Category: Uncategorized (Page 2 of 2)

Earlier this February in Eden, North Carolina, a major coal ash spill has raised the nation’s attention.  The coal ash was found leaking into a storm water discharge pipe buried under the pond and then spewed into the Dan River. As a consequence, 82,000 tons of toxic sledges into the Dan River, making it the third largest coal ash leak in the US history.

Former NC NEDR administrator, now environmental coordinator of Appalachian Voice, Amy Adams demonstrates the coal ash in Dan River, NC. Sources: Associated Press

While the leakage was finally halted, contaminates level fallen to normal and federal investigation proceeding, we cannot let the story end here. The problem of coal ash demands public attention and need to be addressed timely by the government.

The convention is to store the coal ash waste either through impoundment or landfill, yet the Dan River Spill and the even more catastrophic spill in Kingston, Tennessee have demonstrated these methods are not so assuring. The increasing amount of coal ash storages is a growing concern around the nation. Neither impoundment nor landfill reduces the waste but instead creates sources of chronic problems or builds up risks of future catastrophe.

To solve the problem of coal ash, regulations should both aim on improving current storage standard and encouraging alternative handling methods. However, the very first step is to raise the salience of the problem, including both public as well as administrators’ awareness. The problem of coal ash had been historically grossly understated by public and even environmental regulators. With an initial estimation of 710 ponds in the nation, EPA conducted a survey under the request of two environmental groups in 2010, and found out there were actually more than 1100 ash ponds in the nation; 46% of those did not have liner to protect from leakage, another data previously unknown by EPA. The two coal ash ponds at Dan River are but 2 of the 44 Highly Hazardous Coal Ash Ponds identified by EPA in 2009. Immediate actions are required to avoid more serious accidents in future.

Besides, the identity of coal ash remains disputable in legislative context. Coal ash is currently considered as an exempted waste under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA).  Despite EPA was warranted the right to regulate coal ash as a solid waste after the 2000 amendment, it had never issued any regulation on coal ash. After the disastrous accident in Kingston Tennessee, the administration submitted two options to regulate coal ash as special waste or non-hazardous waste respectively. However, almost four years after the proposals, the final conclusion of the identity of coal ash is still lacking. Fortunately, once again thanks to pressures from environmental organizations, EPA signed a consent decree that it shall, by December 19, 2014, publish its final action revising. It would be interesting to see how the Dan River accident will influence EPA’s final decision.

The Kingston, Tennessee Spill in 2008 was the largest coal ash incident in the United State, more than a billion US gallons of coal ash was spewed in consequence. Source: Wikipedia

In addition to improving safety of coal ash ponds and landfills, alternative methods should be considered to reduce the total amount of coal ashes. The market may generate innovative ideas, yet it requires regulation to ensure safety and promote pervasion. Indeed, business has introduced various solutions to reuse coal ash. Coal ash has been used and construction projects. Further, fly ash bricks, contrary to the common perspectives viewing coal ash as wastes and pollutants, have even been labeled as environmental by both waste recycling and emission reducing. Nevertheless, the amount of usage is substantially lower than the amount produced. Based on the report of the American Coal Ash Association (ACAA), even in 2012, when the percentage of recycle is at its highest, the nation had a net increase of 30 million tons of coal ash. Provided that the use of coal ash bricks is safe, it should be promoted to reduce the accumulation of coal ash and eventually reduce the total amount.

It is equally important though, to realize many of those proposals regarding coal ash may inspire new controversies, just as what was seen in the case of Chesapeake Golf Course. Given the potential health and environmental risk associated with coal ash, and its tight relation with the fossil fuel industry, policy design needs to incorporate rigorous safety standards and inspections to ensure the safety of usage. This issue may be further complicated by the EPA’s current effort identifying coal ash, as the industry may be hampered due to fear of litigation if the extra inspections are imposed on coal ash.

Reference:

1. http://earthjustice.org/news/press/2012/new-epa-data-show-coal-ash-problem-much-worse
2. http://www.tva.gov/kingston/pdf/KIF_Fact_Sheet.pdf
3. http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/nonhaz/industrial/special/fossil/ccr-rule/
4. http://www.ect.coop/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/coal-ash-consent-decree.pdf
5. http://www.acaa-usa.org/Portals/9/Files/PDFs/1966-2012_FlyAsh_Prod_and_Use_Charts.pdf
6. http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/photos/americas-10-worst-man-made-environmental-disasters-0
7. http://vawatercentralnewsgrouper.wordpress.com/2012/03/22/update-as-of-february-2012-on-lawsuit-over-use-of-coal-combustion-fly-ash-for-golf-course-in-city-of-chespeake-va/
8. http://www.epa.gov/solidwaste/nonhaz/industrial/special/fossil/ccrs-fs/index.htm

Somewhere in the world, a green energy revolution is occurring. New renewable energy projects hold the capacity to sustainably generate around half of a country’s electricity, vastly improving its citizens’ quality of life. Wind, thermal, and—maybe most importantly—hydropower serve are green alternatives to fossil fuels, that can greatly enhance a country’s industrial capacity and creating a realistic and maintainable trend of economic development.

So, who is this revolutionary innovator, leading the charge in green energy and sustainable development in a world still heavily reliant upon fossil fuels and antiquated patterns of development? Is it Germany, with its engineering expertise and (successful) political action of its Green Party? No. How about the United States, who has historically lead the world in engineering feats and is a developed country now expressing (some) political concern to environmental issues such as climate change and sustainable development? Nope. Well then, it must be China, whose massive hydro-electric dam projects have shown national initiative in creating sustainable sources of energy. Close, but still, no.

Ethiopia has invested over a billion dollars into its green energy plan—which includes solar, hydropower, geothermal, and wind-energy projects—in an effort to provide electricity to 47% of its nation still in the dark. Beyond providing sufficient electricity to citizens, Ethiopian authorities plan to sell electricity generated by renewable energy projects—funded primarily by Chinese, French, and Italian donors—to its neighbors, further generating economic revenue that could continually spur statewide, economic development.

Ethiopia’s green energy plan aims to expand its generating capacity—primarily from renewables—from 2,000 MW to 10,000 MW in three to five years. Nearly 6,000 MW of annual generating capacity is projected to come from the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam on the Nile (currently under construction). The new, 210 million euro (289.68 USD) Ashegoda Wind Farm—constructed by French firm Vergnet SA and financially backed by French Development Agency—will contribute to the projected 800 MW/yr. of electricity generated from wind power. Furthermore, the Ethiopian government has signed a preliminary contract with a U.S.-Icelandic construction firm for a four billion dollar private sector investment targeting Ethiopia’s immense geothermal resources (which are, are maximum predicted capacity, able to produce 5,000 MW of electricity annually).

But just what are the political, economic, and environmental implications of such rapid and massive development? Does the development of a green electric industry imply that an entire nation will undergo sustainable development?

Well, in the case of hydropower, no.

While hydropower is a fantastic alternative source of electricity generation when compared to industrial age coal-fired power plants, and has the capacity to generate significantly more power than other renewable energy sources, it comes with an acute set of environmental, political, and social consequences.

Mega-dams have the potential to cause great environmental harm to the river ecosystem in which they are implanted. The implementation of most hydropower projects in developing countries is seldom determined by the outcomes of an EIS—given that one is even conducted—and thus the projects often become result in environmental degradation. Consider the Merowe Dam in Sudan, for which no EIS was conducted prior to construction. The dam (and its reservoir) acts as a major sediment sink, accelerates bank erosion rates downstream, limits fish habitats in producing anoxic water conditions, and disrupts aquatic biodiversity. Similarly, a mega-dam on the Omo River in Ethiopia has the potential to severely reduce water levels (~80%) and fish populations of Lake Turkana (located in Kenya). Clearly, with both of these cases, it is apparent that acute negative environmental externalities exist that challenge the notion the hydropower is a viable solution for environmentally sustainable development.

