. … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Uncategorized | 3 Comments

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

Understanding the role of, and opportunities for, Canadian fossil fuels in our net zero future

Posted on August 3, 2022 by Blair

In my review of Seth Klein’s A Good War, I took issue with the author’s statement that in order to fight climate change we need to eliminate the fossil fuel industry. I have repeatedly pointed out how ridiculous that claim … Continue reading →

Posted in Oil Sands, Pipelines, Uncategorized | 4 Comments

BC’s new School Food Guidelines: an attempt by bureaucrats to squeeze the joy out of our kids’ childhoods while stripping away parental choice

Posted on April 15, 2022 by Blair

I am the parent of three school-aged kids and the president of our local elementary school Parent Advisory Council (PAC). Last night our PAC looked at BC’s Proposed 2022 BC School Foods Guidelines For Food & Beverages in K-12 Schools … Continue reading →

Posted in Canadian Politics, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Do Canadians really consume the equivalent of a credit card worth of plastic every week? – Of course they don’t

Posted on January 26, 2022 by Blair

This week I was directed to a factoid I had somehow missed that is currently making the rounds. That “humans consume the equivalent of a credit card worth of plastic every week”. The factoid was being used by the CEO … Continue reading →

Posted in Chemistry and Toxicology, Risk, Uncategorized | 4 Comments

Digging into that paper that “associates” VOCs in indoor air and tap water samples with Northern BC LNG wells – a likely example of spurious correlations

Posted on September 24, 2021 by Blair

This week I was directed to a new paper in Science of the Total Environment titled Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in indoor air and tap water samples in residences of pregnant women living in an area of unconventional natural gas … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments