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Climate change threatens Maine’s lobsters

by Vladyslava7u1 Posted on July 3, 2013

Climate change threatens Maine’s lobsters

By John Upton

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Threatened by climate change.

Rising flood waters. Exotic disease outbreaks. Melting glaciers.

Pfft, trifling details. Mere distractions from more tangible impacts of climate change.

Because why? Because LOBSTERS!

The Natural Resources Council of Maine, an environmental group, launched a campaign Tuesday that could grab the attention of some who might otherwise not see any reason to care about global warming. From the AP:

In a press conference on the Portland waterfront, lobster industry advocates said carbon pollution from power plants, cars and elsewhere is warming up and acidifying waters in the Gulf of Maine.

Warmer waters drive lobsters to migrate to colder waters and make them more susceptible to disease, while acidified waters hurt lobsters’ ability to form adequate shells, they said.

Emmie Theberge of the Natural Resources Council of Maine said people should support any federal action that will reduce carbon pollution.

“The fact that carbon pollution hurts Maine lobsters should be a concern to all Mainers,” she said.

The council was joined at the press event by scientists and representatives of the Maine Lobster Council, Ready Seafood Co., and the Maine Restaurant Association.

It might seem strange to fret about the fate of lobsters amid seasons of plenty. But experts warned Tuesday that the record hauls of late might yet dry up. From the Portland Press Herald:

So far, one of the biggest problems for the Maine lobster industry, ironically, has been its own success. Marine biologists have documented the fact that while lobster fisheries in southern New England are languishing, those in the Gulf of Maine are thriving as lobsters abandon warmer waters as far south as Long Island Sound and move north.

The surge in lobster numbers in the Gulf of Maine has led to an oversupply, which last year caused the per-pound price at the pier to dip as low as $2.50 in some areas. Partly in response to that, an aggressive new marketing campaign, funded by $2 million a year in state money, is attempting to open untapped global markets for Maine lobsters. Tuesday’s news conference was part of that campaign.

But the lobster glut in the Gulf of Maine is no reason for complacency, marine biologists have warned. …

Lobsters here have shown negative reaction to warming water temperatures and ocean acidification, as is evident in their early shedding and migrating north to colder water, said [University of Maine zoologist Rick] Wahle. Disease and parasites could become a problem if climate change is not slowed by reductions in carbon emissions. In southern waters, lobsters have developed a disease that causes their shells to slowly disintegrate.

Parasite-riddled lobster scooped from a disintegrating tail, anybody?

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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EPA tells Ohio to stop keeping fracking secrets from first responders

by Aaron Stone Posted on June 27, 2013

EPA tells Ohio to stop keeping fracking secrets from first responders

By John Upton

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He needs to know.

Ohio firefighters, cops, and local officials might soon learn a little bit more about the poisons that frackers are storing and injecting into the ground beneath their feet.

The U.S. EPA told the state that a 12-year-old Ohio law that lets the fracking industry conceal information from emergency-management officials and first responders violates federal law. From The Columbus Dispatch:

The state law, passed in 2001, requires that drilling companies share information about hazardous chemicals only with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, which is supposed to keep the information available for local officials.

But federal EPA officials take a different view. A letter mailed in May to state emergency officials and environmental activist Teresa Mills states that the Right-to-Know Act of 1986 supersedes the Ohio law.

The Right-to-Know Act requires companies to share a hazardous-chemical inventory with local officials.

Mills, an Ohio organizer with the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, demanded yesterday that the state revoke its law. Mills said local officials need to know which chemicals are used in fracking wells in case they have to respond to a fire, spill or other emergency.

Green groups have pointed to a January spill at an oil well in St. Marys, Ohio, as an example of the problem, the AP reports: “They said that when concentrated chemical odors were detected at the facility, local emergency responders were unable to access required chemical data that was supposed to be on file.”

State officials told the Dispatch that they were still reviewing the EPA’s letter and weren’t ready to comment on next steps, other than to say they would contact gas and oil companies “to make sure everyone is in compliance with their reporting obligations under state and federal law.”

The fracking industry disputed the claim that federal law is being violated. One of its representatives ridiculed the importance of the national rules to firefighters. From the article:

[Ohio Oil and Gas Association Vice President Tom Stewart said] fire departments can access a Natural Resources website that is supposed to contain information on fracking chemicals.

“(Before 2001), everyone was filing these paper reports on individual wells. They were storing them in boxes in firehouses,” Stewart said. “Is a firefighter supposed to rummage around in a box or go to an emergency?”

We’re pretty sure that’s not how it works, but there you go.

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 big clean-air case

by Dedra Temores Posted on June 26, 2013

Supreme Court will hear big clean-air case

By John Upton

Rainforest Action Network

Beware, neighbors.

It’s been a week of refreshing news for fans of unpolluted air. As Barack Obama on Tuesday was calling for greenhouse gas limits on power plants, clean air advocates were also celebrating a decision by the Supreme Court to hear an important case on power-plant pollution.

The EPA’s Cross-State Air Pollution Rule was designed to cut down on life-threatening power-plant pollution that blows across state borders. It called for reductions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions at power plants in 28 states in the eastern U.S. The rule would mostly affect coal power plants, the dirtiest of America’s electricity plants. The EPA and supporters of the rule have said it would save tens of thousands of lives every year.

But owners of dirty power plants and some of the states in which they operate argued in court that the rule goes farther than the EPA is allowed to go under the Clean Air Act’s “good neighbor” provision.

Last August, the notoriously conservative U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled 2-1 in favor of the power plant companies, striking down the EPA’s rule.

But now the Supreme Court will hear the case and could reverse the circuit court’s ruling. From Reuters:

At the request of the administration, the American Lung Association and environmental groups, the [Supreme Court] justices will revisit an appeals court ruling that invalidated the Cross-State Air Pollution rule, which the EPA implemented to enforce a provision of the Clean Air Act.

Oral arguments and a decision are due in the court’s next term, which starts in October and ends in June 2014.

“The decision vaults the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule into the top five Clean Air Act cases heard by the Supreme Court,” said John Walke of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The ultimate ruling on this case won’t generate as much press as the Supreme Court’s heartening gay-marriage decisions, or disheartening Voting Rights Act decision, but it could save a lot of lives.

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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Ed Markey, climate hawk, headed for the Senate

by znuojad5 Posted on June 26, 2013

Ed Markey, climate hawk, headed for the Senate

By Claire Thompson

Markey campaign

He’ll soon be the newest member of the U.S. Senate.

Rep. Ed Markey, who pushed climate action and clean energy during 37 years in the U.S. House, is now on his way to the U.S. Senate. As expected, he handily beat Republican businessman Gabriel Gomez in the Massachusetts special election to replace now-Secretary of State John Kerry. With more than 90 percent of the vote counted on Tuesday night, Markey was up 54 to 46 percent.

Backers of Gomez had been hoping for a repeat of Scott Brown’s 2010 special-election upset, but conditions were different then — the Tea Party was on the rise, Obamacare hung in the balance, and the left-wing establishment took it for granted that Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat would stay blue.

This time, even with Markey consistently polling as much as 10 points ahead of Gomez over the course of the two-month campaign, Democrats didn’t assume an easy win. President Obama, Vice President Biden, Michelle Obama, and Bill Clinton all campaigned with Markey in recent weeks, and Markey’s campaign released a flood of ads close to the election, spending $2.6 million total on advertising compared to Gomez’s $1.4 million.

Markey, a committed climate hawk and foe of the Keystone XL pipeline, started with a financial advantage that he maintained throughout the campaign, thanks especially to money from clean-energy interests and environmental groups, reports Politico:

The vast majority of the energy money supporting Markey has come from independent expenditures by environmental groups, which account for more than $2.6 million.

Most of that comes from various branches of the League of Conservation Voters, which have spent more than $1.6 million supporting Markey or opposing Gomez.

Coming in second is the NextGen Committee, a super PAC backed by billionaire Tom Steyer. That group, which spent most of its money on Markey’s primary contest against Stephen Lynch, has spent more than $853,000 so far.

The remainder of the outside spending came from campaigns by the Sierra Club Political Committee, the 350.org Action Fund and Environmental Majority.