Mega-dams also have a tendency to exacerbate political and social tensions found within and shared between affected countries. The Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (which, as I mentioned earlier, is projected to generate ~6,000MW of electricity/yr. for Ethiopia) is being constructed in close proximity to the Sudanese border. This will undoubtedly aggravate political tensions over water-scarcity, as the dam will utilize large amounts of water that usually flows into Sudan (a downstream riparian). Ethiopian authorities are having to finance this project in the absence of international aid, which clearly indicates the political volatility and fragility of the project. Additionally, mega-dam projects are generally associated with the mass-displacement of large groups of people. The Three Gorges Dam in China is estimated to have displaced 1.2 million people; similarly, the Merowe Dam in Sudan has displaced over 50 thousand people from the fertile lands of the Nile valley to the arid desert. Here, we can see that the social injustices produced by mega-dam projects—along with a project’s capacity to negatively influence fragile political relationships—further assert that hydropower may not be a viable vehicle for achieving sustainable development.

The question surrounding hydropower and sustainable development is a difficult one, given that hydropower is—technically—a cleaner and greener method of generating electricity vital to spurring economic development. Needless to say, this topic will become increasingly contested in the coming decade, as traditional Western donors become more involved in implementation through heightened investment.

I’m from Houston, the largest city in Texas and fourth largest in the United States with a GDP to match. With over 5,000 energy firms doing business in our greater metropolitan area and leading the world in petrochemical manufacturing thanks to the top ranked Port of Houston, we lay claim to the title “energy capital of the world.” Unsurprisingly, I grew up in Houston because my dad has worked for the past 35 years in the energy industry. Specifically, he’s spent most of his career involved in natural gas and, most recently, the U.S. shale gas revolution. Because of the huge economic impact it is having on American energy independency as well as its controversial extraction methods, shale gas has received a lot of media attention these past few years. Most of this attention, however, is seldom positive.

Opponents to hydraulic fracturing cite the migration of gas into groundwater resulting from the drilling as a serious health risk. However, the incidence rate of the construction of faulty well seals is only 1-3%, and most of the allegedly affected areas have longstanding reserves of methane unrelated to fracking that lack any kind of pre-drilling baseline data.

Anti-fracking groups also claim that hydraulic fracturing fluids contain dangerous chemicals not disclosed to the public, that the process itself uses outrageous quantities of water, and that disposal of wastewater harms the environment. In actuality, hydraulic fracturing fluid is typically comprised of more than 99.5% water and sand, and 0.5% chemicals, most of which are present in common household applications. The industry is taking steps to voluntarily disclose more information about the chemical composition of fracking fluids, and some states have even established mandatory reporting requirements.

Companies are working to lessen the overall amount of water used in the process through technological advances, and shale gas production requires less water than conventional production of oil and other forms of energy (compare 1.3 gallons per MMBTU for shale gas to more than 2,500 gallons per MMBTU for biofuels). Wastewater is most commonly disposed of through injection into deep, lined, underground wells where it is not at risk of contaminating freshwater resources, and with advances in onsite treatment technologies the percentage of wastewater being recycled by companies is increasing.

And though some anti-fracking groups claim that the drilling technology is too new to judge its environmental effects and lacks scientific research on the subject, a significant number of studies have been undertaken by universities, governmental agencies, and independent research groups exploring the impacts of hydraulic fracturing on human health and the environment.

All of this is not to say that these concerns about shale gas are not valid; there is no such thing as a riskless energy source. Rather, my frustration stems from the seemingly one-sided approach most media takes in airing the aforementioned potentially negative impacts of the shale revolution without balancing them out by reporting on the positive externalities.

Not nearly as publicized as the heated debates over fracking consequences are the huge benefits the shale revolution is bringing to the United States. Oil and natural gas provided more energy in the United States for residential and industrial use than any other energy source in 2010—37% and 25%, respectively. But you’ll probably have to pick up a scientific journal to find an IHS report’s estimation that mainly due to lower energy prices, average disposable income per household increased by more than $1,200 in 2012 and is predicted to grow to more than $3,500 by 2025.

Maybe tucked away in one of the back pages of the newspaper you’ll read about the $12 billion the natural gas industry invested in Pennsylvania in 2011, supporting the creation of more than 200,000 jobs across the region. The American Chemistry Council determined that a 25% increase in domestic ethane supplies derived from shale gas could add over 400,000 jobs across the economy, provide over $4.4 billion annually in federal, state, and local tax revenue, and spur $16.2 billion in capital investment by the chemical industry.

