On July 7, Arkansas and Missouri became the first two states to ban the use of the pesticide dicamba. In the age-old struggle between farmers and weeds, dicamba is the newest weapon in a farmer’s arsenal. The way a lot of farming works these days is big companies, like Monsanto, genetically modify seeds so that they are resistant to certain pesticides, like dicamba. But the pesticide has ravaged acres of farmland, killing off crops that are not resistant to its fatal chemicals. In response, states are beginning to temporarily ban the use of dicamba. Read on to learn more about dicamba and the legal issues that have cropped up around its use: 

Seeds of the Conflict

Many farmers have begun planting dicamba-resistant seeds, particularly farmers in the Midwest. According to the Center for Biological Diversity, 1.5 million of the roughly 3 million acres of soybeans planted in the state are Monsanto’s dicamba-resistant soybeans.

While nearly half of soybean farms in Arkansas are full of dicamba-resistant seeds, more than half of them are full of seeds that are not resistant to the pesticide. This is where the problem begins. Dicamba began drifting into fields planted with non-resistant seeds, killing off many plants that were not genetically modified to withstand the pesticide. When this started happening many farmers took their complaints to the Arkansas State Plant Board.

The Plant Board is a state run entity whose mission is to provide “information and unbiased enforcement of laws and regulations” that have to do with agriculture in Arkansas. They received enough complaints that the state governments of Missouri and Arkansas had to take action. Both states have banned dicamba use between July 11 and November 7. The Arkansas ruling states:

Many other instances of exposure of non-target crops being exposed to dicamba have been reported and this situation poses a grave threat to the farm economy of Arkansas and therefore the public interest requires taking action to prevent unintentional exposure of non-target crops to dicamba. Therefore, the Board finds that there is imminent peril to the public health, safety and welfare that requires adoption of emergency regulations and that the regulation should take effect upon filing with the Secretary of State.

Missouri released a similar statement that stopped the sale or use of dicamba. Missouri’s ban, which includes any product with dicamba in it, will last longer than Arkansas’, lasting until December 1.

This federal action follows a years-long struggle between farmers and weeds, pesticides and plants–and even farmer and farmer.

What is Dicamba?

Dicamba is not a new pesticide. In fact, it was devised in 1958, cooked up by the chemical company BASF. And it is not the only pesticide that farmers use. Roundup, an incredibly toxic weed killer, was once a favorite of farmers. Seed companies manufactured genetically modified seeds that were “Roundup-ready,” and could withstand the toxic pesticides.

Roundup seemed like a good solution for a while. Rather than losing crops to weeds or having to go out and eliminate every weed by hand, Roundup would do the work for you. It was an easy solution, but it did not last long. Weeds began evolving, and developed resistance to Roundup. Thus, farmers began looking for new pesticides that paired with new genetically modified seeds.  

In the Arkansas government’s Emergency Rule, which temporarily bans the use of dicamba, it recognizes the benefits of pesticides. The rule states:

Pesticides are valuable to the State’s agricultural production and to the protection of man and the environment from insects, rodents, weeds and other forms of life which may be pests; but it is essential to the public health and welfare that they be regulated to prevent adverse effects on human life and the environment.

First Signs of Resistance

It all began with a weed called pigweed, a group of weeds which became resistant to most pesticides. Pigweed also spreads like wildfire. “You get one plant in your field, and that one plant can produce more than a million seeds. Many of the seeds become new plants that can choke your fields,” said Steve Inskeep of NPR. Some farmers would rip it from the ground when they saw it. Others resorted to spraying dicamba.

For the 2016 growing season, Monsanto released a new dicamba spray that was less prone to drifting. Old dicamba sprays would vaporize and spread to other farmers’ land. If it drifted to a farm full of non-resistant seeds, the farmer’s plants would wither and die.

The new drift-averse dicamba spray has not been approved by the EPA and Monsanto told farmers not to use other drift-prone sprays, due to the problems that arose from its use. 

Farmers were fined as much as $1,000 for using the illegal spray before the ban went into effect. A steep price, but when their entire yield is at risk of being killed by a weed, some farmers decided to cut their losses. According to The Progressive Farmer, “The Environmental Protection Agency has confirmed that it executed federal search warrants at several southeastern Missouri locations as part of an investigation into alleged misuse or misapplication of dicamba onto herbicide-tolerant soybeans and cotton.”

Drift is nothing new to farmers. Other pesticides have had these problems before. But in the past, farmers would just talk it out to settle the problem. With the onset of dicamba, farmers have taken their complaints to the state. 

Arkansas Bans Dicamba

Some farmers purchased dicamba-resistant seeds, but many others did not. Their crops are starting to die off at alarming rates, and it is believed that dicamba is largely to blame.

Many crops, including soybeans, cotton, and corn, die when they are exposed to dicamba. The leaves of the plants curl and pucker, leaving farmers with a loss on their investment.  

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported:

As of noon Wednesday, the Plant Board, a division of the state Department of Agriculture, had received 551 complaints of damage to soybeans, cotton, vegetables and fruit, up from 25 complaints four weeks ago. The increasing numbers led [Governor Asa] Hutchinson to sign on to a 120-day emergency ban on the sale and use of dicamba.

Terry Walker, the Plant Board’s director, said in an interview with Arkansas Democrat-Gazette that the government had a right to protect the farmers who had not bought dicamba-resistant seeds and who were experiencing adverse effects because of other farmers who were using an illegal pesticide.

The Plant Board also requested an increase in fines. Their request was approved. Beginning on August 1, fines for farmers caught using dicamba will rise from $1,000 to $25,000.

A Pesticide Worth Killing For?

The main controversy surrounding dicamba has been the effect the pesticide has on crops. But one case escalated to the point of murder.

In 2016, farmers began noticing an increase in damages to crops that were not dicamba-resistant. More than 200,000 acres of fruits and vegetables, including soybeans, tomatoes, watermelon, and peaches, took a hit. In a year that was already one of the leanest since 2002, this extra damage was not a welcome sight.

Mike Wallace, a farmer in Arkansas, started noticing a decline in his yield. His crops were dying, and it looked like dicamba was to blame. After complaining to the Plant Board, Wallace took matters into his own hands. He called up Allan Curtis Jones, a 26-year-old farmer from Arbyrd, Missouri. The two argued over the phone and eventually met in person. The meeting, according to Modern Farmer, did not go well:

Wallace grabbed Jones by the arm during the argument, Jones pulled out a gun and shot the older man, who was unarmed. Jones’ cousin called 911 and deputies found Wallace dead by the side of the road when they arrived.

Jones was arraigned last November and was released on a $150,000 bail.

Is Dicamba Legal in Other States?

Dicamba is very toxic and thus highly regulated.

The EPA has approved a list of 34 states (including Arkansas and Missouri) where dicamba can be registered to be used on genetically engineered cotton and soybeans. The EPA has also approved a special strain of dicamba, Xtendimax, that can be used on genetically engineered cotton and soybeans.

Xtendimax “is designed to be the industry’s lowest volatility dicamba,” according to its manufacturer, meaning it is less likely to evaporate. The problem with other dicamba formulas was they would evaporate once sprayed, and float to nearby fields, some of which were not planted with dicamba-resistant seeds. This new formula, which still requires farmers to follow a list of precautions in order to ensure they are adhering to safe practices, was designed to combat the drifting problems many farmers were seeing.

Next Steps

For farmers in Arkansas and Missouri, the next steps will be to untangle the complaints, and to closely examine dicamba’s potential problems and opportunities. Bob Scott, professor and weed scientist at the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service, recently told CropLife, “Going into the fall, we’re really going to have to look at drift complaints, categorize and narrow them down, and try to figure out what’s going on here to determine whether we can use this technology or not.”

Scott said that some farms that were following the rules were still being investigated because their neighbors reported what looked like dicamba-related damage. That could mean a variety of things. Perhaps the dicamba is drifting farther than farmers previously thought it could. Maybe the approved methods of dicamba use are not as safe as was once thought. Whatever the answer ends up being, a thorough investigation will likely be conducted in the coming months. 

Conclusion

Dicamba has led to a lose-lose situation for farmers in Arkansas and Missouri. The farmers who did not buy genetically modified seeds saw losses because their crops could not withstand the illegal use of dicamba. The farmers who did buy dicamba-resistant seeds are now barred from using the powerful pesticide because of the new Emergency Rule. Their options are limited. Some plausible options are they can either pull weeds by hand, try other pesticides, or hope that the weeds do not kill too many of their crops. For now, farmers in Arkansas and Missouri must resist using dicamba, unless they accept the hefty fine–or worse. 

Anne Grae Martin

Anne Grae Martin is a member of the class of 2017 University of Delaware. She is majoring in English Professional Writing and minoring in French and Spanish. When she’s not writing for Law Street, Anne Grae loves doing yoga, cooking, and correcting her friends’ grammar mistakes. Contact Anne Grae at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Dicamba: A Look at the “Deadly” Pesticide appeared first on Law Street.

In a budget memo released in late March, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposed eliminating two programs that focus on limiting exposure to lead paint. The suggested proposal would eliminate as much as $16.61 million in funding and over 70 full-time staff members. While the current federal government is looking to get rid of as much federal oversight as possible by transferring powers and responsibilities back to the states, environmental and public health advocates are extremely concerned about the hazardous consequences for citizens–particularly children.

History of Lead and Lead Paint Use

Lead is a naturally-occurring metal found in the Earth’s crust. As one of the earliest discovered metals in human history, lead quickly gained popularity due to its corrosion resistance and low boiling point. In ancient times, “sugar of lead” was used by Roman winemakers as one of the first artificial sweeteners. Up until the 19th century, white lead pigments were widely utilized in paints by artists, as the durability of lead made it an ideal paint additive. Lead-based paint was also used in the U.S. in the 1920s, though several European countries had already banned the use of it.

Usage of lead-based paint started to decline in the 1940s. In 1971, the Lead-Based Paint Poisoning Prevention Act (LBPPPA) was passed, which aimed to phase out lead paint use in housing built with federal dollars. Lead paint was eventually banned altogether by the American government in 1978.

Lead Poisoning

Lead poisoning occurs when you absorb too much lead by breathing or swallowing it. The neurotoxic effects of lead are substantial, and children are particularly susceptible. When the LBPPPA was passed in 1971, a blood lead level of 60 micrograms per deciliter was considered safe. It wasn’t until 1991 that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) lowered the “acceptable” blood lead level to nine micrograms per deciliter or less. That number has since been lowered again, and there is still no known level of lead exposure that is considered safe.

“Lead Paint” Courtesy of Mike Mozart : License: (CC BY 2.0)

Lead-based paint, which also includes any lead-contaminated dust, is one of the most common causes of lead poisoning. According to a 2011 national housing survey, more than a third of housing units across the nation contain lead-based paint. Risk of exposure is particularly high in older homes with flaked or chipped paint.

Some neurological and behavioral effects of lead poisoning are considered to be irreversible, and it’s estimated that 2.6 percent of American preschool children have a blood lead concentration over 5 micrograms per deciliter–the current level at which the government recommends public health intervention. Children may experience developmental delay and learning difficulties as a result of lead exposure. Most lead poisoning in children occurs from eating chips and flakes of deteriorating lead-based paint. Children with pica, a disorder which leads to a compulsive appetite to consume non-food items, are especially at risk of ingesting lead.

Lead Paint Programs

In October 1992, Congress passed the Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction Act (Title X of Public Law 102-550). Title X amended the Toxic Substances Control Act, and was designed to develop a national strategy to address lead-based paint risks in all housing. Congress promulgated Title X after concerns that low-lead poisoning was widespread amongst American children, particularly those under six years old and minority and low-income populations.

EPA’s Proposed Budget Cuts

On March 31, 2017, a 64-page budget memo covering the EPA’s  2018 fiscal year was released by the Washington Post. The memo showed that officials within the EPA want to eradicate two programs that reduce children’s exposure to lead paint. One of the programs at risk is the Lead Risk Reduction Program. The new budget would slash $2.56 million from its funding and lay off about 73 full-time equivalent employees. This program requires professional remodelers to participate in training to learn safe practices for stripping away lead-based paint in homes. The program was created through an EPA regulation in 2010, which mandated federal certification for renovators.

Lead-based paint programs run by the EPA are also potentially at risk of losing $14.05 million. The EPA has been offering financial assistance to states and tribal jurisdictions, under Section 404(g) of the Toxic Substances Control Act, since 1994. States and tribal programs are given federal money to address lead-based paint risks. Money is granted to develop or carry out authorized lead-based paint activities programs; authorized lead pre-renovation education programs; or authorized renovation, repair, and paint programs.

While a spokeswoman for the EPA stated that the cuts are intended to give local and state governments the authority and responsibility to fund their own entities, the vast majority of states are unable to do so. Only fourteen states are actually able to operate programs which train contractors in removing lead paint. The rest depend on the federal government to successfully run their programs.

These changes come after a Trump Administration order to reduce the EPA’s overall budget by 31 percent. The EPA has proposed eliminating 25 percent of its employees and scrapping 56 programs including: lead reduction programs, water runoff control, and pesticide safety.

Environmental Racism?

Between 1997 and 2001, the CDC found that 60 percent of children who were reported with confirmed high blood-lead levels were black. Children living and playing in inner cities are more likely to be exposed to lead blowing across playgrounds. A 2015 analysis by the Huffington Post uncovered a strong correlation between high percentages of black populations and high lead poisoning rates. Between 1999 and 2004, black children were 1.6 times more likely to test positive for lead in their blood than white children. In Detroit, where 84 percent of the population is black, eight percent of children tested had elevated blood-lead levels in 2013.

Low-income and minority populations are far more likely to live in neighborhoods with dilapidated homes, thereby elevating their risk of exposure to lead paint. Other legal and environmental advocates note that the cuts to these programs will set the U.S. back decades in preventing lead poisoning and only stifle revenue streams. In other words, the government is likely dooming low-income and minority citizens to toxic living conditions.

CDC Lead Poisoning Prevention

The CDC still has programs to help study and eliminate childhood lead poisoning in America. The Lead Contamination Control Act of 1988 authorized the CDC to initiate these efforts. As a result, the CDC Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program was created which helps to develop policies to prevent childhood exposure and poisoning, educate the public and health care providers, provide funding to state and local health departments, and support research to determine the efficacy of prevention efforts.

To date, the CDC has funded nearly 60 childhood lead poisoning prevention programs; developed the childhood blood lead surveillance system, which allows states to report their data to the CDC; expanded public health laboratory capacity; and provided training to public health professionals. The CDC, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, EPA, and other agencies have created a federal interagency strategy to achieve the elimination of childhood lead poisoning as a public health issue by 2020.

Conclusion

While lead-based paint was banned almost forty years ago, its persistence in homes across the country is still alive and well to this day. Pre-1980 American housing contains upwards of three million tons of lead in the form of paint. If the EPA strips these lead reduction programs of funding, this nation will continue to have a high risk of lead exposure for children and adults. Since 36 states rely on federal money to keep programs running, the EPA’s proposed budget is establishing a permanent lead-based environment for the country’s most vulnerable populations.

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Why is the Trump EPA Budget Removing Lead Paint Protection Programs? appeared first on Law Street.

The Endangered Species Act (ESA) was created more than 40 years ago and is considered by many to be an overwhelming success. Rarely has legislation ever remained in its original state over several decades; however, in its long history, the ESA has only been amended four times (1978, 1982, 1988, and 2004), with the most substantial amendments occurring in 1978. Despite many political attempts to reform the act, it seems to be largely shielded from modifications.

Under a new administration, however, efforts to delist a particular species or otherwise weaken the standing law have gained significant strength. Despite the efficacy of the act, concerns over burdensome regulations and negative impacts on private property rights have many concerned that the ESA is not as streamlined as it needs to be. Hearings began in February 2017 to “modernize” the ESA, yet it is unclear exactly how “modern” this law will become.

History of the Endangered Species Act

“Male Passenger Pigeon” Courtesy cotinis : License (Public Domain)

The now-extinct passenger pigeon is largely responsible for the expansion of wildlife conservation efforts in the early 1900s. Once the most abundant bird in North America, the passenger pigeon’s sudden extinction (occurring in less than 50 years) captivated Americans who watched as the bird died out. Prior to the passenger pigeon, the whooping crane also garnered widespread attention when it began to disappear rapidly in the late 1890s, though it is still alive today.

The Lacey Act of 1900 was the first federal law to actually regulate commercial animal markets. The act made it unlawful to import, export, sell, acquire, or purchase any fish, wildlife or plants that are taken, possessed, transported, or sold in violation of any state or federal laws. That piece of legislation was later followed by the Migratory Bird Conservation Act of 1929 and the Bald Eagle Protection Act of 1940, which both met little opposition before being implemented.

Yet the official predecessor to what we now know as the Endangered Species Act was in fact the Endangered Species Preservation Act of 1966. Initially, this act provided a means of listing native species as endangered and afforded them limited protections. This also signified a shift from regulating the taking of an animal to focusing more on habitat conservation and preservation. “Taking” an animal is defined in Section 3 of the act and can occur via direct and indirect actions. In Babbitt v. Sweet Home Chapter of Communities for Greater Oregon, a Supreme Court case decided in 1995, the Court concluded that habitat modification can cause “harm” to a listed animal, thereby causing a “take.”

In 1973, President Richard Nixon sought to overhaul the current law and pass comprehensive endangered species legislation, which brought about the Endangered Species Act of 1973. Written by a team of lawyers and scientists, the new law incorporated dozens of new principles and ideas. Currently, the ESA’s stated purpose is to protect species and “the ecosystems upon which they depend.” The ESA is managed by both the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which includes the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). The FWS oversees terrestrial and freshwater organisms, while the NOAA handles marine species.

The Endangered Species Act Amendments of 1978 implemented some significant changes to the ESA. It attempted to “retain the basic integrity of the ESA, while introducing some flexibility which will permit exemptions from the act’s requirements.” One of the most important changes was the creation of the Endangered Species Committee, commonly known as the “God Squad.” The committee is composed of seven Cabinet-level members, and members have the authority to allow the extinction of a species–hence the nickname–by completely exempting a federal agency from Section 7 requirements (after prior consultation with the FWS and NOAA). To date, only the whooping crane and the northern spotted owl have been exempted from Section 7.

Critical Provisions

The primary goal of the ESA is to prevent the extinction of plant and animal life; an ancillary goal is to recover and maintain populations as much as possible by removing or thwarting threats to their survival. There are a few sections of the act that are considered to be the most powerful in their effect: Sections 4, 7, and 9.

To be listed, a species must meet one of the five criteria listed in Section 4(a)(1) of the act. The listing process is lengthy, involving multiple steps before a species is accepted. A species may be delisted, but only after the committee considers if the threats have been eliminated or controlled. This is based on several factors, including population size and growth, and the stability of habitat quality and quantity. Section 4 also requires the designation of a “critical habitat” within one year of a species being placed on the endangered list, though it normally occurs several years afterwards. A critical habitat includes geographic areas that contain features essential to the conservation of the species and that may need special management or protection.

Section 7 prohibits any actions that jeopardize the survival of any endangered or threatened species, as well as actions that could destroy or adversely modify critical habitats of listed species. The section requires all federal agencies to engage in the consultation process with the FWS or NOAA before engaging in any action that may threaten a listed species. Each federal agency is required under Section 7 to confer with the Secretary of the Interior on any action to ensure that such activities are “not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of any endangered species or threatened species or result in the destruction of or adverse modification of” designated critical habitats. As noted previously, the God Squad has the power to exempt a federal agency from this consultation process under Section 7, if they find no reasonable and prudent alternatives to the agency’s actions.

“Threatened northern spotted owl” Courtesy of USFWS Endangered Species : License (CC BY 2.0)

Lastly, Section 9 prohibits the “taking” of a listed species. It applies to both private and public actions, and applies whether a critical habitat has been designated or not. Section 9 also forbids possessing, selling, or transporting an animal that has been obtained by an unlawful “take,” as well as other prohibitions on imports, exports, and commercial activity. Section 3 of the act specifically defines a “take” as any activity that could “harass, harm, pursue, hunt, shoot, wound, kill, trap, capture, collect, or attempt to engage in any such conduct” a listed species. Harm can occur both directly and indirectly, even via certain habitat modifications.

Proven Success Rate

Currently, there are a variety of species listed as threatened or endangered, including 374 mammals, 338 birds, 185 fish, and 138 reptile species, as well as many more insects, clams, snails, and others. The FWS also acknowledges that roughly 40 species on the list are robust enough in populations to be taken off the protected list. About one percent of the 2,000 species on the list have been delisted because they recovered from extinction.

“Bald Eagle” Courtesy of Pen Waggener : License (CC BY 2.0)

Over the course of its history, the ESA has been nearly 100 percent successful at preventing listed species from going completely extinct. Its successes include the gray wolf, bald eagle, and American crocodile, which are all now thriving species. Very few laws in the U.S. can tout such a high success rate. Only 30 species have disappeared after being placed on the list; many scientists argue that adding species to the list earlier, far before they reach the critical state of endangerment, would add immensely to the ESA’s success.

What Does the Future Hold?

There is now a push to “modernize” the ESA, which defenders of the law contend is an effort to weaken or gut the act completely. Hundreds of bills, introduced primarily by Republican lawmakers, are now seeking to delist a species or somehow weaken the ESA, though most have been unsuccessful. However, the ideal environment to implement significant changes to the act appears to be brewing on Capitol Hill.

Those in favor of overhauling the ESA argue that it imposes too many far-reaching regulatory burdens, particularly on the agricultural industry. Lawmakers point out that the ESA has had a negative impact on drilling, logging, and mining, along with stifling economic growth in these industries. Moreover, private property rights are a concern since the ESA can impose restrictions on property owners’ use of their land because of a listed species. There are estimations that roughly three-quarters of species listed under the ESA reside on private land. One lawmaker recently stated that the act has “never been used for the rehabilitation of a species,” claiming that it has only been utilized to control land.

Still, opponents of any changes to the law argue that the Obama Administration began delisting species significantly, removing a record 29 species from the ESA–more than all previous administrations combined. Modernization of the ESA, environmentalists and activists state, is merely an effort to destroy “the nation’s premier and most effective wildlife conservation law.” Some states, like California, are moving to pre-empt any significant changes to the ESA by passing legislation that would add state-level protections for species that are currently listed as threatened or endangered under the ESA.

Conclusion

Few laws have ever been as successful as the ESA, which has an almost 100 percent success rate in strengthening the population of listed species. Species take decades to recover, hence the low number of animals delisted since the act’s inception. However, there are legitimate concerns about the act’s effect on industries and private landowners. Now, with a new political landscape, significant changes to the law may be on the horizon. What that means for the hundreds of species still extremely threatened or in severe danger of extinction, is still up for debate.

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Endangered Species Act: Should it be Modernized? appeared first on Law Street.

One of Donald Trump’s first moves as president was announcing his plan for the imminent repeal of 75 percent of federal regulations. In a previous article, we went over the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and the ways in which federal environmental regulations affected business growth, outsourcing, and public health costs. Reviews of environmental regulations show that they have saved trillions of dollars in public heath costs while having a modest effect on American business, which has continued to grow and thrive since the creation of the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act. Removing environmental regulations will likely not be the deciding factor that enables manufacturing to return to America but it could seriously endanger our water and air, especially for poor and at-risk communities.

But the question of what effect regulations have on the energy market itself has been a hot topic of debate lately. Conservative interests have argued for some time that environmental regulations place serious handicaps on fossil fuels and unfairly favor renewables, and the Obama Administration’s Clean Power Plan has come under a storm of criticism for strengthening this dynamic. Read on to learn about federal energy policy and environmental regulations to see how they have historically impacted different energy industries and examine what the Clean Power Plan would have done in contrast to what Trump’s proposed policies will likely do.

Regulations and the Energy Market: Renewables vs. Fossil Fuels

A central objection to environmental regulations is that they unfairly skew the energy market. They place countless handicaps on fossil fuel companies and allow renewables full freedom to prosper, unfairly impacting business throughout the country. It is very true that the energy market is subject to unfair business handicaps, but those that are in place overwhelmingly favor fossil fuel companies rather than hinder their success. Much of this dates back to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which determined subsidies for different energy sources. The law allocated $5.6 billion in incentives for the gas, oil, and coal industries, $4.5 billion for renewable and alternative energy sources and $3 billion in electricity incentives that largely addressed nuclear power (another $1.3 billion went to energy efficiency and conservation research and development, which mostly applied to fossil fuel production). This $4.5 billion may seem substantial and it did, in fact, bring forth the creation of critical incentives, such as solar tax credits. However, a review of the 2007 budget shows that more than two-thirds of all these renewable subsidies went to ethanol and biofuels. Only a little over a billion dollars went directly into America’s three dominant clean energy sources: solar, wind, and hydropower.

While direct funding and incentives are slanted toward fossil fuels, the real imbalance comes in the form of large-scale post-tax subsidies for fossil fuels that involve the costs of the externalities they create in the form of environmental damage and public health effects. Globally, the subsidy imbalance is extremely dramatic: worldwide about $120 billion in pre-tax subsidies goes to renewables and $523 billion goes to fossil fuels. But when you add post-tax subsidies, the IMF calculates that the fossil fuel industry received a staggering $4.2 trillion in subsidies in 2011. The United States is the world’s top producer of gas and petroleum and it’s a stretch of the imagination to claim that those industries are getting marginalized or cut an unfair deal.

The first part of this series explained the regulations that were placed on power plants for emissions and dumping, which represented a relatively small industry cost (especially compared to the massive public health savings generated by those regulations) and did nothing to stop the growth of the fossil fuel industry. For the most part, renewable energy systems don’t deal with regulations that affect emissions and toxic dumping because they don’t create waste streams through energy production. However, this doesn’t mean that renewables are given a free ride to prosper in the energy market; they are subject to extensive regulatory processes as well despite the fact that they do not have the same adverse impact on public health. The installation of a wind turbine, for instance, requires permits from a vast number of different regulatory authorities, and if even one of the required organizations doesn’t grant a permit then a project can be killed.

A great deal of attention has been called to the potential damage renewables can inflict on wildlife (the most common narrative is that wind turbines kill birds), despite the fact that fossil fuels do much greater damage to wildlife, and protected species regulations are often used to oppose renewable projects. Renewable energy systems can and have been repeatedly shut down mid-project for causing even minor habitat damage. The $2.2 billion BrightSource Solar Farm in the Mojave Desert, the largest solar facility ever to be built in the United States, was almost completely abandoned because of the death of a single endangered desert tortoise.

Fossil fuel companies must deal with some land and water regulations as well, but they also have access to a variety of unique legislative loopholes that allow them to dodge critical regulations and benefit from the tax code–in effect, giving them permission to pollute so that their business may thrive. The most dramatic example of this is the “Halliburton loophole,” which gives hydraulic fracturing companies special permission to inject hazardous chemicals underground, in what would normally be a direct violation of the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1974. These benefits extend to the basic permitting processes that different energy companies must go through as well: fossil fuel companies generally have a streamlined permitting process, are given the cheapest land leasing rates, and must provide no strategy or evaluation of environmental safety.

In California, for instance, a solar farm project can require a three-year permitting process that requires millions of dollars. Comparatively, a fossil fuel company needs only a one-page declaration of intent and can begin construction almost immediately. Furthermore, the Bureau of Land Management values the land it leases to oil and gas companies at a rate set almost a century ago, meaning these companies pay incredibly low prices when utilizing federal land (costing $30 billion in federal revenue over the last 30 years for undervalued land) while the BLM requires renewables to pay modern land leasing rates. The idea that the fossil fuel industry is unfairly suppressed by regulation is a myth; the fossil fuel industry already has access to numerous regulatory loopholes and subsidy benefits. The environmental regulations that are in place aren’t suffocating growth, they’re providing critical protection for our public health against industries with high pollution potential.

Regulations and the Energy Market: The Coal Industry

The fossil fuel source that does face serious decline is coal, which the Clean Power Plan specifically targeted as the most dangerous energy source in use, both for climate change and for public health. One of Trump’s favorite mantras during his campaign was that regulations have destroyed the coal industry and taken away countless jobs from Americans in the process. Historically, no such pattern has been observable; the coal industry prospered under environmental regulations for decades and has suffered so much in recent years largely because of competition with the massive spike in domestic natural gas production and usage. This makes President Trump’s claim that he will boost both coal and gas production–which are two directly competing industries–particularly confusing. Critics of environmental regulations generally point to the implementation of the Mining Safety and Health Administration’s 2014 Respirable Coal Mine Dust Rule, which decreased acceptable concentrations of coal dust per cubic meter from 2 grams to 1.5 grams and required regular air samplings to be taken. This legislation has been a hot topic among the anti-regulation community and coal advocates have complained that maintaining such low levels are unfairly difficult at existing output levels.

Image courtesy of Greg Goebel; License: (CC BY-SA 2.0).

However, it’s worth noting that the rule was put in place in 2014, long after American business made the decision to favor natural gas and long after the initial downturn of the coal industry. It’s also true that the rule addresses very legitimate health concerns and when evaluating the efficacy of a regulation it is important to compare the health benefits to the cost savings that would disappear if the rule were rescinded. A staggering 76,000 miners have died from black lung over the last 50 years. Over the same time frame, the government has had to pay out $45 billion in federal compensation to affected workers and their families. The law is also directly targeted at mining crews with Part 90 miners–workers who have already been diagnosed with a respiratory illness. The rule sought to protect the most at-risk population of workers and if the coal industry is to have a productive workforce then it has a responsibility to ensure the health and survival of that workforce. Estimated annualized compliance costs were about $28.1 million at a 7 percent discount rate, with the majority of compliance costs coming from tech purchases for the newly required Continuous Personal Dust Monitors. This number may seem huge but it only represents about 0.13 percent of the coal industry’s annual earnings of $20.2 billion and less than a third of the $1 billion our nation pays out each year in federal compensation to sick and dying miners.

As an energy source, natural gas simply provides more energy for a lower cost, making it unlikely that coal will experience a serious resurgence in the United States. The coal industry survived and grew under the Clean Air Act, and the industry was on its way out long before the Respirable Coal Mine Dust Rule came into effect. While it’s highly likely that the Clean Power Plan would deal a deathblow to the industry, increasing funds to gas as Trump plans will accomplish the same thing only just at a slower rate.

Repealing pollution regulations like safeguards and filter requirements and removing coal mine dust restrictions wouldn’t make the changes necessary to revive the weakening business, not as long as gas is abundant and comparatively cheap. Removing these regulations would, however, make the coal production and disposal process more dangerous for the environment and miners would be the first group to experience the health consequences.

Obama vs. Trump

The Clean Power Plan issued new carbon emissions reductions standards for each state and would have required the states to independently create a plan to meet their target goals. The result would have been a huge increase in clean, renewable energy production. Coal would have been hit the hardest by this as the worst polluter, although the natural gas industry would more easily be able to improve efficiency rates and meet the new standards. The CPP actually encourages the increased use of gas, as long as it’s primarily a replacement for coal.

The nature of this policy aligns with public opinion as well. About 65 percent of the population favors stricter emissions regulations, about 70 to 75 percent of Americans want to see increased renewable energy, and only about 30 percent want to see more coal. However, the coal industry represents 174,000 jobs, including extraction, transportation, and production and it is unfair to cut off employment without generating new opportunities, even if those lost jobs had high health risks.

However, the Clean Power Plan has a strong focus on creating jobs in renewable energy and pollution control industries. The traditional conservative narrative claims that fossil fuels create employment and clean energy policies stifle it, but the reality is actually the reverse; renewables can be a vital catalyst for job growth and actually create more jobs than fossil fuels. One powerful example of the over-inflated projections of fossil fuel employment opportunities is happening right now, with President Trump advancing the Dakota Access Pipeline and Keystone XL Pipeline. The Keystone Pipeline, in particular, has come under a media firestorm after it was revealed that the project would only create 35 permanent jobs. Like most construction projects, the vast majority of jobs related to the pipeline will be temporary positions, including some that will only last for a few months or “spillover jobs” that take place in another industry.

The entire clean energy sector employed 8.1 million workers as of 2015 and growth in the sector has also moved at a rate 12 times faster than overall job growth. In 2014 there were 7.7 million clean energy jobs worldwide and by the end of 2015, that number had grown to about 8.1 million. The related job creation is also remarkable when compared to fossil fuels–a million dollars of spending on renewable energy and energy efficiency will create 13 jobs. That same million dollars only creates 6 jobs within the fossil fuel industry. These are good jobs for middle-class Americans as well, paying on average 13 percent higher than median wages. Many of the jobs that are created by renewable energy involve manufacturing, which would align with President Trump’s vow to revitalize the American manufacturing industry. However, unlike fossil fuels, positions in the renewable energy industry don’t endanger the health of the workers who support them. Hillary Clinton’s ambitious Clean Power Challenge would have expanded upon Obama’s CPP and would have increased renewables through competitive grants, tax incentives, and market-based incentives and created a flux of new jobs in the process. Such efforts would have also meant opening up the industry of offshore wind, a massive and untapped source of domestic energy and employment.

“Keystone XL Pipeline Protest at White House” courtesy of Tar Sand Action; License: (CC BY 2.0)

Critics of the Clean Power Plan claimed that it unfairly supported renewables and made it impossible for fossil fuels to thrive. It’s more accurate to say that it would have leveled the playing field, not skewed it in favor of renewables. Fossil fuels would still be disproportionately subsidized and would still play a huge role in American energy. What the CPP would have done is act as a major catalyst for an increase in clean energy use that America needs to combat climate change, establish energy independence, protect our public health and national lands, while creating new jobs for Americans.

Conclusion

It’s a political myth that the fossil fuel industry is unfairly regulated in the United States. America produces more gas and petroleum than any country on earth, subsidizes the fossil fuel industry with billions more than goes to renewables, and gives oil and gas companies fast-track access to land at the cheapest possible rates. The Clean Power Plan was a chance to increase clean, domestic renewable energy across the nation. Without the plan, the state renewable energy goals will be rendered non-binding and the progress of renewables will move at a much slower rate. Over the next four years, America will continue to be dependent on fossil fuels as the Trump Administration works to open up federal lands for drilling and fracking and peel back regulations allowing the oil and gas industry to freely pollute.

Will a Donald Trump presidency destroy the renewable energy industry? No, because the president doesn’t truly have control over the free market. Trump can seriously slow down renewable progress, but even if the Clean Power Plan is reversed, 29 states still have Renewable Target Portfolios established and another eight have created non-binding goals for themselves. The renewable energy industry has grown dramatically and will continue to receive bipartisan support in the places where it is cost efficient and useful. Red states such as Idaho, the Dakotas, and Texas have all made serious commitments to renewables because they have high renewable energy potential and investing in solar and wind simply makes economic sense. Technological improvements, especially within the field of energy storage, are increasingly raising the value of renewable energy systems and boosting growth within the private sector. In terms of coal, it will be difficult, and maybe even impossible, to bring the coal industry back to its previous rates of production as long as natural gas thrives in the United States.

However, climate change worsens every year and we don’t really have the luxury of waiting for things to move slowly. With Trump in power not only will much of Obama’s work be undone, we will also lose out on one of our last chances as a nation to try and combat climate change.

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Impact of Environmental Regulations on the Energy Market appeared first on Law Street.

For many Americans, “I stand with Standing Rock” signs and chants have become all too familiar. Over the past year, the Dakota Access Pipeline has remained an extremely controversial project, putting water rights and tribal lands front and center in oversaturated news cycles. Former President Obama had halted construction of the pipeline until more environmental impacts could be considered, but the new Trump Administration has once again given the contentious project the green light. The Standing Rock Sioux tribe has vowed to shut down the project by any means necessary, indicating an uphill battle ahead for both sides of the project.

Dakota Access Pipeline Project

Priced at $3.7 billion, the Dakota Access Pipeline is a 1,172-mile-long underground oil pipeline project designed to transport Bakken shale oil. The pipeline is poised to transport 470,000 barrels of crude oil a day across four states, from North Dakota through South Dakota and Iowa and into Illinois. According to those in favor of the project, it is supposed to be a more cost-effective method of transporting oil than doing so by truck or train; almost 70 percent of Bakken oil is transported by train. Proponents also contend that the pipeline will help the U.S. gain energy independence.

The pipeline is extremely controversial due to its potential impact on the environment. Numerous tribes have expressed opposition to the project including the Meskwaki, Standing Rock Sioux, and Cheyenne River Sioux tribes. Initially, the pipeline route was intended to cross the Missouri River just north of Bismarck, North Dakota. It was later rerouted closer to tribal lands, a decision criticized by many as environmental racism.

According to the chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, the pipeline was rerouted closer to tribal lands when other North Dakota residents objected to the proximity of an oil pipeline to their communities and water sources. The portion of the Missouri River, where the pipeline will cross when completed, is the Standing Rock tribe’s primary source of drinking water. To date, most of the pipeline has already been built, but the section nearest to the Standing Rock Sioux tribe is still unfinished.

Treaty of Traverse des Sioux and Treaty of Fort Laramie

Opponents have argued that the pipeline would be in direct violation of the Sioux’s national sovereignty, as delegated in the signings of two treaties–the 1851 Treaty of Traverse des Sioux and the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie.

In 1851, the U.S. government and the Sioux in Minnesota signed the Treaty of Traverse des Sioux, which ceded large portions of territory to the federal government. In exchange for annuities in the form of cash and goods, the Sioux agreed under the treaty to move to land along the Minnesota River. White settlers were interested in obtaining control of the land for agriculture and also wanted the Sioux to convert from their nomadic lifestyle to European-American settled farming. However, violations of the treaty in the form of inadequate payments from the U.S., food shortages, and subsequent famines lead to a breaking point in the form of the Dakota War of 1862.

Another influential agreement was the Treaty of Fort Laramie, known as the Sioux Treaty of 1868, between the U.S. and multiple bands of the Lakota people. Signed on April 29, 1868, it guaranteed Lakota ownership of the Black Hills and hunting rights in South Dakota, Wyoming, and Montana. While the land that the Dakota Access pipeline would cross is technically just north of the Standing Rock Sioux reservation, the tribe argues that the land was taken illegally from them via the Sioux Treaty of 1868.

The affected tribes in Standing Rock contend that these treaties are legally-binding and have been ratified by the U.S. Senate; therefore, the oil companies and federal government have failed to recognize and respect the Sioux’s sovereign rights.

Easements and Eminent Domain

While there are many people who support the project, citing job creation as a positive byproduct of pipeline completion, others disapprove of  how the project was implemented. Many Native American landowners have had their land taken away from them against their will to clear a route for the pipeline using eminent domain. Eminent domain is the governmental power to take private property for public use and is the most common way to grant legal right of way easement. An easement is an encumbrance on private property; while landowners still retain ownership of their property, they lose the ability to freely use the portion of the property with the easement on it. U.S. law requires that landowners receive just compensation for the use of their land.

“Standing Rock 4” Courtesy of unitedchurchofchrist : License (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Other Controversies

The Standing Rock Sioux tribe has vehemently opposed the project, arguing that it violates the Treaty of Traverses des Sioux and the Treaty of Fort Laramie, as noted previously. The tribe and a number of its supporters contend that the project will contaminate drinking water, as well as damage sacred burial sites, dubbing the pipeline the “Black Snake.”  The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which has jurisdiction over a small portion of the pipeline, suspended the project last year, after months of intense protests and controversies.

At the protest’s peak, roughly 10,000 people had joined the campsites and more than 200 Native American tribes pledged their support. In 2016, it was the largest congregation of indigenous people in the U.S. in decades, maybe even centuries. U.S. military veterans, several high-profile actors, politicians, artists, filmmakers, and other activists all lent their support.

“Standing Rock 5” Courtesy of unitedchurchofchrist : License: (CC BY-SA 2.0)

The protests surrounding the Dakota Access Pipeline have not always been peaceful. According to reports, protesters have supposedly started fires, attempted to block roads, and have thrown petrol bombs at police. Police have also been accused of instigating violence and utilizing excessive force. Protesters have been attacked with pepper spray, freezing water, sound cannons, bean bag rounds, and rubber bullets. Police have also arrested hundreds of protestors on charges of criminal trespassing, rioting, and other felonies. At one point, the United Nations spoke out regarding the use of excessive force at the protest site.

Future of the Pipeline Project

In February 2017, the Trump Administration granted the final easement for that remaining section of the project. The Obama Administration, through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, had put the project on hold pending an environmental impact statement. Shortly after taking office, President Trump signed an executive memorandum on January 24, 2017, mandating that the pipeline project proceed. If all goes according to plan, that last 1.5 mile stretch of the pipeline will be completed in less than 90 days.

This hasn’t deterred activists and water protectors from fighting against its completion. Several marches in major cities, including a large-scale “Native Nations” march in Washington D.C., are currently in the works. Seattle’s city council also voted to divest more than $3 billion from Wells Fargo, citing the bank’s role as a major lender to the Dakota Access Pipeline as one of its reasons. The city of Davis, California soon followed suit, committing to withdraw its $124 million from the bank by the end of 2017. Wells Fargo has maintained that it is legally obligated to its contract with the pipeline.

Moreover, a legal challenge against the pipeline between the Standing Rock and Cheyenne River Sioux tribes and the federal government has been ongoing since 2016. The lawsuit contends that the Dakota Access Pipeline is an unlawful encroachment on the tribe’s heritage; it argues that the pipeline “might damage or destroy sites of great cultural and historical significance.” The National Historic Preservation Act, Clean Water Act, and Rivers and Harbors Act are the key laws at the crux of Standing Rock’s argument.

The tribe has stated on its website that if all legal actions and protest marches fail, resulting in construction of the pipeline, it will seek to “shut the pipeline operations down.” How that will exactly occur is still uncertain. One thing is abundantly clear: the Standing Rock Sioux tribe and its many allies have no intention of standing down against the Dakota Access Pipeline.

Conclusion

Despite clear opposition and legitimate concerns regarding the Dakota Access Pipeline, the project is scheduled to move forward and be completed in a few months. The project will certainly bring more jobs to the area and transport oil; however, it is absolutely imperative that these water sources and sacred tribal lands are not tarnished by the project. Moreover, it is critically important that protests over its construction remain peaceful, leaving violence and human rights violations behind.

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The “Black Snake”: Unpacking the Dakota Access Pipeline appeared first on Law Street.

President Donald Trump has long promised to remove as many environmental regulations as possible in order to allow American businesses room to grow and prosper and now seems ready to follow through on his pledge. Conservatives and libertarians have spoken out in widespread support of reducing regulations and its ability to stimulate growth. However, many of the regulations that Republicans believe hamper business productivity are in fact key provisions in the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts that form the legal cornerstone for American public health.

More broadly, this narrative that environmental regulations (or really any sort of environmental policy) are damaging to business in American is a timeless conservative stance. But is it really true? Have environmental regulations really dampened the ability of business to succeed in America? Can regulations really be blamed for more and more industries outsourcing to countries that have less stringent rules? Could Trump’s infrastructure plan fix our water contamination in areas like Flint? What is the real, quantified benefit of regulations on American public health and why is it never discussed in these conversations? This is one of the oldest arguments against environmental policy measures and it deserves to be analyzed in depth. Read on to learn about the history and impact of environmental regulations on business, public health, and America as a whole.

The Birth of the EPA and the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts

The advent of environmental regulations in America really begins with the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970. Prior to the 70s, environmental rules were up to each state to determine independently; regulations were generally loose and chemical dumping was a common, widespread industrial practice. It should come as no surprise that America also had significantly worse water and air quality than it does currently. Only about a third of U.S. fresh water was safe to drink from and watersheds across the nation contained dangerous quantities of unsafe pathogens and hazardous chemicals. With the creation of the EPA came the passage of two critical laws, the Clean Water Act of 1972 and the Clean Air Act of 1972.

Using the Clean Water Act, the EPA permanently barred individuals from dumping their waste in navigable waterways and established a dumping permit system for industrial and municipal facilities. These permits could be revoked if any company exceeded the wastewater standards set by the agency, and the removal of a permit resulted in an operational shutdown. The Clean Air Act of 1972 gave the EPA the power to set National Ambient Air Quality Standards for six major pollutants: nitrogen dioxide, particulate matter, ozone, sulfur dioxide, lead, and carbon monoxide. The impact of these acts has been huge. Beyond their immediate environmental benefits, these laws set a legacy of top-down, federal environmental regulation ensuring that America has some of the cleanest water and safest air in the world.

“Smog” courtesy of Isengardt; License: (CC BY 2.0)

Costs and Benefits on the National Scale

The technological changes required by these laws have been significant. Power plants throughout the nation were required to update their systems and install filters on their smokestacks. The transportation sector has perhaps experienced the greatest changes out of all the affected industries as the EPA’s National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) required massive modifications to engine efficiency and emission filtration systems. Congress created the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards in 1975, which required certain fuel efficiency rates for different fleets of vehicles. The combined effects of the NAAQS and CAFE standards have dramatically increased the fuel efficiency of our transportation sector and subsequently reduced petroleum use and its pollutant emissions.

And did we gain anything? Actually, yes. Thanks to the Clean Water Act and its subsequent amendments, the percentage of drinkable fresh water in the United States rose from about 30 percent to well over 60 percent. The six major air pollutants in our atmosphere dropped by over 69 percent between 1972 and 2014. One of the reasons analyzing regulatory costs and benefits is complicated is because the losses are felt by private businesses, but the gains are felt in a completely different area: public health. In 2010 alone, Clean Air Act regulations led to the avoidance of an estimated 160,000 premature deaths from respiratory-related illnesses, 130,000 heart attacks, and millions of cases of acute bronchitis, emphysema, and asthma. By 2020 the effects of the act are projected to prevent over 230,000 premature adult deaths annually.

These benefits don’t just lengthen lives, they also increase productivity throughout a lifetime. In 2010, over 13 million lost workdays and 3.2 million lost school days were avoided. All this has a direct benefit to the productivity of our workforce and the academic success of our students, which eventually aids American businesses by creating educated workers. Furthermore, employers provide health insurance for 59 percent of U.S. citizens, meaning that businesses will often end up directly shouldering the burden of increased health care costs when their workers get sick. In 1990, the Clean Air Act was amended to create a regular review of its costs and savings, the conclusion of which was that the benefits of these programs exceeded their compliance costs by a factor of over 43 to 1, based on the average of the estimated range of savings. In the 20 years since the annual review was first conducted, estimates suggest that the Clean Air Act has generated a staggering $22.2 trillion in savings for the United States compared to only $0.5 trillion in compliance costs for the businesses forced to adapt to new regulations.

But did it stifle the overall growth of American business? No, not really. Between 1970 and 2011, U.S. GDP increased by 212 percent and private sector jobs increased by 88 percent. Even the fossil fuel sector, the industry that stood to lose the most from new regulations, grew dramatically. Oil refineries experienced a sharp uptake in refinery productivity and coal production has increased by 70 percent since 1970.

What About Outsourcing?