Markey received direct contributions from clean energy, environmental, and utility PACs, like the Environmental Defense Action Fund and the American Wind Energy Association PAC, as well as clean-energy companies like SolarCity and NextEra. Markey also got some cash through GiveGreen, a campaign run by the League of Conservation Voters Action Fund, which helps folks donate to lawmakers considered to be environmentally friendly.

Gomez received some contributions from fossil-fuel companies, including ExxonMobil, but Markey led his opponent in energy-money contributions by a factor of 76 to 1. Many of the energy-industry PACs known for supporting Republican candidates neglected Gomez’s campaign, perhaps seeing it as a losing battle.

After all, Gomez was a Republican running in deep-blue Massachusetts, which is perhaps why he made the rare claim of being a “green Republican.” He even declared his acceptance of human-caused climate change. But his green cred stops there, according to Climate Progress:

[I]n almost every instance in which Gomez discusses the environment, it is immediately followed by an equally unwavering endorsement of the Keystone XL pipeline as a job creator, a pathway to lower energy costs, and, alarmingly, environmentally friendly. …

Beyond that, and broad proclamations of support for alternative energy, Gomez has refused to take a position on any substantial climate legislation.

On the same day as Markey’s election, Obama gave his strongest speech yet arguing for climate action, and said carbon emissions would be a key factor in his decision on Keystone XL. It’s a day for climate hawks to celebrate — and then get back to work.

Claire Thompson is an editorial assistant at Grist.

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Rampaging pig virus may raise pork prices

by Leon Russell Posted on June 20, 2013

Rampaging pig virus may raise pork prices

By John Upton

Shutterstock

Vulnerable little factory-reared piggies.

A stomach virus that kills most of the piglets it infects is tearing across America, reaching farms in at least 13 states just a month after it was first detected here.

The disease threatens to trim back the nation’s pork supplies at a time when the price of the meat is already rising following last year’s drought.

Scientists say a strain of porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PEDV), which shares 99.4 percent of its genes with a strain that recently killed more than 1 million piglets in China, is harmless to humans and other animals. But you wouldn’t want to be a baby pig that contracted the disease.

From Reuters:

While the virus has not tended to kill older pigs, mortality among very young pigs infected in U.S. farms is commonly 50 percent, and can be as high [as] 100 percent, say veterinarians and scientists who are studying the outbreak. …

When and how PEDV arrived in the United States remains a mystery. The total number of pig deaths from the outbreak is not known, and the uncertainty is fueling fears among traders, meat processors and farmers about the potential impact on pork supplies later in the year.

The outbreak comes as U.S. hog and wholesale pork prices in the large hog-raising states of Iowa and Minnesota have surged to nearly two-year highs. Supermarkets are racing to fill meat cases for the summer grilling season even as supplies tighten, analysts said. Hog supplies were already tight after last summer’s historic drought drove up feed-grain costs, which prompted a higher-than-normal slaughter rate last summer.

The first U.S. case of PEDV was reported on May 17. But researchers at the National Veterinary Services Laboratory in Ames, Iowa, and other diagnostic labs have since discovered that PEDV arrived as early as April 16, according to the American Association of Swine Veterinarians.

Farmers and county fair goers should be extra hygienic around swine, experts say. From PorkNetwork:

PED typically is spread through the feces of infected swine or contaminated trailers, equipment, boots, clothing and hands. The way it is spread makes it a particular concern now because a number of states will be holding fairs soon, according to [swine specialist David Newman of North Dakota State University].

He says everyone involved in pig handling, including hog operation employees and owners, and those transporting pigs, need to take steps to avoid spreading the virus.

Ew. Time to experiment with veganism?

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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Study finds no direct correlation between the Renewable Fuel Standard and rising food prices

by Posted on June 12, 2013

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Study finds no direct correlation between the Renewable Fuel Standard and rising food prices

Posted 12 June 2013 in

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Opponents of renewable fuel have tried to claim over and over again that the Renewable Fuel Standard is to blame for rising food prices. But a new study from ABF Economics pours cold water on this false premise. Here’s what you need to know about the RFS and food prices:

  1. The Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) isn’t directly correlated to food prices.
  2. According to a recent study from the World Bank, rising food prices are actually driven by energy costs, specifically oil. As they put it, “Of all the drivers of food prices, crude oil prices mattered the most.”
  3. Not only has the RFS not been directly correlated to food prices, the Consumer Price Index shows that retail food prices have gone up more slowly since the RFS kicked in five years ago (See Table 1 on page 4 of the report).
  4. The RFS is also helping to lower feed cost for farmers and ranchers, as they work to feed America. Ethanol production results in a byproduct (known as “dried distillers grain” or DDGS) that is used as highly-nutritious animal feed. Higher-quality feed means livestock and poultry producers can use less of it, and DDGS have increased the availability of animal feed by 21 percent compared to the use of corn alone.

