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Look What’s Behind the Recent Slowdown in Global Warming

by Lionel4334 Posted on November 10, 2013

Mother Jones

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Climate deniers like to point to the so-called global warming “hiatus” as evidence that humans aren’t changing the climate. But according a new study, exactly the opposite is true: The recent slowdown in global temperature increases is partially the result of one of the few successful international crackdowns on greenhouse gases.

Back in 1988, more than 40 countries, including the US, signed the Montreal Protocol, an agreement to phase out the use of ozone-depleting gases like chlorofluorocarbons (today the Protocol has nearly 200 signatories). According to the EPA, CFC emissions are down 90 percent since the Protocol, a drop that the agency calls “one of the largest reductions to date in global greenhouse gas emissions.” That’s a blessing for the ozone layer, but also for the climate. CFCs are a potent heat-trapping gas, and a new analysis published today in Nature Geoscience finds that slashing them has been a major driver of the much-discussed slowdown in global warming.

Without the Protocol, environmental economist Francisco Estrada of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México reports, global temperatures today would be about a tenth of a degree Celsius higher than they are. That’s roughly an eighth of the total warming documented since 1880.

Estrada and his co-authors compared global temperature and greenhouse gas emissions records over the last century and found that breaks in the steady upward march of both coincided closely. At times when emissions leveled off or dropped, like during the Great Depression, the trend was mirrored in temperatures; likewise for when emissions climbed.

“With these breaks, what’s interesting is that when they’re common that’s pretty indicative of causation,” said Pierre Perron, a Boston University economist who developed the custom-built statistical tests used in the study.

The findings put a new spin on investigation into the cause of the recent “hiatus.” Scientists have suggested that several temporary natural phenomena, including the deep ocean sucking up more heat, are responsible for this slowdown. Estrada says his findings show that a recent reduction in heat-trapping CFCs as a result of the Montreal Protocol has also played an important role.

“Paradoxically, the recent decrease in warming, presented by global warming skeptics as proof that humankind cannot affect the climate system, is shown to have a direct human origin,” Estrada writes in the study.

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U.N. lists air pollution as carcinogen

by Susie Quan Posted on October 18, 2013

U.N. lists air pollution as carcinogen

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If you want to avoid lung cancer, the United Nation’s cancer-research body has some advice for you: Don’t breathe.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer on Thursday added air pollution, and the particulate matter that it contains, to its list of carcinogens.

The airborne poisons were classified as “Group 1″ carcinogens, meaning there is “sufficient evidence” that they cause cancer in humans. They are mostly produced through the burning of fossil fuels in vehicles, power plants, and stoves.

And it’s not just lung cancer that can be triggered by air pollution. In a statement [PDF], the agency noted “a positive association” between polluted air and bladder cancer.

“Our task was to evaluate the air everyone breathes rather than focus on specific air pollutants,” agency official Dana Loomis told Reuters. “The results from the reviewed studies point in the same direction: the risk of developing lung cancer is significantly increased in people exposed to air pollution.”

The decision follows findings that air pollution killed 3.2 million people in 2010, including 233,000 cancer-related deaths. Most of the deaths occurred in India, China, and other developing countries with large populations. The Clean Air Act helped dramatically clean up the air that Americans breathe, but anybody who has visited Los Angeles or California’s Central Valley knows that problems persist in the West.

Air pollution and particulate matter now join a list [PDF], nicknamed the encyclopedia of carcinogens, that also contains such nasties as asbestos, plutonium, hepatitis, and tobacco smoke. Oh, and sun rays, estrogen therapy, Chinese-style salted fish, and booze.


Source
Outdoor air pollution a leading environmental cause of cancer deaths, IARC
UN agency calls outdoor air pollution leading cause of cancer, Reuters

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Supreme Court will hear challenge to EPA’s power-plant rules

by caringk63 Posted on October 15, 2013

Supreme Court will hear challenge to EPA’s power-plant rules

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America’s power plants are among the world’s leading sources of greenhouse gas pollution. And their owners secured a legal victory on Tuesday that could help them stay that way.

We’ve written at length about the Obama administration’s efforts to clamp down on power plant emissions. The EPA’s proposed rules would make it difficult to operate dirty coal-fired plants and would help slow down global warming. But the decades-overdue rules don’t delight everybody: They have pissed off some powerful and deep-pocketed polluters.

Conservative states, big business and fossil fuel groups have lined up to challenge the rules in court, arguing that they are far-reaching and intrusive. They say the court’s 2007 Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency ruling only directed the federal government to regulate tailpipe emissions under the Clean Air Act — and that it fell short of granting the EPA the authority to regulate “stationary” power plant emissions.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear some of those challenges.

From USA Today:

The court accepted six separate petitions that sought to roll back EPA’s clout over carbon dioxide emissions from power plants. That could signal the court’s dissatisfaction with a 2012 ruling by the nation’s second most powerful court — the federal appeals court for the District of Columbia Circuit — affirming the agency’s authority.

The decision to accept cases brought by Texas, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, energy producers and others represented a potential victory for groups that customarily enjoy considerable sway at the conservative-leaning court.

It presents a risk for President Obama and his environmental regulators, who replaced the Bush administration’s aversion to regulating greenhouse gases with a major push in the other direction, under the belief that the emissions are responsible for climate change.

The New York Times explains the nitty gritty of the justices’ decision:

The Supreme Court accepted six petitions, but it limited the issue it would review to the question of whether the agency “permissibly determined that its regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles triggered permitting requirements under the Clean Air Act for stationary sources that emit greenhouses gases.” …

A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit last year unanimously rejected the challenges, some on the merits and some on the ground that the parties before the court lacked standing to pursue them.

“The regulations the court has agreed to review represent the Obama administration’s first major rule making to address the emissions of greenhouse gases from major stationary sources across the country,” said Richard J. Lazarus, who teaches environmental law at Harvard. “At the same time, the court declined to review E.P.A.’s determination that greenhouse gases from new motor vehicles endanger public health and welfare and therefore has left intact the government’s current regulation of motor vehicles emissions to address climate change.”

It’s been clear for a while that second-term President Obama aims to use the executive branch’s regulatory power to try to do something about climate change, since first-term President Obama wasn’t able to pass legislation toward that end. Now it’s the judiciary’s turn to weigh in. What move will the nine justices decide to play in Washington’s big rock-paper-scissors game? You, and your atmosphere, must wait to find out.


Source
Supreme Court to Hear Challenge to E.P.A. Emissions Rules, New York Times
Supreme Court agrees to hear greenhouse gas cases, USA Today
EPA Greenhouse-Gas Rules Draw U.S. Supreme Court Scrutiny, Bloomberg

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Oil industry sues EPA over biofuel mandate

by cur07jqm Posted on October 10, 2013

Oil industry sues EPA over biofuel mandate

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Old gas pumps, new fuel mandates.

Oil companies are fighting efforts to boost the percentage of biofuels in gasoline. And they’re not the only ones — some green groups are opposed to the biofuels boost too.

The American Petroleum Institute filed a lawsuit this week that seeks to overturn the EPA’s renewable-fuel mandate, which requires that gas contain a minimum percentage of biofuel. There’s particular controversy over requirements for use of cellulosic ethanol, which can be made from crop waste but is not currently being produced in large supply.  From The Hill:

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued the Renewable Fuel Standard in August, long after the agency’s statutory deadline in November of last year. The industry has repeatedly called the standards unworkable. …

The standards require refiners to use millions of gallons of cellulosic ethanol this year, but the API argues that only 142,000 gallons have been made available to refiners thus far for blending.

Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association, scoffed at the assertion, arguing that the standard can easily be met.

But the Environmental Working Group opposes the new mandates too. Here’s what EWG Vice President Scott Faber told Congress in July:

To date, the [Renewable Fuel Standard] has failed to deliver the “good” biofuels that could help meet many of our environmental and energy challenges. Instead, the RFS has delivered too many “bad” biofuels that increase greenhouse gas emissions, pollute our air and water, destroy critical habitat for wildlife and increase food and fuel prices. …

To allow [cleaner] second-generation biofuels to gain a foothold in the marketplace, Congress must reform the RFS to phase out the mandate for corn ethanol.