It is sometimes incorrectly claimed that environmental regulations are one of the central causes for the significant trend in outsourcing that has swept through American businesses. President Trump certainly seems confident that removing regulations will help to bring back manufacturing to the U.S. But pollution abatement spending by American manufacturing is under 1 percent of the value of their total shipped goods. The primary driver in outsourcing is and has always been a desire to reduce labor costs. It would require much more than just dropping environmental regulations to actually induce companies to return to America (it would also most likely require slashing the minimum wage and dropping most workers’ rights) and the impacts of allowing large industries to pollute freely in this country would be significant.

One only needs to look at the difference in a citizen’s life expectancy and the staggering public health costs in industrialized nations without regulations compared to countries like our own. The World Bank has an exhaustive report on the available data. To do away with regulations will cause a dramatic drop in human health in the United States and would lead to an explosion in public health costs.

It is also overlooked that environmental regulations do encourage growth, as new regulatory mechanisms have consistently led to an increased demand for private tech providers, which are needed to create newly required technology. The American environmental technology sector is actually huge, generating around $300 billion in annual revenues, consisting of 119,000 companies, and providing more than 2.6 million jobs to American citizens. Air pollution control equipment alone generated $18 billion in revenue in 2008. Currently, the United States has the largest Environmental Technology industry in the world, making up about a third of the global market.

Pollution control industries create jobs for engineers, scientists, project managers, construction workers, etc., meaning there are employment opportunities for people of all educational levels. The growth of the pollution control sector also benefits some of the industries it was ironically, and incorrectly, predicted to disrupt–such as steel and plastics manufacturing–which are required to provide the materials for newly developed technology.

Business v. Environmentalism: Flint, Michigan

Much of Trump’s campaign was focused on revitalizing the rust belt through manufacturing and Flint can act as a viable case study for how Trump will impact public health and manufacturing. Flint, Michigan attracted national attention when elevated lead levels were found in many citizens’ blood from drinking contaminated water. Governor Rick Snyder appointed an Emergency Manager to Flint, Darnell Earley, who took control of the city’s budget and switched water sources from the drinkable Lake Huron to the toxic Flint River. The citizens took their complaints to the state Health Department and the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality but both agencies largely ignored their concerns. It took nearly a year before the EPA heard about the problems with Flint’s water and the agency has been strongly criticized for not mobilizing rapidly and effectively enough to address the situation after it knew about it. Flint is a very serious story of how poor communication and utilization of federal resources failed a community in a serious way. What it is not is a story that indicates the EPA should be defunded and environmental regulations should be pulled.

The willful flouting of environmental regulations and requirements was what created the crisis in Flint to begin with. While untreated lead pipes used to be the norm in the United States, numerous laws have been passed over the years to protect American communities from lead poisoning. The Safe Drinking Water Act, amended in 1986, prohibited new pipe installations from using lead and the 1991 Lead and Copper Rule (originally devised under Ronald Raegan and put into action by George H.W. Bush) required all lead pipes in America to either be replaced or be used in tandem with additional water treatment. While replacing existing pipes by using less dangerous alternatives, such as PVC, was heavily encouraged, many municipalities, especially in poorer areas, chose to go the cheaper route and use corrosion inhibitors. The Flint City Water Treatment Plant ignored these federal regulations and made the decision not to use anti-corrosion chemicals for their water system during a time when chemical costs were spiking. Skipping corrosion control saved Flint $140 a day, which pales in comparison to the costs of addressing the damage. Automotive factories witnessing their approaching collapse due to foreign competition chose to ignore federal water protection rules. Years and years of dumping toxic waste made the water in the Flint River particularly corrosive. These sorts of things are exactly what the preventative measures the EPA has set in place are there to prevent, and generally, those measures have been successful. Only one-third of American water was safe to drink before the Clean Water Act whereas that number has doubled because industrial dumping has been cracked down upon.

Addressing Environmental Problems 

The most important service the EPA provides is preventative, in the form of regulations protecting people and the environment from pollution. However, a major part of the agency is also focused on pollution restoration through the superfund program. Defunding the EPA will both remove these preventative measures and take away the safety net in place to fix things when pollution does happen. The EPA superfund program was created in 1980 by President Jimmy Carter in order to restore polluted areas, although it has faced legitimate criticism for not accomplishing enough and not addressing many of the sites that have applied for superfund assistance. The superfund program works on a “polluter pays” principle that requires the industry responsible for the contamination to fund a large part of the project. In areas like the Rust Belt, where many of the industries responsible for pollution went bankrupt, there is often no one to hold accountable and restoration projects are severely underfunded. However, this is not to say that the program is worthless; since its conception, the EPA has restored over 1,100 sites from severe pollution to healthy and livable communities and created circumstances for businesses to grow and thrive within those areas.  Superfund is one of Americans most critical programs for protecting marginalized and endangered American communities and it needs not to be abandoned but to have improved efficiency, administration, and a more reliable funding system for when industries can’t be held accountable for pollution.

President Trump’s proposed solution would be to allocate $1 trillion toward American infrastructure at what he claims would be no cost to taxpayers–by giving $160 billion in tax credits to companies that get involved with new projects. However, Wilbur Ross and Peter Navarro, the advisers behind his plan, admit that the plan can’t actually be self-financing. The private sector will require tens of millions of collective tolls and fees for the infrastructure projects taken from the communities in which the work is done. This means that while wealthy investors stand to make a profit through the infrastructure credits, the poorest and most in-need communities like Flint likely won’t benefit because such projects would not yield the profits necessary for private investors. Infrastructure improvements also won’t replace the direct medical benefits that the EPA has been supplying to the community in the form of lead absorption food packages and chemical treatments to restore the waterways. Now that they have a majority in Congress, Republicans have already started to chip away at environmental regulations, blocking the stream protection rule that controlled coal mining and dumping near waterways. The party’s deregulatory efforts will likely continue over the coming years.

Conclusion

Trump and his team of fossil fuel friendly advisers can do plenty to change the balance of environmental regulation and public health over the next several years. Opening up protected land to drilling, mining, and fracking while also removing environmental regulations places our water and air in harm’s way. Undoing regulations will not, in any sense, be the deciding factor that brings back outsourced manufacturing jobs to the United States, not as long as we have basic labor rights and mandated benefits that prevent companies from putting their staff in sweatshops and paying them a dollar a day.

Undoing regulations will, however, damage the growth of the pollution control industry. Extensive deregulation could even cause a notable increase in health care costs and result in a dramatic increase in cases of respiratory illnesses and eventually increased rates of premature deaths. Allowing manufacturers to dump freely poses a huge danger to American citizens’ drinking water and replacing the superfund program with incentive based infrastructure programs will do little to address environmental concerns in poor areas.

Safe water and air are privileges unique to the developed world and benefits that we’ve had for so long that they may be easy to overlook. However, they are critical to the health of our population and undoing the regulations that enable us to drink clean water and breathe clean air would be a disaster for our nation’s public health.

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Impact of Environmental Regulations on Business appeared first on Law Street.

Public lands dot significant portions of America’s landscape from coast to coast. Managed by a variety of agencies, these lands and waters are home to diverse ecosystems and prime settings for recreational activities. With an immense amount of annual foot traffic and billions of dollars of revenue generated, public lands play a substantial role in American lives.

For decades, there have been debates over whether or not these lands should be turned over to the states or private organizations. Now changes could become a reality, as Capitol Hill is filled with lawmakers who support transferring millions of acres of public lands away from the federal government. But the consequences of such a transfer may have more negative impacts than positive, and many citizens feel that access to public land is an American birthright.

Background of Federal Lands and Agencies

The majority of public lands in the U.S. are held in trust by the federal government and managed by a variety of agencies. According to a 2014 report, the federal government owns roughly 640 million acres, which is about 28 percent of all the land in the United States. Four agencies own over 600 million acres of that land: the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Fish and Wildlife Service, and the National Park Service. The lands are utilized primarily for recreation, preservation, and natural resource development.

U.S. Forest Service

President Benjamin Harrison established the National Forest system with 13 million acres and 15 forest reserves through the Forest Reserve Act of 1891, which gave the president power to set aside and reserve public lands. Conserving land for the people was a national priority, as was obtaining acknowledgement that forested areas needed special protection from the exploitation of natural resources. With 155 forests and 20 grasslands currently totaling over 191 million acres, these lands overseen by the United States Forest Service reach diverse populations and are extremely popular destinations for a variety of outdoor and recreational activities. According to a National Visitor Use Monitoring (NVUM) report, there were over 180 million visits made to National Forest sites in 2015.

“US Federal Land Agencies” Courtesy of National Atlas of the United States: License Public Domain

The Bureau of Land Management

The BLM is responsible for managing 247.3 million acres of public land–one-eighth of all the landmasses in the country. From grazing permits to mining and coal leases, the agency administers 205,498 miles of fishable streams, 2.2 million acres of lakes and reservoirs, and 4,500 miles of National Scenic, Historic, and Recreation Trails in addition to multiple-use trails for recreation purposes. The BLM collects a significant amount of revenue from public lands. In 2016, the agency made $2 billion in royalty revenue from federal leases; the Outdoor Industry Association also estimates that $40 billion in federal tax revenue comes from the recreation industry on public lands.

The Western Concentration

Other agencies such as the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the United States Army Corps of Engineers participate in federal land management and administration. Most of the federal land ownership is concentrated in the western part of the country, contributing to greater controversy over ownership and use of federal lands in the area.

Public Trust Doctrine

The public trust doctrine is a long-standing principle that the government holds some lands in trust for public use, regardless of any private property ownership. Generally, this applies to land, water, and natural resources, such as beaches and navigable rivers. While the doctrine itself varies heavily from state to state, the public may fully enjoy any public trust lands, waters, and natural resources for a “wide variety of recognized public uses.” These rights became established in the U.S. after Illinois Central Railroad v. Illinois, an 1892 case that held that the government cannot alienate a public right to lands under navigable waters.

“Fall Color at Natural Arch – Daniel Boone National Forest” Courtesy of US Forest Service -Southeast : License (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Additionally, the public trust doctrine puts a limit on private rights. A landowner may not alter their property in such a way that it would interfere with use of public land. Moreover, the doctrine specifically protects the land from misuse by the state. A state may not convey public trust lands if the conveyance could substantially impair public use of lands or waters. Thus, any move to privatize public lands may be in direct violation of the public trust doctrine, particularly if the sale would then impair the public’s use of such land or water.

Plans to Privatize Public Lands

The collective ownership of these lands, however, could possibly change if lawmakers continue down their current course. House Bill 3650, introduced to the House of Representatives in September 2015, directs the Department of Agriculture to “convey to a state up to 2 million acres of eligible portions of the National Forest System.” These portions of conveyed land will be administered and managed “primarily for timber production.” On June 15, 2016, the Natural Resources Committee voted to adopt H.R. 3650; it is currently awaiting the next stage in the lawmaking process.

Representative Jason Chaffetz of Utah introduced a piece of legislation at the end of January 2017 that was later dubbed the Disposal of Excess Federal Lands Act. In a press release for H.R. 621, Chaffetz claimed that 3.3 million acres of land maintained by the BLM “served no purpose for taxpayers.” If the bill passed, ten states were poised to lose federal land. However, he withdrew the legislation in February 2017 after facing harsh criticism from his constituents.

“Gunnison National Forest Colorado” Courtesy of David : License (CC BY 2.0)

Despite the withdrawal of H.R. 621, Republican lawmakers still laid out a plan to give away roughly 640 million acres of land in early 2017. Lawmakers overwrote the value of federal lands by changing a single line of rules for the House of Representatives, making it easy to dispose of federal property–even if it ends up losing money for the government and there’s no compensation for American citizens. In essence, the change states that transferring public land to “state, local government or tribal entity shall not be considered as providing new budget authority, decreasing revenues, increasing mandatory spending or increasing outlays.” The land would be given to the states, and then could possibly be sold to private owners.

As a result, places like the Grand Canyon National Park and Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, which are rich in uranium and copper respectively, may be up for grabs first. The oil-rich lands of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge could also be vulnerable for sale. According to Alan Rowsome, the senior director of government relations for The Wilderness Society, it seems very likely that Alaska’s national lands will be open for drilling under a Republican-controlled House. Many western states are already taking the necessary actions to prepare for public land transfers.

Criticism of Privatization

First things first: critics fear that local governments with small budgets will not be able to manage the land once it is transferred to them by the federal government. In the summer of 2016, the Forest Service spent $240 million a week to fight forest fires, and the Department of Interior has estimated that the cost of deferred maintenance is around $11 billion. Over time, whenever federal land has been given to states, it has become less accessible. Between 2000 and 2009, Idaho sold off almost 100,000 acres of public land; in Colorado, citizens may only use 20 percent of state trust land for hunting and fishing.

Private ownership of public tracts of land has profound consequences, as it will probably affect land managed and regulated by conservation programs or private entities, likely reducing public access. Public access to National Forests contributes greatly to state economies; a report completed by the Outdoor Industry Association found that the outdoor industry directly impacts over six million jobs and contributes to $646 billion in outdoor recreation spending. The Outdoor Alliance, a nonprofit coalition of groups that support outdoor activities, has argued that any action to transfer lands to private hands is a “public land heist.”

A 2016 Harvard Kennedy School study, found that 95 percent of the American public believes in the importance of protecting national parks and 80 percent would be willing to pay higher taxes in order to do so. Such an overwhelming response certainly indicates that protecting public places is incredibly important to Americans.

Conclusion

While there is still time before these resolutions become law, plans to privatize our forests have been set in motion on numerous occasions. If Americans’ access is restricted and these lands are exploited for a profit, the primary purpose of establishing public lands for citizen use will disappear. In the famous words of President Teddy Roosevelt, champion of conservation and public lands, “I believe that the natural resources must be used for the benefit of all our people, and not monopolized for the benefit of the few . . . Conservation is a great moral issue, for it involves the patriotic duty of insuring the safety and continuance of the nation.”

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post This Land is Your Land: Should Public Lands Be Privatized? appeared first on Law Street.

While President Barack Obama’s time in office has now come to a close, his environmental legacy has the potential to last far beyond his eight years as president. The Obama Administration has worked tirelessly to protect and defend the environment, championing several initiatives. Some key accomplishments, however, include the establishment of more national monuments than any other president, signing the historic Paris Climate Agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, banning drilling in parts of the Arctic and Atlantic Ocean, and unveiling the Clean Power Plan. Additionally, Obama raised fuel-efficiency standards, invested in green energy, and created the Federal Strategy to Promote the Health of Honey Bees and Other Pollinators. Whether these policies stand the test of time, however, may depend heavily on the actions of future administrations.

National Monuments

While Obama’s time in office was winding down, he was still designating sites as national monuments. On January 12, 2017, Obama named five new national monuments. That brought his total number during his presidency to 34—more than any other president. Moreover, in December 2016, he created two national monument sites in Utah and Nevada. The Bears Ears National Monument, which protects 1.35 million acres of land in southwest Utah and two geological formations, was particularly controversial; five Native nations had petitioned Obama to grant federal monument protections to the area.

“Bears Ears” Courtesy of Bureau of Land Management : License: (CC BY 2.0)

Over the course of his time in office, Obama utilized the Antiquities Act–a law signed by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906–multiple times to create the monuments. The Act gives the President of the United States the authority to set aside land to protect important historic, cultural, and ecological sites without approval from Congress. In total, Obama protected more than 550 million acres. That is more than double the amount that Roosevelt, a well-known conservationist, conserved himself.

A large portion of the land Obama protected is covered by water. He created and expanded several large national marine monuments. One notable monument is the Pacific Remote Islands National Marine Monument, a large collection of coral reefs, underwater preserves, and tiny islands roughly 1,000 miles off the coast of Hawaii. Bush had originally established the monument in 2009 at 55.6 million acres; Obama then expanded it by 261.3 million acres in 2014. Obama also quadrupled the size of Hawaii’s Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, which is home to more than 7,000 species of wildlife, many of which are endangered.

Ban on Arctic and Atlantic Drilling

In addition to the significant acreage of water Obama protected as national monuments, his administration also banned arctic drilling. Using the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, Obama withdrew hundreds of millions of acres of federally-owned land in the Arctic and Atlantic Ocean from new offshore and gas drilling in December 2016. The Act allowed for Obama to act unilaterally, but no president has ever utilized the law to permanently protect land. In particular, large portions of the Chukchi Sea and Beaufort Sea in the Arctic and canyons in the Atlantic from Massachusetts to Virginia are now off-limits to oil exploration.

“Sea Ice in the Chukchi Sea” Courtesy of NASA Goddard Space Flight Center : License: (CC BY 2.0)

The Atlantic Ocean already had a five-year moratorium in place, and the protection of the canyons means that most of the eastern seaboard will not be drilled for oil. The seas in the Arctic are a habitat for several endangered species, including species that are candidates for an endangered species listing, and the canyons protected are largely recognized as biodiversity hotspots. If the ban is upheld by the courts, about 98 percent of the waters in the Arctic would be protected from oil exploration and drilling. In a presidential memorandum, Obama stated that these areas are extremely vulnerable to oil spills and have irreplaceable value for marine animals, wildlife, wildlife habitat, and scientific research–making the Arctic Waters a prime area for protection

Paris Climate Agreement

The Paris Climate Agreement was the first of its kind–a global consensus to combat the effects of climate change. Its central aim is to strengthen the response to threats of climate change and keep the global temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius. The agreement also aims to cut global greenhouse gas emissions by limiting the burning of fossil fuels and assist in preventing further floods, droughts, catastrophic storms, and rising sea levels.

In a rare moment of consensus, both the U.S. and China ratified the agreement, formally committing the world’s two biggest economies to curb climate change. The terms allow countries to determine independently which strategies will be most successful in attaining climate goals. While some of the aspects are binding and some are not, Obama’s ratification of the deal demonstrated a bold move by his administration to make protecting the planet a priority in years to come.

Clean Power Plan

President Obama’s most historic environmental initiative, perhaps, is the Clean Power Plan, which is designed to aggressively shrink America’s carbon footprint. The plan outlined the first national standards to specifically address pollution from power plants. In particular, the plan cuts significant amounts of carbon pollution and other pollutants from power plants that are responsible for soot and smog that have an adverse effect on human health. The plan is long-term, allowing companies to remain in business while making the changes needed to comply with the new standards.

The Supreme Court issued a “stay” in February 2016,  temporarily halting the plan from moving forward. However, it is set to be fully in place by 2030, with carbon pollution 32 percent below 2005 levels, sulfur dioxide pollution 90 percent lower, and nitrogen oxides 72 percent lower. This reduction in greenhouse gases is specifically aimed at combating the dangerous effects of such pollution on the climate. Additionally, the entire plan itself is expected to contribute a variety of positive economic effects–climate benefits of roughly $20 billion, health benefits in the $14-$34 billion range, and total net benefits of approximately $26-$45 billion.

“Power plant” Courtesy of Spiros Vathis : License: (CC BY-ND 2.0)

What’s Next?

Despite the great measures Obama undertook to protect the environment, it is quite possible that some of his environmental policies will be overturned by a new administration. The ban on drilling may or may not be able to be overturned by President Trump, but a Republican-controlled Congress could move to rescind the withdrawal of federal lands from oil and gas exploration. However, such a move might not be successful, given a close reading of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act.

National monuments have never been removed by a subsequent president, but President Trump has reportedly stated that he is open to the idea of doing so. As for the Paris Climate Agreement, Trump has made it clear that he wants to withdraw America’s participation in the historic deal. Arguments that the agreement will be disastrous for the economy and American industry are at the forefront of opponents’ minds. While Trump considers withdrawing the U.S. from the agreement, China, India, Germany, the EU, and the UK have all reaffirmed their commitments to curb emissions. China’s President, Xi Jinping, even stated that removing the U.S. from the agreement will endanger future generations. Furthermore, if other countries continue to invest heavily in clean energy, then money, jobs, and technology are sure to stream into those industries, perhaps leaving the U.S. behind.

The fate of the Clean Power Plan also hangs in the balance under the new administration. Many opposed to the plan have already urged President Trump to sign an executive order that rescinds the rule and tell the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) not to enforce it. However, attorneys general from a variety of states have noted that “history and legal precedent strongly suggest that such an action would not stand up in court.” The plan is also vulnerable to the Congressional Review Act, which would allow Congress to nullify the regulations. For now, the Clean Power Plan remains in limbo.

Overall, most of Obama’s environmental legacy will be decided by the courts, not by a particular administration. With more than 100 judicial vacancies across the country as Trump takes office, along with a vacant Supreme Court seat, the courtroom is going to be the arena in which environmental policies could be dismantled. In particular circuits with more than one vacant seat, specific areas of environmental regulation may be rolled back immensely; for example, the Second Circuit has become a critical arena for determining water regulation under the Clean Water Act and the Ninth Circuit has a profound impact on endangered specifies. Environmental groups are already preparing to take any anti-climate policies or actions to court, along with attorneys general from multiple states.

Conclusion

Obama’s presidency was clearly focused on environmental protection and combating catastrophic effects of climate change in the coming years. As commander-in-chief, Obama did an extensive amount of work to ensure the environment is viable and sustainable far into the future. Whether his efforts will be unraveled in the new Trump Administration and Republican-controlled legislative branch, however, is yet to be seen. Overall, Obama’s actions certainly elevated the environment and climate change to a much higher level of importance, and his environmental legacy may have him remembered as one of the top environmental presidents in history.

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post A Look Back at the Obama Administration’s Environmental Legacy appeared first on Law Street.

Environmental taxes and “ecotaxes” are not a new phenomenon. Proponents of sustainability have advocated for environmental-impact taxes for a variety of products and activities. By requiring a tax, the goal is to drastically change behavior and encourage a more “green” lifestyle. Until recently, no significant research had been completed to determine the global environmental and health impacts of an environmental tax on food. Now, the journal Nature Climate Change has published the first global analysis of such a tax. Read on to learn more about these taxes. 

Environmental Taxes

Environmental taxes, or “ecotaxes,” are taxes on products or activities that are considered harmful to the environment. One of the central goals of a more “green” economy is having prices reflect the true cost of certain activities. The purpose of ecotaxes is to change people’s behavior and promote environmentally-friendly activities. Because the free market fails to address environmental concerns and sustainability, ecotax policies are meant to force the market to consider environmental impacts.

These policies are known as the “green tax shift.” Examples of these taxes include carbon taxes, waste disposal taxes, and taxes on pollution and other hazardous wastes. Generally, ecotaxes can fall into two distinct categories: revenue-motivated and incentive-motivated. Revenue-motivated ecotaxes are designed to actively change behavior by putting or increasing taxes on products or activites that are deemend harmful to the environment. Incentive-motivated ecotaxes instead take a different approach, offering tax credits and relief in exchange for consumers engaging in more environmentally-friendly behavior.

Currently, many products externalize environmental costs. This means that prices are placed at an artificially low value on non-renewable resources. Effects on the air, water, and soil are not taken into account when determining the price of a product. Thus, ecotax reform encourages internalizing these costs, so the long-term environmental consequences of economic activity are not completely ignored.

Agriculture’s Impact on Climate Change

Curbing climate change is of the utmost importance as the world moves further into the 21st century. At the forefront of mitigating the damaging effects of climate change is the agriculture industry. Perhaps what’s even more critical than regulating agriculture as a whole is focusing efforts on the meat and dairy industries. The global livestock industry contributes more greenhouse gas emissions than cars, planes, trains, and ships combined, though most people still mistakenly believe that transportation is the biggest contributor to climate change.

Changing consumer perception regarding meat consumption, however, is a difficult task to complete. Researchers and scientists across the world agree that changing dietary habits is crucial to curbing climate change. In a landmark report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change from 2014, researchers found that dietary changes have the ability to substantially lower emissions, despite very little global action to achieve those goals. Many calls to reduce meat consumption have been met with controversy and significant pushback.