Read more from the Renewable Fuels Association on the ABF Economics study.

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Study finds no direct correlation between the Renewable Fuel Standard and rising food prices

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Coal companies get sweetheart deals on federal leases, shortchange taxpayers

by William V. Wainscott Posted on June 12, 2013

Coal companies get sweetheart deals on federal leases, shortchange taxpayers

By Claire Thompson

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As if climate disruption, air pollution, health problems, and landscape destruction weren’t bad enough, here’s another reason to hate the coal industry: Coal companies are shortchanging U.S. taxpayers out of tens of millions of dollars they should be paying for the rights to mine federal land.

A new report [PDF] from the inspector general of the Interior Department reveals that the Bureau of Land Management routinely underestimates the value of coal, letting companies like Peabody and Arch Coal snap up federal mining rights for a song, often with little or no competition. More than 80 percent of coal leases up for auction in the past 20 years received only one bid, the report found.

The New York Times reports:

The report said that the process by which the value of the leases is computed is faulty, costing the government millions. At the current rate of coal leasing, the inspector general found, every penny-a-ton undervaluation costs the taxpayers $3 million.

Further, the Bureau of Land Management allows coal companies to expand their leaseholdings by as much as 960 acres with no competitive bidding and little oversight, the report says. The bureau has approved 45 such lease modifications since 2000 without adequate documentation, the report states, potentially costing taxpayers $60 million.

Allowing coal companies to pay bargain-basement prices for mining rights supposedly keeps coal-fired power cheap for Americans. But as we turn to cleaner and increasingly cheaper sources of energy, coal’s share of the electricity market is falling — from 50 percent to 40 percent over the past decade. That’s leading U.S. coal companies to ship their goods to Asia, where coal sells for four to seven times more than it does in the U.S., yet the BLM isn’t properly accounting for that higher export value, the report found.

Interior is conducting a separate investigation into whether coal being exported to Asia is properly valued by the BLM. Meanwhile, at the request of Congress, the Government Accountability Office is taking its own look at coal leasing programs.

Luke Popovich of the National Mining Association called the loss of value highlighted by the inspector general’s report a “rounding error” compared to the $2.4 billion in royalties and lease payments the government collected from the coal industry last year. Hardly. An independent study published in 2012 estimated that the BLM’s consistent undervaluing of coal cost the government $30 billion over the last 30 years. Add in all the hidden external costs of coal mining and production, and this is looking like a really terrible deal for taxpayers.

The BLM says it’s revamping it process and convening a task force to consider how it values coal leases. Green groups like the Sierra Club are unimpressed; they’re calling for a moratorium on all coal leasing on federal land.

Claire Thompson is an editorial assistant at Grist.

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China’s plastic-bag ban turns five years old

by John Basset Posted on June 4, 2013

China’s plastic-bag ban turns five years old

By John Upton

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What do you give a plastic-bag ban for its fifth birthday?

In the case of China, which over the weekend celebrated five years of restrictions on plastic shopping bags, officials are showering their ban with accolades and crediting it with keeping tens of billions of bags out of landfills and the environment.

The rules, which took effect on June 1, 2008, ban the manufacture or use of the thinnest types of plastic bags. They also prohibit supermarkets, department stores, and grocery stores from giving away thicker varieties, requiring them to charge customers for the bags.

From Shanghai Daily:

A plastic bag ban launched five years ago has cut consumption by at least 67 billion bags, saving an equivalent of 6 million tonnes of oil, the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said Friday.

Since the ban was implemented, use of plastic bags has dropped by more than two-thirds, said Li Jing, vice chief of energy-saving and environmental protection department under the NDRC, China’s top economic planner.