As Mother Jones reported a few months ago, “The only group that really seems to like the new rule is the ethanol lobby.”

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.Find this article interesting? Donate now to support our work.Read more: Business & Technology

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Why your hybrid doesn’t get that promised mileage

by charlenedean Posted on August 16, 2013

Why your hybrid doesn’t get that promised mileage

By Lisa Hymas

Ford Motor CompanyThe C-Max had a mileage fail.

Are you a hybrid owner who’s never managed to get the high gas mileage advertised on the car window? You’re not alone.

From the Los Angeles Times:

Bowing to criticism that its C-Max hybrid didn’t get the fuel economy claimed on its window sticker, Ford Motor Co. has restated the compact car’s mileage ratings and said it will … make a “goodwill” payment of $550 to people who purchased the C-Max and $325 to those who leased the vehicle.

Ford had previously claimed the 2013 C-Max hybrid got 47 mpg for combined city and highway driving. Now it’s saying 43 mpg. That’s still higher than the 37 mpg that Consumer Reports got when it tested the model.

And it’s not just Ford. More from the L.A. Times:

Last year, the EPA tested multiple Hyundai and Kia models that had become the focus of consumer complaints about fuel-economy ratings, and ordered changes to the labels. The agency said Hyundai and Kia overstated the fuel economy on more than a third of the vehicles they had sold in recent years.

The South Korean automakers issued an apology and said they would give special debit cards to nearly 1 million owners of the affected models to make up for the difference in the lower miles per gallon logged by the vehicles.

Inaccurate mileage claims are a widespread problem, particularly with hybrids — and yesterday the EPA announced that it is finally going to do something about it.

From The New York Times:

The Environmental Protection Agency said it would update its labeling rules — which date to the 1970s — to resolve disparities among the growing number of hybrid and electric vehicles on the market. …

The current fuel economy rules specify that automakers can use the same fuel-economy numbers for similar-size vehicles equipped with the same engines and transmissions. …

When the Fusion hybrid achieved 47 miles per gallon in combined city and highway driving, Ford was allowed to apply that rating to the C-Max hybrid as well. …

[Ford’s Raj Nair acknowledged] that it was difficult to make an exact comparison between the C-Max, a utility vehicle with a chunky design, and the sleeker-looking Fusion passenger car.

In the past, drivers wouldn’t know their exact mileage unless they tracked fill-ups and did some math, but now hybrids’ dashboards display real-time mpg numbers, so it’s a lot easier to know if a car doesn’t live up to an automaker’s claims.

The EPA didn’t lay out a time frame for changing its rules, but car companies may act soon on their own regardless. “Expect to see automakers stick to more conservative claims rather than risk the consumer and financial backlash that can result from inaccurate and inflated fuel-economy estimates,” auto analyst Alec Gutierrez told the L.A. Times.

Lisa Hymas is senior editor at Grist. You can follow her on Twitter and Google+.

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Offshore fracking in California: What could go wrong?

by london Posted on August 5, 2013

Offshore fracking in California: What could go wrong?

By Claire Thompson

Exciting new update in the chronicles of America’s domestic oil-and-gas boom: Not only is offshore fracking a thing, but it’s been happening off the coast of California for a good 15 years now, in the same sensitive marine environments where new oil leases have been banned since a disastrous 1969 spill.

Berardo62

Drillin’ U.S.A.

If that’s news to you, you’re not alone — the California Coastal Commission was unaware, until recently, that the seafloor was being fracked. Because these drilling operations happen more than three miles off the coast, they’re under federal jurisdiction, but the state has the power to reject federal permits if water quality is endangered.

The Associated Press has the story:

Federal regulators thus far have exempted the chemical fluids used in offshore fracking from the nation’s clean water laws, allowing companies to release fracking fluid into the sea without filing a separate environmental impact report or statement looking at the possible effects. That exemption was affirmed this year by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, according to the internal emails reviewed by the AP. …

The EPA and the federal agency that oversees offshore drilling, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement or BSEE, conduct some routine inspections during fracking projects, but any spills or leaks are largely left to the oil companies to report.