Also, the rising demand for meat across the globe, including rapidly increasing meat consumption from heavily-populated countries such as China, may push climate change over the tipping point. Thanks to a rising population and more affordable meat prices, these products are being consumed at a higher rate than ever before. Recent peer-reviewed studies have shown that agricultural emissions will take up the world’s entire carbon budget by 2050, meaning every other industry like transportation and energy would have to be zero carbon.

An Environmental-Impact Tax on Food?

Food production and agriculture are massive contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. Recent research demonstrates that the global food system is responsible for roughly 25 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. However, agriculture has never been included in American plans to reduce emissions. A brand new study suggests using an environmental-impact tax on food to combat this problem.

A study recently published in the journal Nature Climate Change states that if taxes were applied to food products based on the environmental impacts of their production, the environmental costs of agricultural activity could be substantially lowered. Specifically, climate taxes on meat and milk could lead to vital cuts in carbon emissions. The study is the first of its kind; the first global analysis of both the environmental and health impacts of a greenhouse gas on food.

The study runs through the environmental impact of each food type, figuring out the tax required to compensate for damage caused. Beef has the largest footprint, due to deforestation and massive methane emissions. Taxes of 40 percent on meat and 20 percent on milk would be substantial enough to account for the damage the production of these products causes people through climate change, the authors contend. Additionally, increasing the price of beef by 40 percent would likely result in a 13 percent drop in consumption. Some other taxes needed to compensate for climate change are 15 percent on lamb, 8.5 percent on chicken, 7 percent on pork, and 5 percent on eggs. Vegetable oil would require a 25 percent tax increase, but mostly because the initial price of the product is very low.

Some countries are already considering environmental impact taxes on food products. Denmark is one country that has already considered implementing a tax on red meat to fight climate change. The Danish Council of Ethics has recommended a tax on beef this year, coming to the conclusion that “climate change is an ethical problem.” Denmark views climate change as a direct threat to the country. Since it can’t rely on ethical consumers, it believes society must send a clear message regarding climate change through regulation. 

Optimum Tax Arrangement

The authors also took their study one step further, assessing the optimum tax arrangement for both emissions and health. After examining different tax regimes, the authors determined that the ideal policy would combine these taxes with subsidies for food, specifically healthy food such as fruits and vegetables. Moreover, maintaining a broad tax coverage–meaning many countries adopt such policies–would have the most beneficial effects.

This tax plan would reduce emissions by 1 billion tonnes a year, which is the total of the global aviation industry. The researchers were also surprised by the ability to cut emissions on such a massive level, especially when looking at the heavy impact of the dairy industry. Successful food tax policies take money generated through higher taxes and use the revenue for positive outcomes. Here, researchers advocate for utilizing tax revenue to ensure people can afford healthier diets.

Image Courtesy of Robert Couse-Baker : License (CC BY 2.0)

Many of the products that could have the greatest climate change impact also tend to be products that should be consumed in limited quantities. In the U.S., people on average consume three times the recommended amount of meat products, likely due to the relative ease of accessibility as well as a penchant for meat and dairy products. The most deadly and widespread diseases, such as heart disease, strokes, and cancer, may be curbed immensely by reducing meat and dairy consumption. Just last year, the World Health Organization classified processed meat as a carcinogen, while simultaneously classifying red meat as a probable carcinogen–specifically colorectal cancer. Thus, this new published research even noted that imposing an environmental impact tax on food products could end up saving more than half a million deaths each year in the U.S., Europe, Australia, and China. Saving significant money on health costs is a distinct possibility through these policies, as healthier diets would be both encouraged and subsidized.

Conclusion

Environmental impact taxes on food products are certainly controversial, just as the highly-debated soda taxes being implemented across the U.S. have been over the past few years. However, changing habits and behavior simply through marketing and advertisements can be nearly impossible to do. Public sensitivity regarding food choices has led to very few changes in how food is produced and consumed. Sometimes, financial incentives can be the ideal method for encouraging better and more responsible consumption.

As the global population increases, feeding the world will likely become a more daunting task. Currently, many food and tax policy issues are tied up in political knots, with governments hesitant to interfere in what is viewed as more “personal” choices. The powerful sway the food and agriculture lobbying industry has in shaping food policy cannot be ignored either. Additionally, this new research was not all positive, as there are potential negative impacts of adopting such tax regimes. Reductions in food availability and security is a possibility but could be mitigated by tailoring tax plans to each region of the globe. 

For now, environmental impact taxes on food may just be an idea rather than a reality. Such policies would impact more than just climate change, they would impact human health as well. Scientists and researchers across the globe seem to be coming to the same conclusion: to have a substantial impact in reversing climate change, dietary changes are essential to keep global warming below two degrees Celsius. This is a burgeoning field of research in both food and tax policy areas, but the current results are certainly compelling.

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Environmental Taxes: Can Food Taxes Combat Climate Change? appeared first on Law Street.

The use of herbicides and pesticides on crops has become the default method for conventional agriculture. Despite growing public concerns over the use of chemicals on our food supply, these products continue to saturate the market and are utilized at a steady rate. While researchers continue to evaluate the long term effects these potent chemicals have on humans and the environment, another chemical has been added to farmers’ ever-growing arsenal. The Environmental Protection Agency has proposed to expand the use of Enlist Duo, an effective weed killer, from 15 to 34 states. But should we be worried about the toxicity of this popular herbicide?

Enlist Duo

Originally, in 2014, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) approved the use of a brand new herbicide, Enlist Duo, for genetically modified corn and soybean crops. Enlist Duo is a chemical manufactured by Dow AgroSciences, which is a subsidiary of the Dow Chemical Company–one of the largest chemical companies in the world.

After the initial approval of Enlist Duo, the EPA asked a court to give it another opportunity to re-review the approval of the chemical. In a highly unusual move, the agency asked for a withdrawal of its own approval of the product. According to the EPA, it had reviewed the patent submitted by Dow to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and discovered a significant discrepancy. Particularly, the company claimed the product’s combination of two chemicals, 2,4-D and glyphosate, amplified each other and created a far more potent herbicide.

The EPA was concerned that Dow had not disclosed this synergy during the agency’s initial review of the product’s environmental and health risks. The agency scientists wanted to decide if there needed to be a larger no-spray zone at the edge of farm fields. Studies where rats, rabbits, birds, and fish were given one large dose of Enlist Duo showed no increased toxicity in the animals after two weeks. However, the agency never requested that Dow chronically dose rats with a combination of 2,4-D and glyphosate. Therefore, long-term health effects of the chemical mixture are unclear.

“Pesticide spraying” Image Courtesy of Jetsandzeppelins : License (CC BY 2.0)

Lawsuit

Several environmental groups, led by the National Resources Defense Council, brought a lawsuit against the EPA over Enlist Duo in 2014. The plaintiffs stated that the EPA had violated the law because it had not adequately considered the effect that Enlist Duo would have on public health and the environment, particularly the monarch butterfly population.

Dow, of course, opposed the allegations as well as the EPA’s request to vacate the original approval, suggesting instead that the court remand the registration back to the EPA for further evaluation. The company voluntarily agreed to stop sales of the product while the EPA reevaluated it. Additionally, Dow stated that it had abandoned the synergy patent in question when a thorough review revealed that the particular synergies were not in the final formulation of Enlist Duo. However, advocacy groups noted in a legal filing that Dow abandoned the patent a year after the EPA approved Enlist Duo, and only after the EPA requested synergy data from Dow.

Eventually, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the EPA’s original approval. The three-sentence judicial order did not elaborate on any reasoning for the decision. This meant that Dow could continue to market the chemical to farmers for sale, even while the EPA was re-reviewing its initial approval. The company reneged its voluntary offer to cease sales, claiming the offer was never agreed to; thus, the chemical remained on the market.

2,4-D and Human Health Effects

Last year, the Chicago Tribune released an investigative article that revealed that the EPA had changed its interpretation of a key study of 2,4-D. Essentially, the EPA changed the no-adverse-effect level of 2,4-D from 7mg/kg to 21mg/kg in rats, paving the way for the agency to reduce consumer protections. EPA scientists dropped a tenfold child-safety factor after conducting a study that concluded there was no longer evidence of a special susceptibility of children to the chemical compound. Regulators set the allowable daily intake of 2,4-D for people at 0.21mg/kg. Thus, the significant change allowed for 41 times more 2,4-D to enter the American diet than previously allowed, an astounding change.

2,4-D has been around since the 1940’s and was one of the ingredients in Agent Orange, a highly toxic and controversial herbicide used by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program during the Vietnam War. The EPA has discounted safety data showing that 2,4-D has been linked to cancer and other health problems, such as hypothyroidism and Parkinson’s disease. In order to make the change in allowable daily intake, the EPA has tossed aside research produced by Dow’s own scientists regarding kidney problems and kidney lesions caused by 2,4-D.

The overuse of chemicals, like Roundup, year after year has resulted in an increase in weed resistance, or “superweeds,” leaving companies scrambling to find more effective products to market to farmers. As a result, agriculture is now turning back toward older, more toxic products, like 2,4-D. But if you’re concerned about exposure to more toxic weedkillers, disclosures in Dow’s patent applications are very telling. The company’s application for genetically modified corn and soybeans foreshadows a day when weeds develop a resistance to both glyphosate and 2,4-D. The records show that Dow eventually envisions a day when the company must add even more traits to corn and soybeans so that the crops can survive being sprayed with up to 17 different chemicals.

Concerns Regarding Enlist Duo Use

One of the largest concerns surrounding Enlist Duo use is that Dow may have lied on its patent application. A Dow spokesperson adamantly denies that contention, stating that the EPA and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office have “different standards of data requirements” and the company’s claims that the two chemicals amplified each other were “based on a limited dataset.”

After the re-review and approval of Enlist Duo this year, the EPA has also announced a proposal to expand where the new herbicide can be used. Currently it is used to suppress weeds on corn and soybean crops. Now, the EPA is considering whether to allow its use on cotton crops. This expansion means that the new herbicide may be approved for use in 34 states, as opposed to the original 15 states. Moreover, the World Health Organization has issued findings that glyphosate and 2,4-D are probable and possible carcinogens, respectively, in addition to the other health concerns related to 2,4-D.

Monarch Butterfly Populations

In addition to human health hazards, environmentalist groups are concerned about Enlist Duo’s effect on the monarch butterfly population. Monarch butterflies have struggled in recent years, with populations in a steep decline due to the overuse of glyphosate products, like Roundup. Enlist Duo’s chemicals specifically obliterate milkweed, the plant that monarchs need to survive. A 1999 survey found that milkweed was in at least 50 percent of Iowa corn and soybean crops; by 2009, milkweed was only found in 8 percent of those same fields.

Additionally, estimations of the monarch butterfly populations have remained low, despite an initial bump in numbers, after a winter storm killed millions before they ever left the Mexican monarch reserve. Storms devastated 133 acres of trees west of Mexico City and affected over 7 percent of monarchs, with about 6.2 million butterflies frozen or killed.

“Monarch caterpillar on common milkweed in Minnesota” Image Courtesy of USFWSmidwest : License (CC BY 2.0)

The EPA’s failure to consider the effects of Enlist Duo on monarch butterflies has environmentalists extremely concerned for the ailing population, teetering on the brink of extinction.

Conclusion

The market for Enlist Duo is potentially massive, with 94 percent of soybeans and 89 percent of corn planted in the U.S. genetically modified to survive herbicides, primarily the glyphosate in Roundup. However, the EPA’s suggestion to more than double the number of states permitted to use Enlist Duo has outraged environmentalists and advocates across the country. Many people believe that reviving a World War II-era chemical to combat superweeds isn’t the best solution for the sustainability of industrial agriculture–especially when it could have a negative effect on the monarch butterfly population. The EPA contends that the chemical is “perfectly safe,” and poses no long-term health risks to humans.

The EPA is accepting public comments through December 1, 2016 regarding the agency’s proposal to expand the use and registration for Enlist Duo. 

Resources

Primary

EPA.gov: Registration of Enlist Duo

Additional

Dow: Annual Reports

NRDC: EPA Proposes to Re-Approve Combination Herbicide Enlist Duo

NRDC: EPA Unlawfully Approved Herbicide Enlist Duo

Chicago Tribune: Weedkiller’s Revival is Cause for Concern

Chicago Tribune: EPA Tosses Aside Safety Data, Says Dow Pesticide for GMOs Won’t Harm People

Chicago Tribune: Court Clears Way for Revival of Worrisome Weedkiller

Chicago Tribune: Congress Questions EPA About Dow’s Enlist Duo Pesticide Risks

CBS DFW: EPA May Increase Use Of Weed Killer Despite Concerns

The Guardian: Storms Devastate Monarch Butterflies’ Forest Habitat in Mexico

NRDC: EPA Unlawfully Approved Herbicide Enlist Duo

Nicole Zub

Nicole is a third-year law student at the University of Kentucky College of Law. She graduated in 2011 from Northeastern University with Bachelor’s in Environmental Science. When she isn’t imbibing copious amounts of caffeine, you can find her with her nose in a book or experimenting in the kitchen. Contact Nicole at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Enlist Duo: Effective New Herbicide or Monarch Butterfly Threat? appeared first on Law Street.

In the first part of Law Street’s look at the presidential candidates’ environmental policies, we evaluated Donald Trump’s plan to deregulate the energy industry and peel back many of the existing efforts to address climate change. His plans largely focus on undoing as many regulations as possible to allow greater operational freedom to American businesses and using his executive powers to undo previous president’s attempts to protect certain areas of land from fracking and mining.

In the second part, we will review Hillary Clinton’s environmental record and policy proposals. Since Donald Trump’s plans focus more toward energy production rather than protecting the environment and combating climate change, it is not surprising that Hillary Clinton’s positions do more from an environmental perspective. She has committed to some extremely ambitious goals with regards to renewable energy implementation. At the same time, she has chosen to forgo several of the traditionally recommended policy tools used to combat climate change, such as the carbon tax. Are her plans really attainable or are they just empty claims used to attract alienated far left voters to her side? Is she even likely to follow through on her promises based on her political track record? Read on to find out.

Read Part One: Where Does Donald Trump Stand on Environmental Policy?

Hillary Clinton the Environmentalist?

In stark contrast to Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton believes in climate change, believes it’s man made, and believes it’s an urgent threat. She has publicly spoken on the importance of combating climate change since the early 2000s; however, her legislative track record on major issues doesn’t always indicate that she’s driven by environmental interests. When asked her position on current issues related to the environment, such as the Keystone XL Pipeline, she has often avoided taking a stance. Clinton chose not to take a final position on the Keystone XL Pipeline for over a year, even stating that she wished to declare a position after the election ended. But in September 2015, she announced her formal opposition to the pipeline.

Whether you interpret this as anti-environment is up for debate; Clinton has maintained that her lack of a stance on the issue stemmed largely from the fact that the analysis of whether the pipeline was beneficial to national interest was incomplete. If you see her lack of a choice as her withholding a stance until all the facts were clear, then her decision is understandable. However, many environmental activists, including her primary challenger Bernie Sanders, saw the issue as much more simple: the pipeline endangers U.S. waterways and sets the United States on a track toward dependence on oil instead of investing and committing to renewables. Your interpretation of her stance largely depends on how hard-line of an environmentalist you are.

“Secretary Clinton Speaks at a Press Conference” courtesy of United States Mission Geneva; License: (CC BY-ND 2.0)

As Secretary of State, she openly supported the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which critics claim would prevent individual countries from being able to establish environmental trade regulations. Critics also argue that the TPP openly supports anti-environmental practices such as over-fishing and deforestation. As the Trans-Pacific Partnership evolved it has been modified to include wildlife protection mechanisms to promote the sustainable management of forested zones and fisheries. However, most of these efforts are considered to be small in scale, without any monitoring system in place and the long lasting negative impacts of the TPP are projected to outweigh any potential benefits.

Read More: Growing Holes in Our Ocean’s Fisheries

As a presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton has reversed her position on the Trans-Pacific Partnership as well–recently coming out against the final deal, while having supported the effort during her term as Secretary of State. It bears noting that Donald Trump has historically opposed the TPP on the grounds that it will damage American manufacturing. If Clinton hadn’t doubled back on her original stance, this would make the deal one of few issues where Trump is effectively taking a more  environmentally progressive position.

Voting Record

Clinton’s voting record also tells a confusing story. While serving as a Senator she voted for a variety of small-scale bills supported by environmental groups and co-sponsored a number of unsuccessful bills to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. But she’s also given her support to several policies that have had seriously detrimental effects on the environment. Possibly the most notable example of this is Clinton supporting the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the legendary bill that gave hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies to fossil fuel companies and allocated only a fraction of this money to renewables. The bill also contained Dick Cheney’s infamous Halliburton Loophole, which gave fracking companies special permission to inject toxic chemicals underground and essentially opened the doors for hydrofracking within the United States.

Hillary Clinton has also taken flack over the years for taking donations from fossil fuel interests. According to the most recent analysis by Open Secrets, Clinton has raised a total of $2,203,018 from energy employees, with $2,167,333 of this going to the campaign and the remaining $35,685 going to associated Super PACs. While there’s no way to connect the money she’s taken directly with particular policy decisions, some have claimed that this represents a conflict of interest in terms of her claims of being an environmentalist. Given her confusing voting record, recent shifts on controversial issues and her willingness to take fossil fuel funds, many accuse Clinton of green-washing her public persona for the election, especially in order to compete with Bernie Sanders’ pull with the environmentally-minded millennial generation. Objectively speaking, Hillary Clinton has supported environmentalism out loud but has generally done little to help the movement and on several occasions has directly supported policies that will hurt the environment.

Hillary Clinton’s Plan

Of the two front-runners, Hillary Clinton is the only one with an environmental policy at all, unless you call dismantling E.P.A. regulations an environmental policy. She has publicly committed to supporting and building upon President Obama’s Clean Power Plan as well as ensuring that the United States lives up to its COP 21 Paris Agreement commitments. Clinton and her campaign manager John Podesta have both stated that while she would like to see a carbon tax imposed, given the current makeup of Congress such a law would be highly unlikely to pass. In its place, Clinton is committing to more achievable goals, which include increasing funding for renewables, research and development, and energy efficiency, all in the context of increasing American jobs. Even though she has voted for large subsidies for fossil fuel companies in the past, she currently advocates for cutting back funding for oil and gas interests and she has proposed getting rid of tax expenditures for the fossil fuel industry.

With regard to renewable energy, Hillary Clinton has an incredibly aggressive plan to increase proliferation of renewables throughout the country. The plan has two main parts, the first being the goal of installing half of a billion solar panels across the nation during Clinton’s first term. The second is to generate enough renewable energy to power every U.S. home within a decade. To do this she wants to expand upon the Clean Power Plan with a Clean Power Challenge, which would utilize competitive grants, tax incentives, and other market-based incentives to encourage and enable states to independently work toward renewable proliferation. The challenge also places a huge emphasis on updating the grid, improving its infrastructure, and thus also the reliability and efficiency with which it transmits energy. The challenge would include the creation of a fund or a prize that would help enable low-income families and communities to install rooftop solar panels. In addition to increasing renewable energy implementation in American communities, Clinton has championed utilizing public land in the West for solar arrays and wind farms as well as opening up offshore wind farming.

If these goals sound incredibly lofty and ambitious it’s because they are. In fact, they are more ambitious than really anything proposed by anyone before, with the possible exception of Clinton’s primary challenger Bernie Sanders. Many critics have projected that it would be literally impossible to make such a policy work without a carbon tax to make renewables competitive with America’s incredibly cheap natural gas supply. The fact that Clinton has chosen to not pursue a carbon tax and instead attempt to pass smaller scale measures through Congress have made many skeptical that she’s not going to be able to actually do enough to turn her plan into reality.

Realistically, she’s almost certainly right that a carbon tax wouldn’t make it through Congress, but it’s pretty unclear if her alternative plan would be any more welcome. The Clean Power Challenge would cost $60 billion, and its main selling point to Republicans would be that it is designed to create new job opportunities. However, this doesn’t change the fact that the challenge’s commitment to renewable energy flies against what the majority of Republicans are interested in supporting. To bypass Congressional gridlock, Clinton’s plan places a strong focus on using executive power to make these things happen. While it’s not Clinton’s fault, there’s only so much she’ll be able to accomplish solely through executive action; large chunks of her plan will certainly require Congressional approval.

So What Can Actually be Accomplished?

There have been numerous claims over the years that if X or Y region was properly utilized, it could provide enough energy to power the entire United States. While it is technically possible to power this country completely with renewable energy, these claims are often touted by people who don’t understand the engineering behind energy systems or by people with a zealous and innocent belief in what policymakers are capable of or willing to do. Currently, one of the most comprehensive plans for how the United States could run on 100 percent renewable energy has been created by renewable research heavyweight Mark Z. Jacobson and the Standford Precourt Center for Energy. Even this highly ambitious plan projects that if the necessary massive social and economic change were to happen in order to make such policies possible, and it was followed to the letter, the United States still wouldn’t be able to convert fully until 2050. One of the biggest impediments to such a nationwide conversion to renewable energy is that it would require every fuel source to be changed, including the liquid fuel we use to power our cars, trucks, boats, and planes. To completely transform the American transportation sector is a borderline impossible goal because while a solar panel or a wind turbine can feasibly connect to and power any home, most of our cars still run on gas. Electric cars just don’t have the mass circulation that would make such a change possible and to completely eliminate gas-powered cars would go against fair business laws.

What’s truly interesting about Clinton’s renewable plan is that she’s one of the first major politicians to call for opening up the use of offshore wind farming. There’s a good reason why the coastal regions of the United States have been called the “Saudi Arabia of Wind.” There is a massive amount of unused energy lying along our coasts that has been incredibly difficult to tap into thus far due to the extremely high cost of launching such projects, combined with the many public interests that bitterly oppose the industry. It is nearly impossible for Hillary Clinton to live up to her goal of powering the United States on 100 percent renewable energy. However, if she aggressively pursues spreading renewable energy throughout American communities, on public lands and offshore, she could still have a gigantic impact on our renewable energy makeup. The real question is whether she’d actually be able to make any of that happen or if her efforts will be completely blocked off by Congress. Unfortunately, we will simply have to wait and see what happens if she’s elected.

One of the more original and intriguing elements of Clinton’s plan is her proposal to create a Western Water Partnership with the goal of coordinating water use between the West Coast states and the different agencies that control water use within the region. Furthermore, she has proposed creating a Water Innovation Lab dedicated to utilizing and recycling water more efficiently. This proposal is one of the first of its kind in terms of addressing water scarcity in the West on a large scale and could be part of a much-needed solution to help alleviate the burden of the California drought. Clinton has also called for significant revisions to water infrastructure in the United States, including dams, sewage, and waste water systems. This is actually one of few ideas that she and Trump might actually agree on; Trump has stated that he believes water to be a vital issue and that it’s crucial that we update our water infrastructure. However, unlike Clinton, he has given no details on how to do this and has stated that he wants to remove restrictions on drilling near waterways, which would ultimately worsen the American water crisis. Clinton has also promised to protect public lands and prioritize wildlife conservation, in stark contrast to Trump’s announcement that he would open up all federally protected land to oil and gas companies.

Conclusion

Neither candidate has a sterling history of environmentalism, but only one candidate has actually made a commitment to combat climate change. If Trump were to become president, it would be possible for him to hinder progressive environmental policy by replacing the EPA leadership with climate deniers while fighting to remove environmental regulations. If his preferred candidates to lead the EPA were to get approval from Congress, then it would be feasible for him to undo a lot of the progress that has been made thus far with American environmentalism.