But the English-language website of China News Service points to a study that shows there’s still lots of room for improvement:

[T]he regulation has not been carried out effectively and super-thin bags are still being used, even at large supermarkets, according to a report by the International Food Packaging Association on Thursday to coincide with the fifth anniversary of the regulation.

The organization surveyed 10 chain supermarkets, 10 open-air markets and three wholesale markets as well as roadside stalls, and discovered that supermarkets have done much better than the others in following the regulation.

All supermarkets provided plastic bags for a fee, but only four supermarkets, including Wal-Mart, provided bags equivalent to or thicker than [the required] 0.025 mm, the report said.

In contrast, it added, all open-air and wholesale markets and roadside stalls provided plastic bags for free, and only one out of the 10 open-air markets provided plastic bags thicker than 0.025 mm.

Some Chinese retailers may be ignoring the bag ban, but at least the country is doing better than the U.S. at tackling the problem.

San Francisco became the first American city to impose similar restrictions, in 2007, and a few other U.S. cities and counties have followed in its footsteps, but no plastic-bag rules exist at the federal level. Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) has introduced a bill that would impose a five-cent fee on all disposable bags, but it’s about as likely to pass as plastic through a seabird’s intestinal system.

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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Would Hillary and Norgay Recognize Mount Everest?

by Myrna Posted on June 2, 2013

After an embarrassing mistake, climate scientists get solid, scary information about melting Himalayan glaciers. Mount Everest North Face as seen from the path to the base camp, Tibet. By Luca Galuzzi/Wikimedia Commons When Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit of Mount Everest 60 years ago Wednesday, the mountaineers gazed over a view from the top of the world that had never been seen before. The view has changed since that historic day. Pollution and rising mountain temperatures are relentlessly shearing away at the Himalayas’ frozen façade. Photographs taken around the time of the 1953 expedition show hulking ridges of ice that have since shrunk or disappeared. Glaciers and snow are melting throughout the sprawling mountain range, which stretches across India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bhutan, Nepal, and Tibetan China. The waning glaciers are leaving precarious mountainside lakes of cyan blue water in their wake. Click to read the full report in Slate. Link:  Would Hillary and Norgay Recognize Mount Everest? ; ;Related ArticlesThe Arctic Ice “Death Spiral”A Tornado Chaser Falls Doing Extreme ScienceSurfrider college club joins the offshore campaign ;

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Would Hillary and Norgay Recognize Mount Everest?

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Crappy solar panels threaten industry growth

by p555nf Posted on May 29, 2013

Crappy solar panels threaten industry growth

By John Upton

Shutterstock

Faulty solar panels threaten to darken the solar industry’s future.

As the solar sector explodes, some of the solar panels it produces are fizzling out.

The New York Times reports on the problem of faulty panels and says nobody knows how pervasive it is because nobody keeps track. Fingers are being pointed at corner cutting by manufacturing firms in China. From the Times article:

Worldwide, testing labs, developers, financiers and insurers are reporting [quality] problems and say the $77 billion solar industry is facing a quality crisis just as solar panels are on the verge of widespread adoption. …

The quality concerns have emerged just after a surge in solar construction. In the United States, the Solar Energy Industries Association said that solar panel generating capacity exploded from 83 megawatts in 2003 to 7,266 megawatts in 2012, enough to power more than 1.2 million homes. Nearly half that capacity was installed in 2012 alone, meaning any significant problems may not become apparent for years.

“We need to face up to the fact that corners are being cut,” said Conrad Burke, general manager for DuPont’s billion-dollar photovoltaic division, which supplies materials to solar manufacturers.

The solar developer Dissigno has had significant solar panel failures at several of its projects, according to Dave Williams, chief executive of the San Francisco-based company.

“I don’t want to be alarmist, but I think quality poses a long-term threat,” he said. “The quality across the board is harder to put your finger on now as materials in modules are changing every day and manufacturers are reluctant to share that information.”

Most of the concerns over quality center on China, home to the majority of the world’s solar panel manufacturing capacity.

Some industry leaders say it’s time to start shaming the companies that are producing bad products:

[Stuart] Wenham, [the chief technology officer of Suntech], said manufacturers needed to be held accountable and advocated creating testing labs not beholden to the industry that would assess quality.

“We need to start naming names,” he said.

John Upton is a science fan and green news boffin who

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