Although new drilling leases in the Santa Barbara Channel’s undersea oil fields are banned, drilling rights at 23 existing platforms were grandfathered in. Offshore fracking — pumping hundreds of thousands of gallons of water, sand, and chemicals into the sea floor — can stimulate these old wells into production again.

Companies don’t have to disclose the exact combination of chemicals in their fracking fluids — that information is protected as a trade secret — and none of the experts AP interviewed knew of any study on the fluids’ underwater effects. But some of the chemicals known to be used in fracking are toxic to bottom dwellers like fish larvae and crustaceans, and research has shown that fluids used in traditional offshore drilling can mess with some marine animals’ reproductive systems.

The AP describes one major offshore fracking operation:

In January 2010, oil and gas company Venoco Inc. set out to improve the production of one of its old wells with what federal drilling records show was the largest offshore fracking operation attempted in federal waters off California’s coast. The target: the Monterey Shale, a vast formation that extends from California’s Central Valley farmlands to offshore and could ultimately comprise two-thirds of the nation’s shale oil reserves.

Six different fracks were completed during the project, during which engineers funneled a mix of about 300,000 pounds of fracking fluids, sand and seawater 4,500 feet beneath the seabed, according to BSEE documents.

Venoco’s attempt only mildly increased production, according to the documents. Venoco declined to comment.

Other companies’ offshore fracking explorations have yielded similarly lukewarm results. Chevron’s one effort failed, and only one of Nuevo Energy’s nine attempts was considered successful.

Now that the Coastal Commission has wised up, it plans to ask operators proposing new offshore drilling projects whether they’ll be fracking, and may look into requiring a separate permit and stricter review process for such operations.

At least one BSEE employee appeared skeptical of the environmental safety of offshore fracking, according to internal agency emails obtained by AP. Pacific regional environmental officer Kenneth Seeley wrote this in an email to colleagues in February:

We have an operator proposing to use “hydraulic stimulation” (which has not been done very often here) and I’m trying to run through the list of potential concerns. The operator says their produced water is Superclean! but the way they responded to my questions kind of made me think this was worth following up on.

Still, that application, from privately held oil-and-gas company DCOR LLC, ended up being approved.

Claire Thompson is an editorial assistant at Grist.

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You get my drift? Pesticides cause big problems when they go where they’re not wanted

by Laura Posted on July 31, 2013

You get my drift? Pesticides cause big problems when they go where they’re not wanted

By John Upton

Shutterstock

Please be careful where you dump that toxic load.

Too many crop dusters are accidentally missing their targets and spraying poisonous pesticides where they’re not supposed to go, killing crops and sickening farmers’ neighbors.

Indiana Public Media reports that three-quarters of farm pesticide violations in the state involve what is euphemistically called “drift.” That is, the chemicals don’t land where they’re intended to. From the report, which is the first in a three-part series on the problem:

[Farmer Brett] Middlesworth grows about 300 acres of tomatoes each year, but last summer he saw about a tenth of his yield damaged by a single instance of pesticide drift.

It happened halfway through the growing season. His neighbor was spraying a soybean field with Roundup herbicide. The wind picked up and carried the spray across the property line and onto Middlesworth’s tomatoes.

As Roundup targets broadleaf weeds, and tomatoes are broadleaf plants, the area closest to his neighbor was a total loss. …

[T]he Office of the Indiana State Chemist, the agency tasked with enforcing state pesticide laws, documented 97 cases from 2010 through 2012 where applicators spraying farms violated anti-drift laws.

Most reports of harm caused by pesticides drifting onto someone’s property involve damage to plants. But in the last several years, the state has documented a dozen violations where someone said exposure to drifting pesticides made them sick.

Growers report making headway in the last few years with voluntary efforts aimed at preventing drift damage, but produce industry leaders say they are worried the approval of new genetically modified crops could undo that progress.