Clinton has a spotty record when it comes to the environment and has made dubious choices about many important issues in the past, such as the Energy Policy Act, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and the Keystone XL Pipeline. However, her current environmental platform has made her commitment to the environment clear and she has doubled back on all of her previous controversial positions (at least with regard to the environment). Whether her current stance is due to green-washing for the 2016 election, or due to Obama’s legacy of the Clean Power Plan influencing her opinions, or due to Bernie Sanders forcing her to move further to the left in the primaries, the end result is that she’s pursuing an aggressively progressive environmental policy. Whether her methods to make that policy a reality will be effective remains to be seen, but when it comes to environmental policy, Hillary Clinton is the superior candidate.

Resources

The Atlantic: How Green is Hillary Clinton?

Business Insider: Where Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump Stand on Climate Change

Democracy Now: How Much Money has Hillary Clinton’s Campaign Taken from Fossil Fuel Companies?

Environmental Protection Agency: Summary of the Energy Policy Act of 2005

Fact Check: Clinton’s Fossil Fuel Money Revisited

Grist: Who’s Really in Charge on E.P.A. Rules? A Chat With Legal Scholar Lisa Heinzerling

High Country News: Are Hillary Clinton’s Clean Energy Goals Achievable?

Hillary Clinton Fact Sheets: Renewable Energy Vision

National Geographic: 4 Ways Green Groups say Trans-Pacific Partnership will Hurt the Environment

New York Times: Clinton’s Ambitious Clean Power Plan Would Avoid Carbon Tax

NPR: Fact Check: More on Hillary Clinton and Fossil Fuel Industry Contributions

Open Secrets: Hillary Clinton

Politico: Clinton Says her Keystone XL Position Isn’t a Flip Flop

Politico: Hacked emails from John Podesta: Clinton Disses Environmentalists in Private Meetings with Unions

Politico: The Politico Wrong-o-Meter: Fact Checking the 2016 Presidential Debate

Think Progress: Environmentalists: The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a Disaster for Climate Change

Scientific American: Hillary Clinton’s Plan to Combat Climate Change

Sierra Club: Trans Pacific Partnership

The Washington Post: Campaign Finance 2016

The Washington Post: Bernie Sanders Thumps Hillary Clinton for Keeping Mum on the Keystone XL Pipeline

The Washington Post: Energy Bill Raises Fear about Pollution, Fraud

The Washington Post: Fact Checking the Campaigns for and against the TPP Trade Deal

The White House: What Environmental and Conservation Advocates are Saying about the TPP’s Environmental Chapter

Vote Smart: Hillary Clinton’s Voting Records

Vox: Here’s What it Would take for the U.S. to Run on 100% Renewable Energy

Time: Lobbyists Celebrate Democratic Party’s New Embrace at Convention

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Where Does Hillary Clinton Stand on Environmental Policy? appeared first on Law Street.

After a year of intense debates, drama, and scandals, election day is now less than a week away. The results of the 2016 election will have a major influence on the next four years in politics with regard to a variety of issues, including gun rights, immigration, and tax reform. While environmentalism has not been a highlight of this election cycle, each president has a dramatically different approach to the issue, and the winner will have a serious impact on the future of environmentalism in the United States.

In this two-part series, we will unpack each candidate’s stance on environmentalism and their plans for the future, as well as outline exactly what is within their power to do. This first part will focus on the Republican side of the issue and analyze Donald Trump’s environmental policy. How exactly would Trump’s plan to loosen environmental regulations influence global warming as well as air and water quality? What exactly is Hilary Clinton’s renewable energy proposal and how effective would it really be? These are pressing questions that have gotten little attention throughout the campaign season.

Read Part Two: Where Does Hillary Clinton Stand on Environmental Policy?

The G.O.P. Debates: The Case of the Missing Environmentalist

First a little context. While the 17 original Republican candidates fought bitterly on a variety of issues, they were almost all united in their belief that climate change is a hoax. There were a few exceptions to this rule; Jeb Bush and John Kasich admitted that climate change was real, but not that it was caused by humans, while Carly Fiorina both admitted that climate change was real and caused by human activity. Chris Christie and Rand Paul have both publicly admitted to climate change being real and human-caused (Rand Paul even signed onto a bill agreeing to this) but both later went back on their statements, claiming that the science is still unclear.

Republican runner-up Ted Cruz briefly drew public attention with a clever scientific misinterpretation when he claimed that there has been no warming over the past 18 years, at least if you go by satellite data. His timeline of 18 years would take us all back to the uniquely hot 1997-1998 El Nino. It is true that if you only look at a short period of time and begin with a hot year, it doesn’t appear that much warming has taken place. But if you look at global temperatures over any kind of longer period, they are very clearly going nowhere but up. The methodology behind his assessment also flies in the face of the scientific community, which creates climate change models based on satellite atmospheric data combined with surface measurements, because satellite data can easily be subject to flaws due to confounding variables.

Current Republican nominee Donald Trump has had an even more outlandish position–that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by the Chinese in order to render American manufacturing less competitive. He has since both claimed that this was a joke and that he never said any such statement, although it still exists on his Twitter account and in videotaped interviews.

“Donald Trump” courtesy of Gage Skidmore; License: (CC-BY-SA 2.0)

Where the Party Stands

The Republican party is often viewed as being anti-environmentalist and generally for good reason. Currently, 182 members, or 34 percent, in Congress do not believe in climate change. While this list of climate deniers includes both Republicans and Democrats, Republicans make up the vast majority of this demographic. In fact, only eight out of 278 Republican members of Congress have taken open stances that they believe climate change is real. However, it wasn’t always the case that Republican presidential candidates also soundly rejected the existence of global warming. Both George W. Bush and John McCain did have environmental proposals when they ran for president and made public speeches about their intentions to aid the environment (although Bush’s environmental legacy was far from positive).

It is not exactly unique that environmental protection isn’t high up on the list of Republican priorities, but is unique that climate change and environmentalism were hardly even touched upon in the Republican presidential debates. The closest these topics came to being debated was within the context of which energy sources the candidates supported, which were universally oil, gas, or coal. Several of the candidates offered support for renewable proliferation to increase domestic energy security, but not at the expense of the economy or energy producers.

The internationally acclaimed COP 21 agreements came to pass without so much as a mention during the G.O.P. debates; the California drought was similarly ignored. This may be reflective of the voting base Republican politicians appeal to, which also has a high percentage of climate deniers. Interestingly enough, this is beginning to shift with time as well; where 24 percent of Republican voters believed in climate change in 2014, now 47 percent embrace the science. If the Republican party shifts enough in its position on environmentalism, it will be interesting to see if Republican politicians will also be forced to change their stances.

Donald J. Trump: Get Rid of All Regulations

Republican nominee Donald Trump does seem to have a consistent view on whether climate change is real (unless you count being confused as to whether or not he blames the Chinese for it). Historically, he has always claimed that climate change is a hoax. His campaign manager, Kellyanne Conway, publicly stated that, while Trump acknowledges that temperatures are rising globally, he doesn’t believe that human activity has had any influence over this. Trump’s running mate Mike Pence, however, spoke on CNN a day after the first debate to say that climate change was definitely real and man-made–although he reiterated Trump’s general stance that no environmental policies should be put into place that would hurt businesses or cost jobs.

Trump’s environmental policy logically follows his general denial of climate change as relevant or real. Trump’s original plan was to entirely abolish the Environmental Protection Agency–the government body that designs new environmental rules and regulations (working together with the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, an umbrella department within the Office of Management and Budget). While it is not within his power to do so unilaterally, one of the most important ways a President can influence energy policy is by choosing a new administration for the EPA. Each new President can appoint a new Administrator, who must be approved by Congress. If the president’s recommendation is approved, that further gives him or her the power to reshape both the upper positions of the EPA and the direction the agency will take.

Trump’s proposed selection to lead the EPA transition team is none other than Myron Ebell, the director of the Center for Energy and the Environment at the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute, a group that uses bogus science to question “global warming alarmism.” Ebell is a famous climate denier and believes that Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which will dramatically shift the future of energy production in the United States, is not only a huge waste of government funds but also illegal because of the undue burden the regulations place on American businesses. At this time it’s unclear if Trump’s intention is to attempt to make Ebell the new EPA Administrator, but his current position as leader of the team puts him at the top of the suspected list. Alongside Ebell, the EPA transition team includes Republican energy lobbyist Mike Mckenna and former Bush Administration Interior Department solicitor David Bernhardt.

In the event that Trump is able to get his EPA transition team approved by Congress (and they will almost certainly face some opposition), they would be well equipped to try to dismantle the Clean Power Plan and remove many environmental regulations. Which brings us to the simple cornerstone of Trump’s environmental policy: remove as many regulations as possible. Trump has said that he will fight to do away with all regulations he believes are unnecessary in order to allow American businesses more operational freedom and greater room to grow.

In terms of Republican politicians, this position is in no way unique, but few presidential candidates have taken such a hard line stance against previously established environmental regulations (runner-up Ted Cruz would be fighting a very similar battle right now). Trump’s plan includes freeing up protected federal land, both on and offshore, for oil and gas drilling. Interestingly, designating an area as federally protected government land under the Antiquities Act is one of the few ways a president can directly use their executive authority to protect the environment. George W. Bush and Bill Clinton are both known for designating huge areas of land as federally protected, Clinton doing so several times specifically to prevent oil and gas companies from drilling in certain areas. For Trump to attempt to use executive power to remove these designations is a little like one president fighting directly with the legacy of a previous president.

More Fossil Fuels

Trump has said he would open up these swaths of federal land for coal mining leases and remove some of the rules that protect waterways throughout the nation from drilling, which is of concern if you’re an environmentalist or if you drink water. Trump is, in fact, one of few politicians still talking about the fantasy power source of “clean coal” in 2016. The general concept behind clean coal is to burn coal as efficiently as possible and then capture the emissions afterward, making it as “clean” as possible. While it’s true that we have made coal cleaner, it’s impossible to burn coal without some pollution. Clean coal has proven much more expensive and difficult to scale than its early proponents thought, making it far from a viable method to reduce carbon emissions. This is particularly true when less expensive and more efficient alternatives exist.

Trump’s focus on coal in particular is interesting, because coal as an energy source has dropped significantly in popularity and coal-fired power plants are rarely built these days (President Obama, coming from coal-heavy Illinois, also once preached the benefits of the mythical Clean Coal, although he’s since done an 180 on the issue and one of the key focuses of his Clean Power Plan is to regulate and reduce coal emissions by as much as possible).

Trump has made public that he views regulations on pollution as an obstacle to the success of business and jobs in America, although research indicates that over the past few decades the negative impacts of regulation on business have been modest and the demand for cleaner technology has in the past repeatedly stimulated innovation and growth in the private tech industry. If his EPA team was driven by the goal to free up businesses from all regulation, this would also involve dismantling key provisions of the Clean Water act and Clean Air Act. While a president can’t literally change the provisions of these acts, the administration he or she puts in place can reinterpret them and Trump could effectively remove the enforcement mechanisms that enable these acts to have their nationwide impact. Trump has, in fact, publicly stated that he would review the EPA endangerment findings, which are used to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. To strip away the EPA’s ability to regulate air and waterborne pollution would dramatically increase the United States’ role as a global polluter and worsen public health throughout the United States.

Conclusion

It’s important to look at our current political context to see if Trump really could do any of what he proposes. His selection of an EPA transition team of climate deniers is a little ridiculous and simply unrealistic considering that any new administrator could be blocked by Democrats in the Senate. A figure as divisive as Myron Ebell, or any of the other members of the team, will simply not make it through Congress. If Trump does become president he will most likely have to consider a more neutral person to take the EPA Administrator role.

The fact that Congress is largely deadlocked between the two parties on environmental issues has been and will be a huge obstacle for any president trying to accomplish anything (a problem that extends far beyond the environment). Because of this gridlock, nearly all political efforts to combat climate change have had to come through executive action, a pattern that can be easily seen throughout Obama’s two terms. Trump’s commitment to reversing Obama’s executive actions would potentially mean undoing much of the last eight years of environmental policy efforts, worsening air and water quality and giving fossil fuel companies greater access to federal land for fracking and drilling. By specifically using executive power to accomplish this, it would be within Trump’s hands to dramatically peel back the progress that the environmental movement has made in the United States. His plans should be taken seriously by American voters as a threat to the future of our public health and energy security and to the ever worsening global problem of climate change.

Resources

The Blaze: Mike Pence Breaks From Trump, Says Humans Have a Hand in Climate Change

Business Insider: Where Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump Stand on Climate Change

CBS News: Where the 2016 Republican Candidates Stand on Climate Change

CNN: Campaign Manager: Trump Does Not Believe Climate Change is Man Made

Competitive Enterprise Institute: Myron Ebell

The Economist: Green Tape: Environmental Regulations May Not Cost as Much as Governments or Businesses Fear

Fortune: How Donald Trump’s Energy Policies Are All About Removing Regulations

Grist: How Obama Went from Being Coal’s Top Cheerleader to its No. 1 Enemy

Governing: Economic Engines: Do Environmental Regulations Hurt the Economy?

Grist: Who’s Really in Charge on EPA Rules? A Chat With Legal Scholar Lisa Heinzerling

Grist: Why is Trump so Fixated on Abolishing the EPA?

The Hill: Top Climate Skeptic to Lead Trump’s EPA Transition Team

Politico: The Politico Wrong-o-Meter: Fact Checking the 2016 Presidential Debate

Think Progress: The Anti-Science Climate Denier Caucus

Think Progress: Christie Says He’s Not ‘Relying on any Scientists’ to Inform Climate Change Views

Think Progress: The Environmental Implications of a Trump Presidency

Scientific American: Many More Republicans Now Believe in Climate Change

Scientific American: Trump Picks Top Climate Skeptic to Lead EPA Transition Team

The Washington Post: Ted Cruz Keeps Saying that Satellites Don’t Show Global Warming: Here’s the Problem

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Where Does Donald Trump Stand on Environmental Policy? appeared first on Law Street.

The infrastructure that moves energy throughout the United States is called the macrogrid, a colossal system that provides power from 7,200 power plants to 120 million homes and businesses over 300,000 miles of transmission lines. While these numbers may be impressive, the macrogrid is actually one of the most outdated and inefficient pieces of critical infrastructure in the United States. Energy is lost through moving energy over long distances using aging power lines as well as when it is converted from AC to DC for electronic devices. The macrogrid is also particularly vulnerable to severe weather events, which caused 679 blackouts between 2003 and 2010 and cost between $18 to $33 billion annually in grid maintenance. The macrogrid has a huge job but its massive size and America’s complete dependence on it have created vulnerabilities in the nation’s energy system. Its interconnectedness means that if one part of the grid is damaged, everyone will suffer.

Microgrids: The Solution?

Enter the newly popular phenomenon of Microgrids. Microgrids are small energy distribution centers that are localized to a specific area, like a certain number of homes or businesses. Microgrids are normally attached to the macrogrid, but in the case of damage to the larger grid, a microgrid can separate and function independently, continuing to provide power to the buildings connected to it. Because of this ability, microgrids can offer a much higher level of energy security to Americans.

As a novel infrastructure design, microgrids also have the potential to benefit the environment in several ways. The first of these ways is by improved efficiency; power plants waste huge amounts of energy during production and additional power is lost during electrical conversion and movement through power lines. Because microgrids are localized to the areas they power, they simply need to transport their power over much shorter distances, which also allows them to skip over electrical conversions. Furthermore, microgrids provide opportunities for small-scale renewable implementation. Building large renewable projects–like wind farms or solar fields–can be incredibly expensive and often face opposition from a range of groups while requiring complex permitting processes. However, the compact and localized nature of microgrids drastically reduces these challenges, providing a new opportunity for increased clean energy distribution.

Hurricane Sandy: An Important Wake-up Call

The real impetus for microgrid policy started with Hurricane Sandy, an event so devastating that it required lawmakers to rethink the idea of energy security. Superstorm Sandy left 8.5 million people huddled without power for days, effectively immobilizing one of the world’s largest cities. Not only was energy shut off for homes and business, but critical structures such as hospitals and police stations were also cut off, meaning some of the most necessary community services were stripped of their functionality.

The metaphoric light in the dark came in the form of two microgrids in New York and New Jersey. The NYU microgrid kept power flowing to 22 buildings and heat to 37 buildings and the Princeton University Microgrid managed to provide power to a shocking 4,000 apartments, 35 high rise buildings, three shopping centers, and two schools for three days. The terrible damage caused by Sandy highlighted the serious vulnerability of our energy infrastructure and provided a powerful example of how microgrids can be useful.

“Hurricane Sandy power outage in Lower Manhattan, New York” courtesy of Lisa Bettany via Flickr

Different Models of Development

The majority of attention and investment in microgrids is happening in six states: New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Maryland, California, and Massachusetts. It’s no coincidence that, with the exception of California, most of the states that have taken an interest in microgrids are in the Northeast–a particularly storm-vulnerable region of the United States. California actually stands out from these other states because it chose to commit primarily to renewable energy in its microgrid projects. In 2014, California state legislature dedicated $26.5 million to the construction of microgrids that heavily integrate renewables, with $6 million going directly to microgrids that could power electric cars. A large part of this policy decision was made in order to meet California’s aggressive statewide renewable energy target of 50 percent by 2020, and it stands out as one of the first states to see the technology’s potential for clean energy.

Unfortunately, California is unique in its environmental approach to microgrids, while the majority of states are dedicating the bulk of their research toward natural gas and diesel generators rather than solar, hydro, or wind. The primary concern of most states is reliability before clean energy production, which makes sense considering the fact that California doesn’t face the same threats to its energy security as the other areas. However, this does not mean that these microgrids won’t make an impact; by design, microgrids are more energy efficient than the traditional macrogrid and use energy in a more environmentally friendly manner.

Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York provide interesting examples of different policies for microgrid development. Connecticut was the first state to put serious money into the movement, holding a competition for the best microgrid designs and awarding $18 million in 2013 to nine different communities for the construction of microgrids. Connecticut followed this initial investment with a $15 million competition and currently leads the United States in terms of overall installed capacity. Connecticut’s competition funding method is a novel approach because the technology is so young and there’s very little research on the best possible ways to use it. By allowing different communities to design independent projects, the state acknowledged that the varying needs and geographic characteristics of different regions will require different microgrids. This also gives it an opportunity to see different approaches to the technology in action and get a sense of what the best possible approaches may be.

New Jersey, alternatively, decided to take a top-down approach to microgrid development and have the state Department of Energy decide where the funding should go, what models should be developed, and where they should go. The New Jersey transit system is the third largest in the world and provides the only public link between New York and New Jersey. Hurricane Sandy devastated the New Jersey transit system and, accordingly, it became the primary focus for microgrid development in the state. Governor Chris Christie dedicated $1 million for a project conducted by the New Jersey Public Utilities Board working together with the U.S. Department of Energy to construct a microgrid that could sustain the transit system. Since then, New Jersey has dedicated a staggering $200 million to their Energy Resilience Bank for the development of microgrids throughout the state.

In some ways, the Connecticut and Jersey models run parallel to one another. Connecticut (with a comparatively small amount of funds) allowed communities to do the research, design, and construction for their projects, requiring only that they build community service microgrids rather than single service projects. New Jersey, on the other hand, decided to let state departments perform all the work themselves and focused on one particular model: the Distributed Energy Resources Customer Adoption Model.

“Army Engineer Spur Development of Tactical Microgrids” courtesy of U.S. Army RDECOM via Flikr

In New York, following the devastation from Hurricane Sandy, Governor Cuomo and the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) began a massive effort to create the Reforming the Energy Vision, which was finally released in 2016. REV detailed plans to change the future of New York’s energy infrastructure and launched the New York Prize Microgrid Competition to promote the development of microgrids throughout the state.

New York based its plan on the Connecticut model of competition; however, New York stands out from other states because it made the unique decision to separate the competition into three stages. The very first stage awarded $100,000 to communities throughout the state to begin the design for their project. Feasibility studies are generally high-cost and high-risk projects because negative returns mean the initial investment was a waste. By removing the economic barrier of conducting the initial feasibility studies, New York allowed 83 communities (in contrast to Connecticut’s nine communities) to participate in this first stage competition, thereby creating an opportunity for many more microgrids to be built. The second stage awards $1 million for the design of the project and the final stage awards $10 million for the construction. While many of the communities that enter the first stage won’t progress to the second and third, NYSERDA predicts that once feasibility studies have already been designed, many communities that don’t pass on to the final stages will still be able to attract outside investors and complete their projects independently.

Potential Environmental Impacts

Do microgrids have promise as a pro-environment technology? Definitely, but it’s a little more complicated than that. Renewables have several major problems: they don’t produce a lot of energy, they don’t produce regular, reliable energy and they’re expensive. Wind only provides energy while the wind is blowing and solar only produces energy during the daytime. Hydropower provides more regular energy but has a nightmarish permitting process and is generally avoided for microgrid projects (only one of the 83 communities in the New York Prize Microgrid Competition tried to utilize hydro). While more and more battery systems are constantly being developed, current energy storage technology is just not advanced enough to make solar and wind storage effective to provide large amounts of power.

As a side note of interest, there are many engineers out there who believe that the next major energy revolution will come in the form of effective batteries, which would change the way we produce and utilize energy while making renewable energy endlessly more powerful. Unfortunately, we really aren’t at this point yet, which means that it’s very difficult for renewable technologies to be the sole energy provider for a microgrid, especially in the case of a serious outage. The reliability-first model of microgrid design means that the most important function of that model is its ability to support homes and businesses without fail in case of damage to the grid.

The cost of renewables is also a serious obstacle, but in a very different way than when constructing a large-scale solar or wind operation. The price per kilowatt of most renewables has actually dropped significantly, making them legitimately competitive technologies. However, microgrids are an inherently expensive project and most large utilities can already provide relatively low fossil fuel prices, at least for natural gas. In order to make a microgrid a cost effective project, a community must use technologies that will have power production and efficiency rates that are high enough that it makes economic sense not to buy energy from the macrogrid.

The technology that has taken the central role in microgrid development is cogeneration, also known as Combined Heat and Power. Normally up to 65 percent of energy is burned off as heat and wasted during production, which is a large part of the reason power plants are so inefficient. Cogeneration, however, traps this heat waste and uses it to provide thermal power to the areas it services. Energy from the grid–after production waste, conversion waste, and transmission waste–is typically between 20 to 25 percent preserved. Any given cogeneration unit can’t produce enough energy at the scale that a power plant can, making them inefficient for providing power to huge numbers of customers. However, cogeneration’s waste-heat recovery can produce energy with at rates up to 60 to 80 percent efficiency, making it the ideal technology to support a small, localized system. Cogeneration utilizes natural gas, but in a substantially more effective manner than the traditional macrogrid does. Natural gas fuel cells have also gotten attention for their high efficiency, although currently, it’s difficult to make them cost effective.

All of this doesn’t mean that renewables have no place in the microgrid movement. While California is the only state to dedicate their projects completely to renewable power, every state has a Renewable Energy Target and microgrids provide a great way to reach that target without large scale projects. New York, for instance, required each of its 83 communities designing microgrids to incorporate renewables in some way into their plans.

Renewables also combine well with other technologies. Solar generation can provide a significant source of energy during the day, but may not be able to meet peak electricity demand in the early evening. Because of this, solar and cogeneration can be combined to work well together. Cogeneration provides the “base load”–or the minimal amount of energy that will always be used consistently throughout the day–and solar can offset or even become a substitute during the day. In this way, natural gas provides stability while solar energy reduces emissions whenever possible.