Switching to natural gas over coal-fired power plants, a transformation already well underway thanks to the discovery and extraction of newly accessible shale resources, also greatly reduces comparative environmental degradation an increases public health. Air pollution, mostly from coal burning, kills over three million people each year (primarily in the developing world); coal-fired power plants in the United States emit 17-40 times more SOx emissions per MWh than natural gas, and 1-17 times as much NOx per MWh. Lifecycle CO2 emissions from coal plants are 1.8-2.3 times greater (per KWh) than natural gas emissions.

So as someone who has worked in and been raised around the natural gas industry her entire life, I tend to bristle at sensationalistic news reports or disparaging Hollywood portrayals that all too often depict shale gas extraction as the single greatest threat to America’s health and happiness. Shale play development is bolstering the U.S. economy, reducing energy-related environmental degradation, increasing public health, and increasing national security by lessening our dependence upon unstable foreign oil sources. Hydraulic fracturing is not going anywhere anytime soon, so rather than fighting it (which is distinct from educating about it), we should instead continue to focus on improving existing energy technologies, implementing regulatory measures that prioritize public safety and environmental consciousness, and developing alternative energy sources to position us for a more secure, sustainable future.

I’ve always loathed the either-or, true-false question that students are often frustrated with. That, however, is the kind of question I faced as a 14-year-old on a father-daughter whitewater-rafting trip through the Grand Canyon.

During the bus ride that brought my father and I to the launch point, we watched a video about the triumphs of whitewater-rafting pioneers as well as the woe in environmentalists’ inability to save Grand Canyon’s sister Glen Canyon from being dammed. The film’s before-and-after footage depicting the disappearance of Glen Canyon’s wispy hues toyed with my emotions, and I couldn’t imagine anything but the pristine canyon safeguarded from human profligacy. Nonetheless, a few hours later while the Colorado River licked the shore of our campsite, my father had the nerve to say he also would have dammed Glen Canyon since it provided people with water and hydropower. My anger at him waned after I realized that it was really directed towards the either-or extremes of the question at hand—leave the canyon entirely alone, or drown the ecosystem to meet human needs. Was there no middle ground?

This polarized question is inherent in the contemporary “hotspots strategy” for protecting organismal biodiversity, valued for medicinal opportunity, food and material provision, and protection from natural disaster. The policy, crafted by Norman Myers of the University of Oxford in 1988, funnels funding into “hotspots,” threatened regions that harbor high species “richness,” or large plant diversity. Today, Conservation International (CI) embraces 34 hotspots home to 50% of world plant species, hoping to protect them by establishing national parks and prohibiting human use and settlement.

CI’s track record has not been so hot, however. By cordoning off these areas, the policy pits humans’ wellbeing against nature’s. In fact, this tension is exacerbated by the fact that the 34 hotspots are also home to some of the most impoverished human populations in places like Burundi, Sierra Leone, and Somalia. Increasingly, with millions of already destitute people now estranged from their homes and income, governments have had to make some tough choices. For instance, in 2005 Kenya’s president Mwai Kibaki returned Amboseli National Park to its original Maasi inhabitants, a reflection of burgeoning discontent.

With more aid from the international community, the picture doesn’t get any better. When revealed in 2007, Ecuador’s ITT-Initiative to safeguard Amazonian rainforest from oil extraction was hailed by environmentalists as “unprecedented.” Ecuadorian President Correa promised protection and no drilling in parts of the Yasuni National Park hotspot on the condition that international donors would reimburse half of lost oil revenue. When the money failed to materialize this past August, however, Correa abandoned the initiative, opening the park up to the petroleum industry.

In addition to this notion of a vacillating pendulum incapable of finding a middle ground, the hotspots strategy is riddled with a spectrum of logistical concerns. For instance, the system exhibits a mismatch between species richness and endemism. A 2013 study analyzing the effectiveness of the hotspots approach and its species richness benchmark in the Southern Central Andes of Argentina discovered that only 19% of endemic species had half of their range protected. This was due to safeguarding the highest plant diversity regions in humid forests with little endemism while largely disregarding the less rich but highly endemic arid regions.

This incongruity causes the hotspots paradigm to neglect the world’s largest tropical desert, the Sahara. The locale’s low species richness renders it insignificant by hotspots standards; though the Sahara covers half of Africa’s landmass, it received only 12% of Global Environment Facility funding to Africa from 1991-2009. The result is that 12 of 14 large vertebrates endemic to the Sahara are considered by the IUCN Red List to be either extinct or in danger of extinction—a drastic blow to insight scientists can gleam about genetic bases to water stress and extreme temperatures.