And other kinds of problems can arise from unintended pesticide fallout. We told you earlier this week that pesticides appear to be blowing from California’s Central Valley into the state’s mountains, where they are accumulating in the bodies of frogs.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Leaked EPA document raises questions about fracking pollution

by Palahnajje Posted on July 30, 2013

Leaked EPA document raises questions about fracking pollution

By John Upton

William Avery Hudson

The EPA isn’t looking too hard at what Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. is up to behind this fence, or anywhere else.

The EPA doesn’t seem very interested in finding out whether fracking pollutes groundwater. The latest indication of this emerged over the weekend in the Los Angeles Times.

Residents of the small town of Dimock in northeastern Pennsylvania have long been convinced that Cabot Oil and Gas Corp. was poisoning their drinking water by fracking the land around them. In July of last year, the EPA announced that although water from some local wells contained “naturally occurring” arsenic, barium, and manganese, the agency was ending its investigation there without fingering the any culprits.

Now we find out that staff at a regional EPA office were worried about the role of fracking in polluting the town’s water, but their concerns appear to have been ignored by their bosses.

An internal EPA PowerPoint presentation prepared by regional staffers for their superiors and obtained by the L.A. Times paints an alarming picture of potential links between water contamination and fracking. And it reinforces the perception that the EPA is giving a free pass to the fracking industry, perhaps because natural gas plays a key role in President Obama’s quest for “energy independence” and an “all of the above” energy portfolio. From the L.A. Times article:

The presentation, based on data collected over 4 1/2 years at 11 wells around Dimock, concluded that “methane and other gases released during drilling (including air from the drilling) apparently cause significant damage to the water quality.” The presentation also concluded that “methane is at significantly higher concentrations in the aquifers after gas drilling and perhaps as a result of fracking [hydraulic fracturing] and other gas well work.” …

Robert B. Jackson, professor of environmental sciences at Duke University, who has researched methane contamination in the Dimock area and recently reviewed the presentation, said he was disappointed by the EPA’s decision.

“What’s surprising is to see this data set and then to see EPA walk away from Dimock,” Jackson said. “The issue here is, why wasn’t EPA interested in following up on this to understand it better?”

The EPA confirmed the authenticity of the PowerPoint presentation, but dismissed it as “one [on-scene coordinator’s] thoughts regarding 12 samples” that was never shared publicly because “it was a preliminary evaluation that requires additional assessment.”

The Natural Resources Defense Council puts this latest retreat by the EPA into some context:

Unfortunately, what appears to have happened in Dimock is just the latest in a larger, troubling trend we’re seeing of EPA failing to act on science in controversial fracking cases across the country. Instead, the agency appears to be systematically pulling back from high-profile fracking investigations.

First, in March of 2012—without explanation—EPA abruptly withdrew an emergency order it had issued two years earlier against Range Resources Corporation after the agency found nearby natural gas production operations from the company had likely caused methane and toxic chemical contamination in Parker County, Texas drinking water supplies. … [T]he Associated Press reported that a leaked confidential report proved that EPA had scientific evidence against Range, but changed course after the company threatened not to cooperate with the agency’s ongoing national study of fracking. AP also reported that interviews with the company confirmed this. When asked to explain its actions in light of all of this, EPA’s silence has been deafening.

Then, in late June 2013, EPA made an equally abrupt and unexplained announcement that it was abandoning an investigation into a high-profile drinking water contamination case in Pavillion, Wyoming. …

Now it seems the third shoe drops in Dimock — the latest in what was a triumvirate of highly anticipated federal fracking-related investigations.

Maybe the EPA has forgotten what its middle initial stands for?

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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FDA moves to keep arsenic out of your apple juice

by bvds34dfsg Posted on July 15, 2013

FDA moves to keep arsenic out of your apple juice

By John Upton

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Finally, more apples in our arsenic juice.

Apple juice may soon be as safe to drink as tap water. (Well, except for all that sugar.)

Nearly two years after consumer groups raised alarms about elevated levels of arsenic in some brands of apple juice, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Friday proposed new limits on permissible levels of the chemical, which can cause cancer and other maladies.