Conclusion

While research and investment in microgrids are expanding, the movement is still developing and the technologies continue to evolve. It’s difficult to say exactly how the microgrid movement will progress and if it will spread to regions outside of the Northeast and California. It’s also difficult to predict whether policymakers will choose to stick with the popular bottom-up style of microgrid development or if they will go to the New Jersey route and choose to mandate certain models and patterns of development. There’s also the potential for large energy businesses like the fossil fuel industry to start to lobby against decentralized power and seriously impede progress.

However, the benefits of microgrids are very real. Americans depend on the outdated macrogrid for our daily lives and as the infrastructure grows older and storms become more frequent and more severe, we only become increasingly vulnerable. Microgrids provide a real opportunity to improve energy security throughout the United States and to produce energy in a more environmentally friendly way, both by increasing the efficiency of our energy sources and increasing the implementation of renewables.

Resources

Boeing: Introduction to Microgrids

Center for Climate and Energy Solutions: Cogeneration

E & E Publishing: LLC: Microgrids Become Reality as Superstorm Sandy’s Anniversary Nears

GreenTech Media: California Governor Jerry Brown Calls for 50 Percent Renewables by 2030

GreenTech Media: California Ready to Fund the Next Wave of Microgrids Paired With Renewables and Storage

GreenTech Media: New Jersey Launches $200 million Energy Resilience Bank for Microgrids and Distributed Energy

Greenbiz: New Jersey Becomes Latest State to Invest in Microgrids

Inside Energy: Lost in Transmission: How Much Electricity Disappears Between a Power Plant and Your Plug?

Solar Schools: Advantages and Disadvantages of Renewables

Microgrid Knowledge: States Leading on Microgrids…California, Connecticut, Maryland (Part 1)

NYSERDA: NY Prize Microgrid Competition

Princeton University: Two Years After Hurricane Sandy, Recognition of Princeton’s Microgrid Still Surges

U.S. Energy Information Administration: Energy in Brief

Editor’s Note: This post has been corrected to clarify the way in which solar electricity can be with electricity from natural gas as well as the way energy is lost through transmission and conversion.

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Microgrids: The Future of Smarter Grid Design and Energy Stability appeared first on Law Street.

We buy products, use them, and then dispose of them. After we’re done with our stuff, we throw it in the trash and someone comes to take it away–out of sight, out of mind. But trash doesn’t really disappear; it takes up a larger and larger physical presence on our planet each year. In 2012, the world produced 2.6 trillion pounds of waste, all of which had to be disposed of. About 46 percent of that was organic waste, 17 percent paper, 10 percent plastic, 5 percent glass, 4 percent metal, and another 18 percent comprised of miscellaneous other materials.

Handled incorrectly, this 2.6 trillion pound mess can cause serious problems for the environment, from polluting freshwater to suffocating unsuspecting animals looking for a meal. Some of our trash gets buried underground, some of it gets burned, and some is thrown into the ocean. There are solutions that would allow trash to be made useful again, including composting and recycling. Organic waste, which makes up the majority of worldwide waste, can be turned into fertilizer and certain materials can be recycled to build new products. Read on to learn how different waste disposal methods work and what their exact impacts are on our planet.

Landfills

The vast majority of trash worldwide goes into landfills, which basically means that it’s buried in a huge hole in the ground. Generally, the bottom is covered with a liner, made out of clay or synthetic materials, that acts as a barrier preventing the trash from leaking into the surrounding environment. The waste is collected in different cells and as the cells fill up, they are covered and a new layer, or “lift,” is started above them. Over time, landfills produce a liquid called leachate that consists of dissolved and suspended trash materials. Because of this, landfills must also have a drainage system that collects the highly polluting leachate and stores it on site or at a wastewater plant for treatment. If leachate breaks through the liner, it can pollute ecosystems and ruin groundwater aquifers, making groundwater monitoring around landfills extremely important.

As the trash degrades, it releases carbon dioxide and methane, which inevitably rise up into the atmosphere. Often, the water soluble carbon dioxide will leave the landfill with the leachate, but methane release poses a serious problem to the environment. To control emissions, methane must be captured and contained in storage wells, where it is either burned off and turned into the less potent carbon dioxide or used as a power source. Because landfills create methane on their own and save the trouble of drilling for it, some companies have started to use landfill gas-to-energy systems, using the methane to generate power for the surrounding areas.

As a disposal method, landfills are far from perfect. Maintaining one is a constant struggle to control the polluting leachate released below and the heat-trapping greenhouse gasses that escape above. Furthermore, landfills are intended for waste containment, not waste elimination. The trash doesn’t go anywhere, it simply sits in the cells and piles up to greater and greater heights as the population increases and waste streams continue to grow larger. In this sense, landfills can be thought of as one of the most permanent things modern humans have created, giant holes filled with trash that will still be on earth long after the pyramids crumble.

“Landfill” courtesy of Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources via Flickr

However, landfilling waste is still preferable to, for instance, doing nothing with it. Some waste simply can’t be recycled or composted, and this stuff still needs a place to go. If we don’t contain our trash it enters the world and its ecosystems as litter and can cause great damage to the areas it inhabits. Possibly the most famous example of this is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a vast area of floating litter that extends between North America’s Western Coast and Japan. The trash is caught in a series of underwater currents called the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, which carries it in a perpetual vortex. The trash is comprised of countless non-biodegradable items, such as clothes, machinery, and a giant soup of microplastics. Furthermore, the majority (about 70 percent) of marine debris sinks, which means that below the surface of the garbage patch, beyond where we can see, there may be an ocean floor covered with the denser trash that’s been dumped in the water.

Much of the debris in the ocean was dumped by cargo ships and commercial fishing vessels, but plenty of it was simply cast off from different countries. We do need a place to put all this stuff and landfills provide an important service in this sense. However, one of the big problems with landfills is that much of what’s inside of them doesn’t need to be there; if we were to remove the recyclables and organic waste from landfills it would cause them to take up significantly less space.

Can Recycling be an Effective Solution?

Some materials, paper, plastic, glass, and various metals can be recycled and used again to create new products (a lesser known recyclable material is actually cooking oil, which can be converted into biofuel for use as an energy source). Recycling is one of the most sustainable alternative methods of waste disposal out there. However, not everything can be recycled and even then, most recycling processes generally have low levels of efficiency.

Plastics, for instance, have a huge presence in ecosystems around the globe. Currently, we’re heading toward having more pounds of plastic in the ocean than living creatures. Plastic can suffocate animals that accidentally consume it and can also release harmful phthalates into the surrounding environment. Recycling is absolutely necessary if we want to save marine and land ecosystems from plastic litter. However, only one major type of plastic called thermoplastics, which can be softened by heat, are able to be recycled. The other major category, thermosets, cannot be remolded with heat. Because they can’t be recycled, it’s crucially important that they are still sent to a landfill because they can cause environmental harm if stored improperly.

Thermoplastics don’t undergo chemical changes when they’re exposed to heat and can be melted down and reformed into new products, making them work well as recyclables. While recycling a piece of plastic is never 100 percent efficient (and usually far from it), reusing plastics still has a powerful impact on the industry. About 60 percent of energy is saved when creating a plastic product out of recyclables instead of raw materials, and every piece of plastic that is recycled represents a piece that isn’t in a landfill, or worse, an ocean.

Paper, like plastic, has a fairly low level of efficiency when recycled. Pieces of paper must be shredded down before they can be reused, which continuously makes the fibers shorter and shorter. After five to seven times through the system, fibers become frayed to uselessness. In fact, aluminum, copper, and glass are the only materials that can be recycled endlessly. While they all go through different processes, each essentially amounts to exposing the material to extreme heat and breaking it down to be rebuilt in a new form. However, due to the high cost of reprocessing glass, many businesses don’t actually accept glass waste, or will merely throw it out when they receive it.

While electronic waste is made out of several recyclable metals, it also contains a number of rare earth metals, which can be dangerous when released into the environment or exposed to humans. Because of this, e-waste must be disposed of and recycled in a very particular way. Check out this previous Law Street article for an in-depth breakdown of global e-waste disposal.

“Landfill” courtesy of “Aaron ‘tango’ Tang via Flickr“

Composting

Organic waste makes up a staggering 46 percent of waste worldwide. Despite this, proper food waste disposal methods are rarely talked about. About two-thirds of the average household waste can be recycled; if citizens everywhere adopted the practice it would make a huge difference in the global waste problem. Adding compost to a garden can dramatically increase the health of the soil by neutralizing ph and binding soil particles together, enabling them to better retain water and nutrients.

One problem with composting is that most people don’t see any value to it. Unless you’re interested in personally growing something, compost won’t be useful to you. If you live in an urban setting, it most likely won’t be useful to anyone near you either. Some cities have programs that collect compostable waste in neighborhoods to supply nearby farms. This gives the people in the area reason to adopt the practice and provides a free source of fertilizer for farmers; it can also have the added benefit of educating people on problems of organic waste that they may have been unaware of.

The Role of Incineration

Incineration is one of the more controversial methods of waste disposal out there and it’s been growing rapidly in recent years, especially in Scandinavian countries. This process either burns (or melts down and then burns) all waste that enters a waste plant to convert it into energy. Many love incineration and its proponents say that it makes trash disappear, leaving no physical burden behind while also providing the useful service of generating energy. The temperatures inside incinerators are often so high that they also destroy harmful chemicals and pathogens, making them ideal for the disposal of hazardous waste. While incineration is practiced widely throughout Scandinavia, Norway is currently the world’s leader in turning trash into energy. Norway, in fact, imports trash from other European countries, earning it a profit and a free source of power.

Incineration does offer a way to change the way trash is looked at from a burden to a commodity. It’s nothing new for countries, states, and territories to export their waste for another area to deal with, but generally the importer only gains profit, and still has to deal with the burden itself. In the United States, for instance, about 17 percent of municipal waste crosses a state boundary and the trash trade was a $4 billion dollar industry in 2005. However, the trash market inevitably creates waste havens in states that decide to commit to the industry and build mega-landfills. Pennsylvania, for instance, is the trash capital of the country, importing 10 million tons of waste each year. This can benefit local economies, but is widely hated by the people who live in them. Many argue that incineration could make a significant difference in the way trash importing and exporting is handled. If waste is looked upon as a useful source of energy instead of something to be buried in the ground, then a state like Pennsylvania could use its position in the market to generate domestic energy instead of increasing the size of its dumps.

However, incineration is not without serious drawbacks. The trash burning process creates toxic emissions, although particulate matter, ash, and, toxins are collected in mandatory filters. As the ash builds up, it must be stored carefully on-site, and there’s currently no real way to treat or remove it. It’s also been argued that very small particles of ash and dioxins can still make their way through filters, which could be very dangerous to the health of those living near an incinerator. Furthermore, incinerators have an adverse effect on climate change, producing more carbon dioxide and mercury even than coal-fired power plants. They also release nitrous oxide, and ammonia, and organic carbon. Valuable recyclable materials such as glass, metal, and plastic, are completely destroyed during incineration, which is a huge waste of resources that could otherwise be recycled. The EPA concluded in a 2009 study that if the United States were to adopt large-scale recycling and composting, this could mitigate up to 42 percent of our national emissions. Incineration, on the other hand, destroys recyclables and produces emissions, further exacerbating the problem of global warming.

Conclusion

The world produces a lot of trash and we’re only going to produce more as time goes on. The worst possible option is to do nothing with all this trash and simply leave it to cover our forests and oceans. Landfilling is an effective alternative to this, making sure that all the trash is contained and, ideally monitored and controlled so it won’t hurt the environment. However, the landfills fill up and we keep making more trash. Responsible waste management requires us to keep sustainability in mind when we think about the way we dispose of our waste and what we send to the landfill.

Many governments advocate for waste to energy incineration, but ultimately this will only release more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and destroy valuable resources. Widespread composting, alternatively, could eliminate just about half of all the world’s waste, an absolutely enormous difference. While not every material can be recycled and not every recycling process is perfectly efficient, reusing our products can still have a huge impact by reducing the need to mine for more resources and the energy needed to process new products. If we want to make our trash more sustainable, then recycling and composting need to be the cornerstones of global waste disposal.

References

Aljazeera: Dirty Power: Sweden Wants Your Garbage for Energy

Apartment Therapy: What Really Happens to all that Stuff You Recycle

The Atlantic: 2.6 Trillion Pounds of Garbage: Where Does the World’s Trash Go?

Eco Ants: Waste Incineration

Bright Hub Engineering: Pros and Cons of Incineration for Landfill Relief

Earth 911: The Benefits of Using Compost in Your Garden

Environmental Protection Agency: Opportunities to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions through Materials and Land Management Practices

The Guardian: Full Scale of Plastic in the World’s Oceans Revealed for the First Time

The Guardian: Trash to Cash: Norway Leads the Way in Turning Waste into Energy

Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives: Incinerators: Myths vs. Facts about “Waste to Energy”

International Panel on Climate Change: Emissions in Waste Incineration 

MRC Polymers: Recycling Facts

National Geographic: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

The Leachate Expert Website: What is Leachate?

Less is More: What Happens to Trash

Philadelphia: Is Pennsylvania America’s Dumping Ground?

The Trash Blog: Trash Trade in the U.S.

Republic Services: Landfill Science

SF Gate: How Many Times can Something be Recycled?

The Wall Street Journal: High Costs Put Cracks in Glass Recycling Programs

The Warren: Resistant Materials: Plastics

Washington Post: By 2050, There Will be More Plastic than Fish in the World’s Oceans, Study Says

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post What Really Happens to Your Trash? appeared first on Law Street.

Seafood is the primary source of protein and nutrition for about three billion people worldwide, especially in small island states and poor coastal areas. Fishing is also an important source of income for about 200 million people, with 97 percent of fishers in the developing world. However, as the global population has risen dramatically over the past century, the quantity of fish caught every year has increased as well. Due to the sheer size of the demand for seafood, and the fact that the market generally revolves around a few select kinds of fish, the growth in fishing has caused considerable damage to ocean fisheries.

Many populations of fish have become threatened, and in some areas, they have died off completely. As fish die out, ocean biodiversity suffers and the fishers’ ability to sustain their livelihood is threatened. There are several varying models of exactly how threatened the fish industry is, and there’s often disagreement between conservationist scientists and market experts. Read on to find out more about what exactly is happening with our fisheries and the different possible solutions.

So How Bad is it Exactly?

It is widely accepted that ocean fisheries are over-exploited, although there’s plenty of disagreement on exactly what that means for the future. One of the first major examples of fish stocks losing their stability happened in the Gulf of Maine, where a massive restriction on cod fishing was placed all along the gulf, from Cape Cod to Nova Scotia. The cod stock in the area had dropped to such low levels due to intensive fishing practices that the federal government was forced to scale back the industry in order to save the species. Unfortunately, this also meant that fishers, in order to leave the cod undisturbed, had to reduce their catch of several other species, including pollock, haddock, and hake, because they share the same feeding ground on the ocean floor. This move caused an uproar within coastal communities, many of which depended on fishing as a major source of employment and income for their citizens. Fishing reductions both cut off a local food supply and disrupt a way of life.

The same problem is happening in countless fisheries across the planet, and if a fishery shuts down, similar consequences will be felt in its surrounding areas. This can be particularly disastrous in coastal or island communities in the developing world where fish provide the central or only source of food and employment.

The first major analysis of global fisheries was conducted in 2006 by the marine research ecologist Boris Worm and a team of Stanford researchers. Worm and his team analyzed 48 different marine protected areas and then combined their findings with global catch data from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization. As a result, they were able to track the biodiversity of 12 coastal areas over 1,000 years. They found that biodiversity had dropped off rapidly over the last millennium and that the collapse of any given species is likely to disrupt the entire ecosystem, increasing the threat to other species. That pattern has caused the loss of biodiversity to move at a rapid and increasing rate throughout history as we approach the modern day. They predicted that without a massive change in the way we fish and a concerted effort to create more restoration areas for threatened species, all global fisheries would collapse by 2050.

This estimate was almost immediately attacked by fishery scientist Ray Hilborn, who claimed that the projections were widely inaccurate and sensationalist. Two movements, ecologists (who are generally conservationist minded) and fishery scientists (who are generally economically or market-minded) butted heads on their projections for years until remarkably, they decided to work together. Boris Worm, Ray Hilborn, and their teams combined their data sets and evaluation tools to publish a paper together in 2009. The results from their combined efforts show, with some optimism, that several of earth’s ecosystems that were thought to be dying out have been steadily recovering. However, they also calculated that 63 percent of global fish stocks need to be rebuilt, requiring a dramatic reduction in global catch. They advised catch restrictions, modifications, closed off restoration areas, and a reassessment of the fishing methods used by international commercial fleets.

Destructive Fishing Methods

A major reason for our current situation is the way in which we actually fish. As the demand for fish increased over time, innovations in hunting methods progressed rapidly as well. Unfortunately, this led to the widespread use of several highly destructive fishing techniques, such as bottom trawling, purse seining, longline fishing, gillnetting, and a variety of other less commonly used methods.

Longlining involves stringing down weighted lines below fishing ships. Each of these lines is covered with hooks running vertically down the line, which allows for fish to be caught at each point on the line where a hook is attached. These lines can be up to 50 miles long and present the risk of hooking sea turtles, sharks, and aquatic birds because much of the bait is close to the surface. Because of this, experts say that longlines should be sunk at deeper levels to reduce this problem. However, longlining is still in many ways one of the least invasive forms of hunting used by commercial fisheries, whereas the other three methods all make use of giant nets in different ways. Purse seining drags a vertically weighted net in a circle to entrap fish in the center. The circle is eventually drawn smaller and smaller until the fish are trapped. Gillnetting suspends nets underwater with weights on the bottom and buoyed floaters on the top. The nets are made of very thin mesh and are almost invisible, causing many fish to try to swim right through them and get caught. Trawling drags a weighted net along the ocean floor, scooping up anything that it passes over.

The primary problem with these three methods is that they result in high rates of bycatch, which is the catching of fish that are considered to have no commercial value. Fish that are caught but can’t be sold die, which causes huge amounts of unnecessary damage to populations of fish outside of what we actually consume and attempt to hunt for. Trawling, in particular, has come under public scrutiny because the method is uniquely invasive. As the net drags along the ocean floor, not only does it generate huge quantities of bycatch, it also indiscriminately destroys the ecosystem that covers the ocean’s bottom, including ancient animal habitats and coral reefs that have existed for centuries. Trawling is also not to be confused with trolling, a method of fishing with which boats cast lines behind them and tow them forward. This technique primarily attracts a few species of fish–such as salmon, tuna, and mahi-mahi–and follows fast moving targets, resulting in one of the lowest rates of bycatch.

Market Limitations

Problems with bycatch are further compounded by the fact that there are only a few species of fish that are generally hunted and eaten. Actually, as Paul Greenberg notes in his critically acclaimed book, “Four Fish,” the fish market revolves around just four types of fish: salmon, tuna, bass, and cod. (The book also points out that the modern livestock industry has decreased in biodiversity over time and now only revolves around a few major animals as well. The same problem can be seen in agriculture with the increasing prevalence of monocultures that have led many species of vegetables and grains to die out).

Our love of these specific kinds of fish makes them the only species considered commercially viable, and therefore, they are the focus of most fishing. This presents two major problems, the first being that we are exclusively targeting only a few primary species, which is inevitably going to threaten their populations. The second major problem is that countless other fish, which are completely edible but not considered popular, become bycatch during industrial fishing expeditions. As a result, a large amount of marketable fish become waste and their populations can be severely damaged.

This problem is particularly difficult when it comes to animals that are already considered to be threatened are caught in nets, such as certain species of dolphins, sharks, and turtles. There is no specific reason for the exclusive popularity of cod, tuna, salmon, and bass, as plenty of other fish have similar tastes and nutritional values. If humans were to expand their diets and the market responded accordingly, then it would be hypothetically possible to reduce our targeted hunting of threatened species and expand to other, more stable fish stocks.

“Untitled” courtesy of Proscilas Moscas via Flickr

Eating seafood lower down on the food chain, such as clams, anchovies, sardines, and oysters, would generally be a more sustainable method of consumption. Smaller aquatic animals are in much greater numbers and are capable of reproducing at much higher rates than larger fish. This would also lessen the amount of Persistent Organic Pollutants that enter human bodies through fish consumption. POPs, such as methylmercury and PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls, often used with electrical equipment) enter the ocean ecosystem through pollution and are stored in the fatty tissues of fish. POPs bioaccumulate, meaning that when larger organisms in the ocean eat smaller organisms, they retain all the toxins from their prey. As a result, the largest fish are often the most toxic. POPs can cause serious damage to a person’s organs and nervous system over time. The lower down on the ocean food chain you eat, the more sustainable it is for the biodiversity of the ocean and the lower your risk is of consuming high levels of toxic pollutants.

Aquaculture vs. Open Hunting

Aquaculture has been proposed by many as a solution to some of the current problems with open fishing. Aquaculture is the process of “farming fish” by keeping them in a controlled environment and supplying their diet for them. Currently, aquaculture supplies about 50 percent of the world’s fish and allows fishing companies to both create a high yield of certain stocks and to avoid problems with bycatch. There are a variety of ways to raise fish, both indoors and outdoors, and it’s possible to do so in a way that’s sustainable for the population.

If you raise fish on a vegetarian diet, the cost of input is fairly low. However, in order to gain desirable tastes and the healthy omega-3 fatty acids that customers want out of fish, aquaculture generally raises its animals on a carnivorous diet. This requires fishing for all the food needed to raise these animals to a size large enough to sell. In worst case scenarios, this means that industrial fishing methods are still widely used for aquaculture, but only to collect the food for other fish (although this results in less bycatch and waste since smaller fish are mainly what bigger fish want to eat). Currently, 37 percent of all global seafood isn’t eaten by humans, but is ground into protein feed and fed back to fish or to livestock farm animals.

“Fishing for Tonight’s Dinner..” courtesy of Mark Guadalupe via Flickr

Furthermore, aquaculture often results in the destruction of the ecosystems it is conducted in. The most serious problem with this is the destruction of the mangrove forest, which is a shoreline habitat for many threatened species. Often times, especially in East Asia, mangrove forests will be razed to make way for the construction of an aquaculture farm, causing many threatened species to lose their habitat as a result. These farms also release harmful chemicals into the surrounding environment, including pesticides, veterinary drugs, and untreated waste water.

These problems are at their worst in the areas where aquaculture is the most practiced, such as China, which has environmental regulations that are very lenient. All this is not to say that aquaculture is bad; in fact, aquaculture has great potential to increase the sustainability of the way we utilize our fisheries. However, fish farms have to be created without destroying precious ecosystems, and they have to be run in a way that takes into account the damage that they can inflict on the surrounding areas if their operators aren’t careful.

Conclusion

Fish are not a limitless resource and there are countless things that need to change in the way we fish if humans want to maintain our way of life. Our industrial fishing practices are destructive and cause the large-scale death of fish that we never even eat. Humans are only willing to eat a few select species, and this causes those populations to be severely threatened. The way we currently fish destroys ecosystems and wastes incredible amounts of edible fish as bycatch. We won’t be able to do this forever. After working together, Boris Worm and Ray Hilborn agreed that it’s possible for global fish stocks to survive past 2050–but doing so will require serious changes around the world.

Resources

BBC:  How the World’s Oceans Could be Running out of Fish

CNN: A Fishing Way of Life is Threatened

Encyclopedia Britannica: The Pros and Cons of Fish Farming

Environmental Protection Agency: Persistent Organic Pollutants: A Global Issue, A Global Response

Marine Conservation Institute: Destructive Fishing

Mercury News: Lean Year for New England Cod Ahead, Shutdown Looms

Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch: Fishing and Farming Methods

Nereus Program: Predicting Future Oceans

New Zealand Ministry for Primary Industries: Fishing Methods

The New York Times: Study Finds Hope in Saving Saltwater Fish

The New York Times: Where Have all the Cod Gone?