Thus, what we need to both circumvent such shortcomings and create a middle ground in conservation is a shift in paradigm away from biodiversity hotspots. In order to augment public salience for conservation, we must emphasize ecosystems whose degradation affects human wellbeing—whether that includes such services as water filtration and climate regulation or food provision and inspiration, an “ecosystems services” approach championed by chief scientist at the Nature Conservancy Peter Kareiva. The answer thus lies not in alienating humans from the environment, but rather in establishing them as stakeholders in their communities. Sustainable use programs on a local level entailing reforestation, ecotourism, and even market-based approaches like transferable fish quotas can go a long way in transforming the otherwise either-or conservation question into a multi-faceted approach.

Do robots dream of subsidized corn?

Running for president of the United States certainly has its advantages. Your job is to travel the country kissing babies and sampling indigenous food and beverage. You get to be on television more than all the Kardashians combined. And last, but not least, you are uniquely positioned to focus substantial national attention on the specific issues that you and your political party believe are critical for the present and future health of your country.

Any candidate’s selection of the key issues on which they will build their campaign is also a function of current events. The crippling global recession that began in 2008 dictated that the 2012 presidential campaign would be focused on the economic health of the US. With twelve million Americans unemployed as of September 2012, neither Barack Obama nor Mitt Romney need polls to tell them that the man with the most credible plan for stimulating economic growth will win the election (although that is exactly what they indicate). However, the wonkish focus of the campaign on creating domestic jobs has led to a substantial public health ramification of the economic downturn being omitted from the political discourse: the increasing risk for obesity.

Both presidential candidates have failed to recognize that an individual’s socioeconomic status is strongly associated with that person’s risk for obesity. Individuals with a low socioeconomic status bear a disproportionate risk of becoming obese. There are many possible explanations for this correlation such as a lack of nutritional education in poor areas or persistent cultural food traditions, but the most compelling explanation is based on a combination of economics and predictable human decision making mechanisms. When faced with severely constrained income, people optimize by purchasing foods based on a strong preference for satiation (the feeling of being full) and palatability (tastes good) over any consideration of a food item’s nutritional content. (See this paper from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition for more information.)

A study has indicated that the number of unemployed Americans is positively correlated with the number of Americans who participate in the federal supplemental nutritional assistance program (SNAP). Commonly known as the food stamps program, SNAP provides financial assistance for purchasing food to low income people living in the US. According to census data, in 2010, 40.3 million Americans received assistance from SNAP, which is considerable increase from 26.3 million who received assistance just three years before. The average SNAP participant only has $133.79 per month available to be spent on food, compared to the $215.26 the average American spent on food per month in 2010.

As mentioned earlier, people with severely limited income, such Americans who rely on SNAP, make food consumption decisions based primarily on satiation. This is not a bad thing in and of itself. This human tendency becomes problem when the cheapest food items are unhealthy, high-fat, calorie-dense processed foods. The reason these foods are so relatively inexpensive is that they are composed of corn products that are artificially cheap due to large government subsidies to corn producers. The corn subsidies, which total approximately $5 billion annually, skew food prices and help to make a bag of Doritos (which is both filling and delicious) less expensive than a bag of spinach (which is clearly healthier). These altered prices distort the economic environment of low income people and lead them to consume diets that exacerbate the risk of obesity.

Thus, the missing ingredient in the 2012 campaign is an open recognition of the nexus between the federal corn subsidies, economic distress and obesity. As of now, the candidates have only been interested in talking about obesity in the context of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) and determining who will foot the healthcare bills associated with the disease. This approach ignores that the underlying causes of the obesity epidemic must be treated in addition to the negative health effects. A prescient presidential candidate must acknowledge that, even if they are capable of restoring the economy to its former glory, the long recession will have increased the incidence of obesity as approximately one sixth of the population will have spent some time in poverty. Any ameliorative effort must recognize the perverse effect of corn subsidies on SNAP recipients and should seek to promote public health via reform that results in competitively priced healthy food options.