The FDA’s proposed “action level” for inorganic arsenic in apple juice matches the EPA’s existing rules for tap water — 10 parts per billion.

From The Christian Science Monitor:

The FDA has tested arsenic in apple juice for at least 20 years and has long said the levels are not dangerous to consumers, in particular the small children who favor the fruit juice (second only to orange juice in popularity, according to industry groups).

But the agency issued a tougher stance with its announcement Friday. Under the new regulation, apple juice containing more than 10 parts per billion could be removed from the market and companies could face legal action.

The proposal follows testing by The Dr. Oz Show and Consumer Reports [PDF] that revealed that some apple juices contained more arsenic than was allowed in tap water.

WTF is arsenic doing in apple juice anyway? The Chicago Tribune explains:

Inorganic arsenic in food can come from pesticides or from soil and groundwater pollution, though some occurs naturally in the environment. Organic arsenic is viewed as relatively safe, but emerging research suggests that two types of organic arsenic may be toxic. The FDA says these occur rarely or in negligible quantities in apple juice.

It probably doesn’t help that a lot of the apple juice sold in the U.S. comes from concentrate imported from China, a country that does not have an exemplary food-safety record.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who tweets, posts articles to Facebook, and blogs about ecology. He welcomes reader questions, tips, and incoherent rants: johnupton@gmail.com.

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Think about it for a minute

by Posted on July 15, 2013

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Think about it for a minute

Posted 15 July 2013 in

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If there’s one thing most people can agree on, it’s that consumers constantly feel the pinch of high gas prices. In 2012, Americans spent the highest percentage of household income – nearly four percent – on gas in nearly thirty years. And while consumers are hit with wallet-draining gas prices every day, oil companies continue to make huge profits — $118 billion alone last year. Even worse, the oil industry is exploiting high gas prices to justify additional domestic drilling, despite the fact that record drilling in the US has failed to slow gas prices. That’s why tomorrow the Senate’s Energy & Natural Resources Committee will convene a hearing to find out why gas prices remain stubbornly high, despite a new wave of domestic oil production.

Here’s what you need to know:

More drilling isn’t the answer

Oil prices are set on a global market that is subject to factors like unrest in the Middle East. A recent report from the International Energy Agency predicted that drilling our way to energy independence will leave us with oil costing $215 per barrel.
Often times, refineries fail to pass on the lower costs to consumers and hitches during production lead to skyrocketing gas prices, meaning a drop in the price of crude oil does not necessarily translate into cheaper gas for consumers.

The price shocks associated with a volatile oil market not only impact hardworking Americans, diminishing disposable income that would have been spent elsewhere, but they also affect national security. Leaders have long agreed that fluctuating prices hamstring the military’s planning and budgeting processes, leaving our troops on the ground vulnerable.

Renewable fuel is the clear solution

Renewable fuel already provides 10% of America’s fuel needs and that number is growing. Increased access to homegrown renewable fuel has provided consumers with choice at the pump, given consumers savings from decreased gas prices, and reduced our dependence on foreign oil.

In 2011, gas prices were reduced by $1.09 per gallon and the average American household saved $1,200 on their gas bill thanks to renewable fuel.
Americans saved approximately $50 billion in imported fuel costs thanks to renewable fuel in 2011.
Cellulosic renewable fuel (made from things like algae or switchgrass) is coming online, with the EIA predicting 250 million gallons of capacity by 2015, setting the stage for a future with an even more diverse, clean and homegrown fuel.
The USDA and DOE have estimated that there is enough biomass in the United States to replace nearly a third of the country’s gasoline with renewable fuel by 2030.

In order to further reduce our reliance on oil and ease consumer pain at the pump, we must continue to support policies such as the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) that are creating a competition in the transportation fuel sector. Without the RFS and support for homegrown renewable fuels, our nation will be left with a virtual oil monopoly that continues to consume high carbon petroleum transportation fuels, priced at the whim of the global market leaving American families vulnerable and struggling for stability. We must protect consumers by protecting the RFS.

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Think about it for a minute

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