Salem State University: Benefits of Aquaculture

Science Mag: Rebuilding Global Fisheries

Stanford News: Study Predicts Collapse of All Seafood Fisheries by 2050

United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization: General Situation of World’s Fish Stocks

WDC: Whaling

Paul Greenberg: Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food

Wild Aid: Shark Fin Soup

World Watch Institute: Eating Sustainable Seafood – Three Tips to Steer Clear of Fisheries Collapse

World Wildlife Fund: Infinite Depths: Protecting Oceans and a Global Seafood Pipeline

World Wildlife Fund: Unsustainable Fishing

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Growing Holes in Our Ocean Fisheries appeared first on Law Street.

Globally, we eat more meat now than ever before. Cultures that traditionally held vegetarian diets have become steadily more meat-oriented. In many areas, meat is seen not only as a delicacy but also as a luxury expense and a symbol of status. As the production of meat has gone up in recent decades and the cost has steadily dropped, meat is now much more affordable than ever before. This has led to what is referred to as a “global meatification of our diets.”

However, this new trend carries with it a series of environmental burdens. The livestock industry creates enormous amounts of waste, generates pollution, and also releases large amounts of methane into the atmosphere.

Waste

Vegetarian farming methods generally require large-scale irrigation and sometimes pesticides and fertilizers as well. Livestock farming, alternatively, requires keeping animals alive, which requires land, food, and water for the animals. Because of this, animal farms are also dependent on grain farms to create a food source for their animals. This food could be eaten by humans directly, but instead is used over a long period of time (in combination with a variety of animal growth hormones) to get an animal to an edible size. In fact, more than two-thirds of all agricultural land worldwide is dedicating to feeding livestock. In contrast, only eight percent of agricultural land produces food exclusively for humans. The land used for animal grazing, as well as the land that goes to specialized crop production for livestock animal diets, often causes mass scale deforestation: in the last 40 years, an estimated 40 percent of the Amazon trees were taken down with the vast majority of this land going to livestock feed production. Freshwater is also a finite resource that’s being used in mass quantities for irrigating animal feed and nourishing the animals.

“Pink.”courtesy of Rosalba Tarazona via Flickr

Every bite of meat that is eaten represents all the various inputs that went into raising that animal to adulthood. NPR published a report showing that a single quarter-pound of beef requires 6.7 pounds of grain, 52.5 gallons of water (for the cow’s personal needs and also for watering the crops it ate), 74.5 square feet of land for grazing, and 1,036 BTUs (British Thermal Units) of fossil fuel energy for food production and transport. If you calculate the amount of water required to sustain an American citizen, the average meat eater requires no less than 4,800 gallons whereas a vegan only needs 300. But when the average consumer eats a burger, all they will see is the finished product while the hidden costs remain unnoticed. Herein lies part of the problem with the meat industry: all of its worst elements aren’t ever visible to consumers who decide what kinds of food they want to spend their money on.

Fossil Fuels

First, fossil fuels are used to make the pesticides and fertilizers that keep grain crops growing rapidly and protected from insects. These inputs are essential to many of the traditional commercial vegetable farms throughout the world, which is a serious problem for the environment on its own. However, specialized grain or corn crops are created specifically to sustain livestock, which adds an unnecessary burden that wouldn’t exist without the meat industry. Carbon dioxide emissions also necessarily come with the large-scale transport of meat to grocery stores and restaurants throughout the world. Some of the largest meat-producing nations–such as the United States, Brazil, and the Netherlands–also export meat products to other countries, sometimes halfway around the world.

However, transportation actually only accounts for about six percent of livestock emissions. Ten percent comes from manure storage and disposal, 39 percent comes from food processing and production, and 44 percent comes from enteric fermentation. Enteric fermentation is the process by which a cow’s stomach digests its food and releases greenhouse gasses as a result. Interestingly, while the typically unnatural corn-based diets (in concert with a constant stream of growth hormones and medications) dramatically worsen the health of cows, grass-fed cows actually release far more greenhouse gasses than corn-fed cows. This is because the roughage eaten by grass fed cows is high in cellulose, which is then broken down into methane during anaerobic digestion. In contrast, commercial farm cows generally subsist off of foods that are low in cellulose and high in simple sugars. Because of this, grass fed cows can release up to two to four times as much methane as commercial cows.

As a greenhouse gas, methane has as much as 86 times the heat-trapping power of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. Methane only stays in the atmosphere for about 12 years while carbon dioxide can remain for hundreds; however, in terms of a greenhouse gas’s ability to rapidly impact global warming, methane is considered to be far more dangerous.

Methane emissions from a single dairy cow amount to the equivalent of up to 1.5 metric tons of carbon dioxide each year. Globally this adds up to the equivalent of  2.2 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year. The Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO) calculated that cows contribute 53 percent of the world’s human-related nitrous oxide and 44 percent of its methane. There has been some debate over exactly how much the livestock industry contributes to climate change. The FAO claims that the livestock industry releases 14.5 percent of global anthropogenic greenhouse gasses.

However, the FAO’s analysis has been criticized for being conducted exclusively by livestock specialists, not environmental specialists, and for understating the extent of livestock’s impact on climate change by overlooking and undercounting related emissions sources. The FAO has also been criticized for having a partnership with the International Meat Secretariat and the International Dairy Federation. Current and former World Bank environmental specialists conducted their own study and argue that livestock actually accounts for 51 percent of the world’s anthropogenic greenhouse gasses–much more than the 14.5 percent estimated by the UN.

Livestock as a Public Health Issue

In some areas, the growth in meat consumption has had a positive impact on the diets of the local people. This is particularly true in food insecure regions such as some areas in Sub-Saharan Africa where meat is an important source of protein. However, the livestock industry has also posed a danger to public health in several facets of life. The first is simply through pollution. Fertilizers and pesticides used to grow feed crops are washed away in runoff and taken to streams and rivers. On farms, animal manure is swept away by that same runoff and taken to water sources where it can contaminate drinking water with fecal bacteria.

A red meat-based diet can also be unhealthy. Regular consumption of meat can raise cholesterol and lead to cardiovascular disease and cancer down the road. Furthermore, the unnatural diets and regimen of growth hormone that we administer to livestock essentially keeps them sick, which also requires constant medication. Almost 80 percent of all antibiotics sold in America are used for livestock and not for people.

“Vasikkakasvattamo” courtesy of Oikeutta eläimille via Flickr

The diets we force upon animals can also potentially impact our own health when we consume them. For instance, many of the pathogens and bacteria that develop in cows stomachs can be easily killed by our stomach acids. However, as we continue to modify their diets we’ve caused cow stomachs to become increasingly more acidic as well. In the worst case scenario, this could lead to dangerous pathogens, such as E.Coli, adapting to live in a more acidic environment and potentially being able to survive in our stomachs as well.

Conclusion

Despite many problems in the livestock industry, the popularity of meat is only projected to continue increasing. Some anticipate meat demand to double expected to double by 2020. Although some organizations dispute the validity of this projection, most agree that meat consumption will continue to increase in the coming years. If humans don’t manage to reduce our global greenhouse gas emissions by 2020, then the globally accepted goal of limiting warming to 2°C will be extremely difficult to accomplish. Without dramatic changes to the livestock industry, these reductions will never be able to happen.

A traditional meat-based diet simply isn’t sustainable for the entire planet. However, the majority of the current problems with the industry are far out of consumers’ sights. As long as meat continues to get cheaper and people enjoy how it tastes, its popularity will continue to grow as well. Greater transparency on the issues might change public perception of the industry and shift consumer attitudes. Another possible solution could be an increased emphasis on alternative lifestyles, whether they be vegetarian based or just focused on eating from small, more sustainable livestock farms. The FAO actually suggests that we intensify the commercial livestock industry in order to reduce and eliminate the greater degree of emissions that comes from grass fed cows as opposed to commercial farm cows. Whatever the method may be, it’s clear the world can’t continue to consume meat at such alarming rates.

Editor’s Note: This post has been updated to clarify the debate over livestock’s effect on climate change and its share of human-related emissions. Additional information has also been added about the implications for grass-fed cows on methane emissions and the environmental effect of commercial farms has been clarified. Additionally, methane is now thought to have 86 times the heat-trapping power of carbon dioxide, not 25 times as scientists previously believed. The post has been updated to reflect that change. Updates also add context the debate over the projected growth in meat demand by 2020.

References

Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations: The Role of Livestock in Climate Change

Food and Agricultural Organization of the Unite Nations: Key Facts and Findings

New York Times Opinion: FAO Yields to Meat Industry Pressure on Climate Change

Reuters: Grass-Fed Beef Packs a Punch to the Environment

John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health: Health & Environmental Implications of U.S. Meat Consumption and Production

New Harvest: the World’s Leading Driver of Climate Change: Animal Agriculture

NPR: A Nation of Meat Eaters: See How it All Adds Up

Policy Mic: Farm Bill 2013: Small Farmers Can’t Make Money from Farming Anymore

Politifact: Rep. Louise Slaughter says 80 Percent of Antibiotics are Fed to Livestock

Salon: What Nobody Told Me About Small Farming: I Can’t Make a Living

Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment: Consequences of Increased Global Meat Consumption on the Environment – Trade in Virtual Water, Energy & Nutrients

United Nations News Centre: Rearing Cattle Produces more Greenhouse Gases than Driving Cars, New Report Warns

US Environmental Protection Agency: Overview of Greenhouse Gases: Methane

World Watch: Livestock and Climate Change

World Watch Institute: Is Meat Sustainable?

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post How Does the Livestock Industry Impact the Environment? appeared first on Law Street.

In the past 20 years, fuel has been the fastest growing export in the world, both in terms of volume and value. Oil makes up a huge portion of these fuel exports and is also the primary energy source for transportation throughout the world. Currently, the only alternatives to oil for the transportation sector are electric and hydrogen cell powered cars. Both of these are comparatively very small industries and only act as energy alternatives to on-road vehicles, while the transportation sector also includes all the world’s ships, planes, and military vehicles, which are all heavily dependent upon petroleum. As of now, oil is here to stay on planet earth, whatever its consequences may be.

Oil production in the United States has changed a lot in recent years. Following the discovery of the Bakken Shale formation in North Dakota and Montana, the United States increased its domestic production dramatically. The Bakken formation combined with the Eagle Ford and Permian Basins located in Texas allowed the U.S. to produce 66 percent of its oil domestically in 2014. The discovery of the Bakken Shale was hailed by some as an incredible discovery that will allow the United States newfound energy independence. But an equal number of people have objected furiously to our exploitation of the shale patch, claiming that it only further solidifies the United States on a path toward fossil fuel dependence. Our domestic production has decreased somewhat in the last two years as oil prices have dropped abroad, but overall our production rates are higher than they have been in a very long time and there is a considerable push to continue strengthening the industry domestically.

Now that a greater quantity of oil is being produced on the U.S. mainland than before, the amount of oil being shipped via tanker to the United States has dropped dramatically, which means that globally the risk of ocean oil spills has decreased as well. However, transporting oil domestically poses its own environmental problems and even imported oil often needs to be shipped to different parts of the country by land transport. If oil spills on the mainland, it can destroy ecosystems and watersheds and render communities unstable. If oil catches fire, it can lead to gigantic explosions, a few of which have historically had terrible consequences for American towns. Read on to learn about the pros and cons of different methods of oil transportation and the policy fights involved.

Rail

Currently, the most common method of oil transport is by railway. Truck transport of oil now only accounts for 4 percent of all petroleum moved because of its high level of inefficiency and risk. While pipelines can often be more efficient modes of transport, their construction can lead to political battles. The advantage of rail transport is that the infrastructure is already in place and already spans across America–all it needs is to be re-utilized.

Many railroads owners are willing to sign contracts with crude oil companies that allow for their railways to be used for transporting oil. Often these contracts are short term and many railway owners reserve the ability to withdraw from the business relationship later down the road. The railway transport business has grown exponentially along with the upward spike in oil extraction. Only 9,500 carloads of oil were moved on freight lines in 2008; by 2013 435,560 carloads of oil were moved, equivalent to 300 million barrels of oil.

“Crude Oil Storage on Stilts” courtesy of Anthony via Flickr

However, this increase in railway transport has led to an increase in the risk of oil-related disasters. When a train transporting oil (also known as a “bomb train”) runs into a problem, it generally causes the oil to ignite, which results in an explosion. These explosions can be gigantic in size and result in large scale destruction. While railway movement is considerably safer than trucks in terms of land transportation, a single incident can have disastrous effects. This is further compounded by some evidence suggesting that Bakken shale produces a more flammable crude oil because of its specific mineral content. Because of North Dakota’s location in the very center of America, these bomb trains have to span incredible distances to move oil to the coasts of the country, which increases the risk that something may go wrong. Between 2013 and 2015 more than 10 major explosions took place in America.

The explosions can have devastating immediate effects, but oil leakage also poses its own risk. In 2013 alone more than 1.15 million gallons of oil were spilled. Oil leaks can take a considerable amount of time to clean up and the damage can happen very quickly. Oil is mostly made up of a combination of thousands of different hydrocarbons and is generally toxic to almost every living creature. Crude oil, in particular, is oil in its least processed form and poses a greater risk than refined petroleum to an area it enters and contaminates. Because of this, an oil spill can cause tremendous damage to an ecosystem. Furthermore, an oil spill in the ocean will eventually go away, partially through evaporation and partially through breaking down and falling to the ocean floor as an inert tar. However, if oil enters freshwater it can permanently render it undrinkable, which can be particularly serious in areas where humans live nearby and rely on freshwater for drinking water.

Pipeline Alternatives and the Keystone XL Expansion

Right now Canada is the largest U.S. supplier of foreign oil, which offers a certain level of ease of transport because the two countries are on the same landmass. Currently, 70 percent of petroleum products in Canada and the United States are shipped via pipeline. A certain amount of crude oil can be moved over the border on the Canadian Pacific Railway and Canadian National Railway, but there’s been a huge push to connect the two countries via new and larger pipelines. Pipelines would dramatically expedite the process of oil movement by making it both quicker and cheaper, and many argue that it would make the process dramatically safer for Canadian and American communities.

“Trans Canada Keystone Oil Pipeline” courtesy of shannonpatrick17 via Flickr

Much of the argument around pipeline transport has focused on the construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline expansion, a gigantic pipe system that would in theory run 1,661 miles between Alberta, Canada and Illinois. The oil giant TransCanada proposed Keystone XL in September 2008 and estimated that it would cost about $7 billion to create. Most of the labor force that would go into its  design would be from the United States, creating up to 20,000 new jobs. It would also generate about $585 million in taxes for the states it ran through and over $5.2 billion in property taxes over the course of its functional lifetime. Many saw the pipeline as an incredible chance to increase energy security and to generate new job opportunities. An equal number of people opposed the movement, saying it only put the United States at greater risk of leaks.

There are others who support the pipeline from an environmental/human health perspective. It’s important to remember that while one can object to oil as an energy source in theory, we still very much need it to live our normal lives. Oil transportation will happen one way or another, and pipelines are generally thought as being safer than trains and therefore the lesser of two evils. However, the distinction really depends on how you measure safety. If you use damage to human life and property as your metric, then trains are the far more dangerous method of transportation because they can generate large explosions. When something goes wrong on a train, the damage is immediate and severe. However, a leak from a pipeline can last indefinitely and may even go unnoticed, pouring a continuous stream of oil into the surrounding areas. Because of this, pipelines cause a much greater level of oil spillage overall than trains and may have a much more severe impact on the environment.

Keystone Pipeline Debate

There was a lot of opposition to the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline from environmentalists as well as worried community members who felt that their areas would be endangered by potential spills. A large portion of the public opposition to the pipeline has come from Native American communities that live in the states the pipe would run through. Several Native American groups in Nebraska especially have argued that the location of the pipeline directly endangers the Ogallala Aquifer, which sustains huge numbers of people and a thriving agricultural business. The sheer length of the pipeline is also alarming to many; while it ends in Illinois, the crude oil will then be processed in-state and shipped south via existing pipelines all the way to the Texas coast. This means that gigantic streams of crude oil would constantly be moving across the center band of the United States.

“pipeline” courtesy of Ripperda via Flickr

TransCanada argued that the pipeline would be built with state-of-the-art safety equipment, including over 16,000 smart sensors along its body, to allow for the quick relay of any problems and relevant information to repair teams. These sensors deliver information to satellites, which then dispatch emergency response crews that are located along the pipeline in each state. This level of security is particularly important because the Keystone XL would transport pre-processed crude oil to refineries. Crude oil is so thick that it has to be continuously heated in order to flow properly, which increases its volatility in the event of a spill.

Four years after it was initially proposed, President Obama rejected the Keystone XL expansion presidential permit in 2012. Not to be deterred, TransCanada began to explore alternative methods of building the pipeline and working closely with Nebraska, which led to the submission of another presidential permit less than half a year after the original rejection. The Obama Administration spent several years refusing to make a final decision on the expansion, saying that while it supports the pipeline’s ability to spur business and create jobs, it wouldn’t make a decision that will cause an increase in greenhouse gas emissions.

In November 2015, President Obama made the final decision to reject the Keystone XL pipeline, claiming that the benefit it would have for the economy in the long term wouldn’t outweigh the damage it would do to U.S. energy security and the country’s role as a progressive energy leader. TransCanada responded by asking for a delay on the review of the Nebraska route, which most likely would have pushed the final decision back for another indefinite period of time. This most likely would have placed the power of approving or rejecting Keystone XL in the hands of the winner of the 2016 Presidential race. However, the Obama Administration rejected this as well, ending the battle over the Keystone XL once and for all.

Conservatives were mostly furious and environmentalists were generally overjoyed. However, from a public health perspective, it isn’t completely clear what impact this decision will have. The risk of oil pollution will decrease but railway oil transportation and its dangers will remain prevalent instead. Furthermore, a large part of the argument from pipeline supporters is centered around energy security; increasing oil imports from Canada is viewed as a much safer business deal than increasing them from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, for instance. With the pipeline abandoned, it’s possible that the next energy argument will center around increasing oil extraction from U.S. reserves back to their 2014 levels and beyond, which would increase energy independence but also cause greater damage to the U.S. ecosystems and communities.

Conclusion

No method of oil transportation is completely safe, and different methods have their own advantages and disadvantages. Boats are generally the safest method for moving oil but have the greatest possible impact on the environment when they do actually spill. Oil movement on land is a completely different issue because it involves areas where humans live. While oil spills from trains result in higher levels of human death and property destruction, oil spills from pipelines are more common and often more severe, with longer lasting effects on the environment.

The extreme position is to fight against all forms of oil transportation under the argument that every resource dedicated towards oil industry infrastructure takes away from resources that could go to more progressive transportation technologies, such as electric cars and hydrogen fuel cells. Currently, the world is nowhere near ready to wean itself completely off oil, but competitor transportation technologies have steadily grown larger and larger in the past decades.

It’s important to remember that none of these alternatives are perfect and completely environmentally friendly–electric cars require large-scale mining operations to access the lithium iron for their batteries, for instance. However, overall a shift toward non-fossil fuel based transportation alternatives would still dramatically reduce global emissions. The world may not be technologically prepared to survive without oil, but as long as we depend on it, oil transportation and its risks and dangers will always be a factor in our lives and communities.

References

Americans for Tax Reform: A Brief History of the Keystone XL Pipeline

Aljazeera America: A History of Keystone

Desta: The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, the World Trade Organization, and Regional Trade Agreements

Forbes: Pick Your Poison for Crude: Pipeline, Rail, Truck or Boat

The Hill: Obama Rejects Keystone Pipeline

Institute for 21st Century Energy: Background of Keystone XL

Oil 150: Early Oil Transportation: A Brief Transportation

RiverKeeper: Crude Oil Transportation: A Timeline of Failure

RT: What’s the Hold Up?  Still no Decision on Keystone XL Nearly 7 Years Later

Scientific American: The Ogallala Aquifer: Saving a Vital U.S. Water Source

Sightline Institute: Oil Train Explosions: A Timeline in Pictures

U.S. Rail Transportation of Crude Oil: Background and Issues for Congress

The Des Moines Register: Corps: We’re Not For or Against the Bakken Pipeline

World Trade Organization: International Trade Statistics: World Export for Commercial Services

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post What’s the Best Way to Transport Crude Oil? appeared first on Law Street.

In some ways, the more urbanized an area is the greater potential it has to be sustainable. Public transport becomes readily available, reducing the need for individually owned cars, and the closer together things are the easier it is to walk from place to place. However, while grocery stores and restaurants may be close by to customers, more often than not the food that sustains them comes from outside of the community, sometimes from hundreds of miles away.

When calculating the carbon footprint of a suburb or a city, it’s important to keep in mind that the distance food delivery trucks travel to keep an area well-fed can be a serious obstacle to any community’s sustainability. This problem gave birth to the locavore movement, which has been steadily growing in popularity throughout America. Locavores attempt to get their food as close as possible to where they live, which has the benefit of reducing CO2 emissions, supporting local farmers, and ensuring that one’s food hasn’t been treated with pesticides or raised with hormones.

One result of locavorism is the urban agriculture movement, which strives to utilize local property for small scale farming. Urban agriculture can manifest in a variety of ways in both suburban and city environments but it has been vehemently opposed in many areas throughout the country. However, the movement has serious potential to help increase sustainability in communities around the country.

“Roof allotment III” courtesy of David Barrie via Flickr

Suburban Lawn Farms

The modern American suburban home typically has a small front lawn, which is kept mowed and watered for aesthetic purposes. However, added up throughout the nation, these lawns make up a huge amount of underutilized, farmable land. Homeowners in states all over the country are starting to realize the potential of this land, and are growing edible gardens in their front yards. The average suburban property won’t generate a yield that’ll provide for an entire family’s calorie requirements, however, they can dramatically contribute to a household’s vegetable needs. This has the environmental benefit of reducing a family’s dependence on produce that comes through long supply chains and also encourages a healthy diet.

Edible gardens actually require about half as much water to maintain as a traditional lawn and prevent the exhaust fumes from lawnmowers, which are exceptionally polluting machines due to their unregulated and highly hazardous fuel contents. Furthermore, if you cultivate your edible garden without pesticides and fertilizers (which would generally be unnecessary in small scale agriculture) then you prevent a host of chemicals from being picked up by rainwater and delivered into local water sources. Depending on the amount of space in your lawn, it may also be possible to raise smaller livestock animals, such as chickens and rabbits, which generally don’t require very much space to take care of. If an entire community bands together and adopts this model of living, it can dramatically reduce the area’s carbon footprint, conserve water, and strengthen community bonds.

Urban Agriculture: Rooftops, Windows, and Empty Lots

In an urban setting, there’s no such potential for lawns to be directly repurposed into gardens, so city dwellers have to pursue more creative pathways. While the average person who lives in an apartment doesn’t own that property, anyone with a window facing steady sunlight can grow small scale produce hanging out of their windows. This is the premise behind the idea of vertical gardening, which seeks to make use of all the surface area we have built vertically as a source of nutrition and as a sink for carbon.

Theoretically, high-rise apartment buildings have created an abundance of additional land by building walls that take up more surface area than the original width and length of the plot of land they were built upon. This increases the potential for food development, although produce that requires high sun exposure can only be grown near windows and may require heavy watering. However, it’s just as possible to grow produce on vertically stacked beds in any apartment and in any house, though it may require additional light to grow healthily if plants can’t be exposed to a natural light source. Growing mushrooms may also be a good choice for indoor gardening because they require little to no light and provide strong sources of protein.

Rooftop gardens are another way to produce a significant agricultural yield since the area of a building’s roof is generally the same as the land taken away on the ground by its construction. While you can easily cover a roof with potted plants, it’s also possible to actually build a garden directly on a rooftop, equipped with soil layers, and drainage and irrigation systems. One of the major obstacles to these “intensive” rooftop gardens is that architecturally, there are limits to what a roof can hold. Soil, especially when saturated with water, can be extremely heavy and can be a serious burden on what a building can hold. When designing a rooftop garden it’s important to take into account the exact weight that your building can handle and not to exceed that. Other concerns include the potential safety risks involved in rooftop gardening.

The top of urban buildings are almost always built of impervious surfaces that cause rainwater to rapidly pour off, which can also lead to flooding and may carry contaminants into water sources. When rainwater encounters vegetation, it dramatically decreases the speed of runoff and risk of flooding, and may even filter water as it moves downward. Rooftop gardens also have the benefit of blocking roofs from sun exposure. Black asphalt absorbs heat, creating the Urban Heat Island Effect, which causes cities to reach uncomfortably warm temperatures, especially in the top floors of apartments. The canopy offered by rooftop gardens has a cooling effect that can both increase comfort and decrease air conditioning expenses.

Empty lots also provide ample space with which to grow gardens and to aesthetically improve an area. Empty lots have the unique feature of being non-exclusive gardens, unlike window or rooftop agriculture. A local community can cooperatively participate in a lot garden, which can strengthen community bonds as well as provide local produce.

“Urban Agriculture at Erdos Eco-City” courtesy of SuSanA Secretariat via Flickr

Victory Gardens

While the concept of edible gardens may sound strange and novel, it’s not a completely new concept. In World War II the lack of labor and transportation difficulties severely cut off food supply chains, so the government proposed the idea of “Victory Gardens.” Victory gardens encouraged citizens to raise as much produce and livestock as they could as part of their patriotic duty as Americans. Backyards and empty lots were converted into small farms and even city rooftops were covered with whatever could be grown on them. A huge number of Americans banded together and an estimated 20 million victory gardens were created. Altogether these gardens produced between 9 to 10 million tons of produce, equivalent to the amount of commercially produced vegetables at the time. This impressive yield serves as a powerful example of the impact the same practices could have today. So what’s stopping America from achieving the same results again?

Obstacles to Urban Agriculture

Many states have laws against owning livestock such as chickens, goats, and beehives on private property. Suburban communities across America also have made objections to edible gardens, claiming that they hurt the aesthetics of a neighborhood. Farmland can be considered unclean and a symbol of lower class status. Many believe that suburban gardening will decrease the property value of surrounding houses. States like Iowa, Florida, and Louisiana have written laws banning backyard gardening and require lawns to be regularly maintained; countless city and town governments have made similar mandates.

Apartment building owners may have objections to vertical gardening for similar aesthetic reasons. Rooftop gardens are one of the most significant ways to impact urban agriculture, but their existence also largely depends on the wishes of the building owners. Rooftop gardens are highly complex and require large amounts of maintenance. Many people may not want to invest the time and resources into actualizing their existence. There’s also an ongoing debate on whether rooftop space would be better utilized with solar panels since the tops of tall buildings provide some of the best access to solar energy. As for empty lot gardens, it’s often the case that just because an area is abandoned, that doesn’t mean it’s publicly accessible. Many open city lots may be boarded or fenced up to prevent people from interfering with the area. In some places this has led to movement of “guerilla gardening,” that is, throwing projectiles made of seeds wrapped in clay over fences. These vegetable “bombs” protect the seed long enough for it to sprout and draw nutrients, encouraging vegetation growth in otherwise inaccessible areas.

Beyond community opposition and technical difficulties, it’s also just true that only a small percentage of people are interested in urban agriculture. America is a very different place now than it was during World War II and we have nowhere near the food insecurity we previously did. The ethos of patriotism that inspired American citizens to grow food for the sake of the country’s stability is no longer in effect, and many people simply don’t see the benefits of urban agriculture. Ideally, Americans could regain the desire to grow their own food now in the interest of environmentalism. However, as large as our grocery stores are fully stocked, it is fairly unlikely that the urban agriculture movement will truly grow huge.

“New crops” courtesy of Linda N. via Flickr

Resources

About News: Origin of the Word Locavore

Chicago Department of Environment: A Guide to Rooftop Gardening

EarthEasy: Lawn Care Chemicals: How Toxic Are They?

Guardian Liberty Voice: Personal Gardening and Farming are Becoming Illegal

Hofstra University: Transport and Sustainability

Living History: Farming in the 1940s

Mother Earth News: Grow Your Own Mushrooms

Oregon Public Broadcasting: Rethinking Your Front Yard: Cities Make Room for Urban Farms

People Powered Machines: Cleaner Air: Gas Mower Pollution Facts

Resilience: Why Our Food is so Dependent on Oil

Seattle Urban Farm Company: Suburban Front Yard Farm

TakePart: Leave Your Lawn for Life on the Urban Farm

Urban Gardens Web: Growing Free Food and Community in Front Yard Farms

The Washington Post: “Guerilla Gardeners” Spread Seeds of Social Change

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Promise of Urban Agriculture appeared first on Law Street.

As climate change worsens, melting ice from earth’s glacier sheet combined with the expansion of warming sea water has caused the world’s oceans to rise dramatically. There are a number of organizations dedicated to recording the rise in sea levels, including the Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services–a part of the NOAA that collects data on changing sea levels with numerous tide stations–and NASA, which use satellites to gather the same data from a different perspective. Currently, there are about 150 years of data gathered on changes in the Mean Sea Level (MSL) over time and the current scientific consensus is that sea levels have been rising at a rate of 3.42 mm annually over the last 20 years, which will lead to a total rise of between 1-2 meters by 2100.

Rising sea levels pose a very serious threat to many populous cities throughout the world, particularly those that have developed as coastal trade centers. As sea levels continue to rise, many of these coastal cities will become increasingly vulnerable to flooding, especially in the geographically low-lying areas of the earth. Flooding is a unique consequence of climate change in that it affects people both from the richest and the poorest parts of the world, and while everywhere has their own local approach to flood mitigation, there are generally two major ways to address the issue politically. The first and most popular approach is to develop coastal protection systems to prevent rising tides from impacting coastal zones. The second technique is to commit to renewable energy in order to directly address the problem of global warming and rising sea levels. The larger the country, the greater its personal commitment to fossil fuel divestment matters. Unfortunately, many of the largest countries which have the greatest carbon footprint generally make very low levels commitments to renewables, which makes the commitments of many of the smallest, most flood-vulnerable countries less significant.

Read on to learn more about how the different areas of earth are dealing with rising sea levels.

“Flood” courtesy of ddqhu via Flickr

The United States

The United States is an interesting case of flood politics because it’s one of the world’s wealthiest countries and thus most capable of handling flooding. However, there’s very little political consensus on the scientific validity of climate change in Congress and rising sea levels are rarely if ever mentioned in policy debates at the federal level. The government provides disaster relief funds for the areas that have been most severely affected by rising sea levels, but actual policy changes generally must happen at the individual, state, or even city level. Several areas throughout the United States face a high risk of flood inundation, including New York City; Newark, New Jersey; Boston; Miami; New Orleans; and the entire state of Hawaii.

Hawaii 

Hawaii is relatively low-lying compared to the rest of the U.S. mainland and a sea level rise of 1-2 meters would absolutely devastate the state. Furthermore, each island is so small that there’s very little inland area, meaning that few people would be safe from flooding. It’s no coincidence that Hawaii leads the United States in addressing climate change and is the very first state to commit to getting 100 percent of its energy from renewable sources. This also makes sense from a business perspective because it’s very expensive to ship oil and gas to Hawaii and the state is geographically blessed with ample renewable resources. However, the decision to commit to renewables was made largely out of necessity, as Hawaii’s community, as well as its primary source of revenue, the tourism industry, would suffer immensely from the effects of flooding. Of course, Hawaii’s commitment is a drop in the bucket compared to all U.S. emissions. However, its decision allows the state to lead policy by example and proves that 100 percent renewables are an attainable goal. For a real impact to take place, the other states must follow suit, along with many of the world’s countries.

Cities: New Orleans, New York, and Miami 

None of the other states are as universally vulnerable to flooding as the state of Hawaii, but several have been forced to take measures to protect their largest population centers. Cities like New Orleans and New York City are at particularly high risk not only because they are located on high-risk coasts but also because they’re located in areas that are extremely vulnerable to severe weather events, as seen with hurricanes Sandy and Katrina. New York has made its own commitment to 50 percent renewables by 2030 and has also tried to take more immediate action to prevent Sandy-level flooding from happening again. The current plan is to allocate $100 million of Sandy’s relief funds to the construction of a wall to protect the city as well as apply for an additional $500 million dollars of Federal Housing and Urban Development Funds. The project will be very expensive and require a huge amount of resources, but without flood protection, New York’s electric grid and underground subway system could be completely dismantled, crippling an economic center of the nation and costing billions of dollars in restoration funds.

“Coastal Flooding in Washington DC” courtesy of Bruno Sanchez-Andrade Nuño via Flickr

New Orleans suffered an even greater extent of damage from Hurricane Katrina than New York did from Hurricane Sandy and has also bounced back at a considerably slower rate. Unlike New York, New Orleans is a relatively poor city and was largely at the mercy of how the federal government decided to handle the situation. Congress allocated a massive $14.5 billion relief package to construct an upgraded levy system designed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The new and improved system will be much better equipped to protect against flooding, but the upgrade has met some serious criticism. Even the Army Corps of Engineers has warned that there’s a limit to what it can do based on New Orleans’ geography. The area is uniquely low-lying and most of the natural marshes that have historically acted as flood barriers have disappeared over the years, stripping the city of its natural protection.

The political context of different vulnerable areas also heavily influences the way decisions are made. Miami, for instance, is also only 4 to 5 feet above sea level and the entire beach may disappear within the century if sea levels continue to rise. While the state has sunk hundreds of millions into flood prevention, Florida has almost no renewable power at all and has made few steps towards achieving its Renewable Portfolio Standard of 20 percent by 2020. The difference between New Orleans, Miami, and New York’s approaches to their vulnerability represents how wealth, political nature, and geographical position strongly influence what is and what can be done to address the risks of flooding. While commitments to renewable energy address the larger problem of global warming and sea level rise, they do little to directly impact an area’s vulnerability to flooding. This generally means that if renewables aren’t cost effective and receive political opposition, then they will rarely be considered as a valid policy option.

The European Union

The areas of Europe that face the highest risk of flooding are the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, and Northern Germany because of their flat geography and proximity to the rapidly melting Greenland Ice Sheet. Flood prevention has become a serious issue in the European Union, not only because these areas are at high risk from sea level rise but also because Central and Eastern Europe have experienced rising levels of river flooding from severe weather events. In response to these changes, the European Union made one of the European Regional Development Fund’s duties to establish structural funds for flood mitigation and adaptation. Furthermore, every member of the European Union has their own Renewable Energy Target, which varies widely depending on the location.

However, in a parallel that runs somewhat similar to how only a select set of vulnerable U.S. states address flood risk aggressively, only a handful of European states have serious flood policies. While the overarching body of the E.U. provides structural adaptation funds in the same way the U.S. provides federal disaster relief funds, flood control is only a highly salient issue in the northernmost parts of the continent. The most dramatic example of this is the Netherlands, which is an incredibly low-lying nation that also has an extensive canal system that runs a high risk of flooding. The sea surrounding the Netherlands was originally projected to rise about 1.05 meters within the century, but newer models project a 26 percent chance that the sea will actually rise to 1.8 meters, making it the most vulnerable European nation. England is not far behind, with a renewed projection that there’s a 27 percent chance of sea level in the surrounding areas by 1.75 meters. Both countries have extensive coastal protection policies in the form of barriers, dikes and sluice gates, but many scientists fear that this will not be enough to protect them from flash floods in the future.

The World’s Most Vulnerable Areas

As with many serious environmental issues, the developing world faces some of the greatest risks from these problems but has the least resources dedicated to addressing them. While the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is generally (and accurately) characterized as being an incredibly dry and hot region, the coastal areas between the two continents face serious risks from flooding. If sea levels rise between 0.1 and 0.3 meters by 2050 as predicted, the coastal regions of Libya, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Kuwait could be exposed to severe flooding. A temperature rise of 1 to 3 degrees would exacerbate sea level rise to the point where it would critically endanger urban coastal areas, and could expose six to 25 million people in Northern Africa to flooding.

Many of these areas, including Algeria, Morocco, Djibouti, Lebanon, and Yemen have designed Disaster Risk Management Plans to increase resilience in their cities in preparation for oncoming natural disasters. However, many of the MENA countries are actively involved in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) whose economies are heavily dependent on the fossil fuel industry. The leaders of OPEC generally admit that climate change is real but are quick to dismiss efforts to regulate fossil fuels. They view the push against oil in international negotiations as an unfair handicap against their industries and generally fight against any attempt to regulate or shrink the fossil fuel market. Despite the fact that MENA will suffer some of the worst effects of climate change (taking into account desertification as well as flooding), it seems unlikely that the area will diverge from fossil fuels at any point in the foreseeable future.

Many parts of South America, including Venezuela, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil along with almost every country in Southeast Asia, are also at some of the highest risks of flooding in the world. Unlike the MENA region, few of these countries fight with the same vigor to support the fossil fuel industry, with the exception of Venezuela, the only non-MENA member of OPEC. However, many will still fight for their personal rights to use fossil fuel projects in the name of internal development since the majority of the burden of climate change was caused by the developed world. The issue of flooding is further exacerbated by the fact that several of the countries in these regions have resource extraction economies that rely on deforestation, which steadily shrinks their natural riparian protection from rising sea levels.

Perhaps the worst example of a disenfranchised flood-vulnerable country is the Maldives, both one of the poorest and the lowest lying island nations in the world. As sea levels continue to rise, the Maldives will be one of the first countries to become completely inundated, despite the fact that as a developing country it has contributed a very small percentage of the emissions that have contributed to climate change. The Maldives’ first ever democratically elected leader, Mohamed Nasheed, committed his country to achieving 100 percent renewable energy and made the Maldives the very first country to sign onto the Kyoto Protocol. He encouraged a massive reforestation program along the beaches to prevent soil erosion and act as a riparian barrier from flooding. He also initiated litter cleanup programs and special protection for the coastal reefs that protect the nation’s boundaries.

The actions of a small country like the Maldives will help give it better protection but will do little to fight climate change without the commitment of larger nations in North America and the European Union to reduce emissions. While the Maldives’ commitment to clean energy would have had a small impact on global emissions, they stood as an important symbol of forward progress, especially to other vulnerable island states. However, in January, Mohammed Nasheed was overthrown and imprisoned after allegedly ordering the arrest of a judge. The brother of the previous dictator rose to power and has undone all of Nasheed’s efforts, promising to tear up every tree he had planted. The Maldives’ high level of vulnerability combined with its new lack of a flood adaptation policies places it at extreme risk from sea level rise and within 100 years the island is projected to be uninhabitable.

Conclusion

Rising sea levels are a problem that will affect countless areas, both in the developing and the developed world. The exact decisions that governments will make heavily depend upon their political affiliation, what is geographically possible, and how much funding they can reasonably allocate to combating flooding. Much of this means that the poorest areas of the world are disproportionately affected because they neither have the resources nor the political organization needed to address these problems. Furthermore, they may have economies based on resource extraction industries, which further exacerbate their vulnerability.

Globally, considerable resources have been dedicated to flood prevention, but little commitment has been made to abating fossil fuels in the name of halting sea level rise. This is largely because it’s extremely difficult to establish federal and international policy on climate change, so often policy changes happen on a more local level. Because these decisions are made by smaller, more vulnerable entities instead of larger international organizations, these areas will often settle for mitigation policy instead of prevention based, emissions reductions policy. However, as long as climate change continues, then the root of the problem will continue to exist and sea levels will continue to rise. At the current rate, several areas around the world, including the Maldives, will inevitably become uninhabitable and unless large-scale changes in global emissions are made, more and more countries will suffer the same fate.

Resources

The Atlantic: Is Miami Beach Doomed?

BBC: Former President Mohammed Nasheed Allowed Foreign Trip

BBC: Maldives: Paradise Soon to be Lost

Climate Central: New Analysis Shows Global Exposure to Sea Level Rise

Daily News: New York will fund $100M Flood Protection Project to Shield Lower Manhattan from Major Storms

Energy Information Administration: Florida Profile Overview

European Commission: Flood Risk in Europe: Analysis of Exposure in 13 Countries

Floodlist: Thousands Displaced by Flooding Rivers in Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil, Argentina

Florida State University: Florida’s Renewable Energy Future Depends on Incentives for Renewables

Green Biz: New York’s Plan to Reach 50 percent Renewable Energy

International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis: European Flood Risk Could Double by 2050

Karen and Clark Company: Most Vulnerable Cities to Storm Surge Flooding

The Lens: New Orleans Flood Protection System: Stronger than Ever, Weaker than it was Supposed to be

Live Science: The 20 Cities Most Vulnerable to Flooding

Nation of Change: Hawaii Enacts Nation’s First 100 Percent Renewable Energy Standard

NASA: Global Climate Change: Sea Level Rise

Nature World News: Climate Change and Sea Level: England, Europe at Risk of Major Sea Level Rise

NCBI: Floods in Southeast Asia: A Health Priority 

The New Yorker: The Siege of Miami

Niels Bohr Institute: Risk of Major Sea Level Rise in Northern Europe

NOLA: Upgraded Metro New Orleans Levees will Greatly Reduce Flooding, Even in 500-Year Storms

NOAA: Tides and Currents

Renewable Energy Action Coalition of Hawaii: Planning Hawaii’s 100 percent Renewable Energy Future

Tech Insider: Hawaii is Harnessing 100 percent Renewable Energy 0 with Active Volcanoes

Time: Why New York City will Be Flooded More Often

USA Today: One Year After Sandy, 9 Devastating Facts

World Bank: Adaptation to Climate Change in the Middle East and North Africa Region

World Bank: Water in the Arab World: From Droughts to floods: Building Resilience Against Extremes

Yale Environment 360: A Plague of Deforestation Sweeps Across Southeast Asia

ZME Science: New Study Highlights Vulnerability of Low Lying Hawaiian Islands

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Rising Tide of Flood Prevention Politics appeared first on Law Street.

Human life has become incredibly dependent on electronic technology. The rate of citizens in the developed world who own cell phones, laptops, and other devices have gone sharply up since 2000 and the electronics industry is currently valued at $2.4 trillion worldwide, second in value only to the oil industry. While the proliferation of electronics in our lives have provided new sources of entertainment, increased information access, and made communication easier, the industry also takes an incredible toll on the planet.

Electronics must be built from resources that are generally found underground, which requires high-intensity mining operations. During production, mechanical devices are treated with a variety of toxic chemicals and at the end of their lifetime, electronics are often shipped to developing countries where they become dangerous sources of hazardous waste. However, much of this happens out of sight of the consumer, making the environmental costs of the electronic industry largely invisible to many parts of the world.

Image courtesy of baselactionnetwork via Flickr

An Overview of the Market

Currently, China is the fastest growing player in the electronics industry, because of a combination of its incredibly low labor manufacturing costs and its lack of domestic environmental regulations. Many Asian exporters, Japan and Hong Kong in particular, have steadily shifted large sections of their electronics markets to China as they find themselves unable to compete with China’s low manufacturing costs (labor costs are about 10 percent lower in China than in Hong Kong and overall production cost savings can range between 35 percent to 75 percent depending on the product). Over the years, China has also instituted several supply embargoes on countries that don’t actively participate in trade with Chinese electronic products. The electronics industry continues to grow  stronger and stronger in China as the country makes it a more central part of its economy.

Furthermore, the production of electronics is reliant upon 17 rare earth metals (REMs) and access to these metals strongly impacts a country’s ability to grow within the industry. China currently controls between 90 and 95 percent  of the planet’s rare earth metals, giving it a huge advantage within the market. Some may misinterpret China’s control over the industry to mean that 90 percent of rare earth metals are found in Chinese land. However, only about one-third of the world’s REMs, most notably dysprosium and neodymium, can actually be mined in mainland China, although the level of mining in China is still incredibly high. What is actually true is that China is responsible for the production of 95 percent of the rare earth metals worldwide; a large portion of Chinese mining and processing happens in the developing world, most notably in Central Africa, which has a number of REMs that can’t be found anywhere else.

Before we delve into the mining process, it should also be noted that while China controls a huge section of the rare earth industry, other countries do have large reserves on their mainlands. This prevents China from having a complete monopoly on the industry and from shouldering all the responsibility when it comes to global pollution. Australia, for instance, controls the vast majority of tantalum, which is crucial for almost every single electronic device.

The Environmental Impacts of Mining

Without rare earth minerals, electronics cannot be produced. However, REMs are buried underground and require high-intensity mining operations for extraction. Mining inevitably creates a huge burden on the local environment, both in terms of groundwater and air pollution. The mineral extraction process generates an incredible amount of waste–80 tons of waste is produced from just one ounce of gold–and much of this waste, including toxic metals, cyanide, and various acids, ends up in the earth and the groundwater of the surrounding area. This can completely contaminate the aquifers where mining takes place, both causing large-scale biodiversity loss and devastating effects on local communities that lose their source of drinking water. The same processes release large amounts of dangerous chemicals into the atmosphere and cause staggeringly high rates of respiratory illness in miners.

Air Pollution from mining isn’t just localized to the immediate area; gold mining, for instance, is a leading source of airborne mercury in the United States after coal-fired power plants. These problems are further compounded by the fact that most mining happens in developing countries where environmental regulations are minimal and poor communities are unlikely to receive government protection.

Rare earth mineral mining is also uniquely hazardous to the environment because it has a more complex extraction process than common minerals do. REMs must be physically removed from the earth, then crushed and milled into dust form. They then undergo a flotation stage to separate the material bastnaesite from the rubble mixture. The isolated mineral bastnaesite is then treated with acids, oxides, and a variety of other solvents to corrode away the common minerals. What is left is the rare earth minerals in their crude form, which must be further purified and then combined into alloys to reach commercial standards.

This 10-day process can be contrasted to gold, which only requires a one-step separation process, to illustrate how complex the process of extraction and production is for rare earth minerals. Due to this added complexity and the nature of the acids used in the refinement, there is a much higher potential for chemical pollution to surrounding areas with REMs as compared to other mineral extractions.

The Social Impacts of Mining

The effects of the mining industry on the environment are significant, but the social influence of the industry has also been highly disruptive. While the majority of Rare Earth Mineral production happens in China, Africa has the largest or second largest reserves of several crucial REMs and other common metals, including bauxite, cobalt, industrial diamonds, manganese, phosphate rock, soda ash, vermiculite, zirconium and several platinum metal groups.

South Africa and Zimbabwe together make up the majority of the world’s platinum metal group deposits and South Africa possesses every single rare earth metal except Bauxite and crude oil, which makes it work well as a trading partner with the Bauxite rich nation of China. However, African countries domestically control a very small share of the profits of these reserves, and the entire continent on average only receives about 15 percent of global exploration, expenditure, and mining investment. The bulk of the industry’s profits goes to foreign mining companies, which have played a role on the continent in some way, shape, or form since the 1800s, although their share has steadily decreased somewhat in the past 20 years. Furthermore, government corruption in many of the mineral-rich African nations has funneled large percentages of the funds from the mining industry away from domestic development, depriving many areas of the supposed benefits of this trade relationship.

In the worst case scenario, the mining industry has helped to fuel conflict in some of the least stable countries in Central Africa. The most serious case of this is in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where copper, cobalt, and tantalum reserves are controlled and leased to China by a variety of different militia groups. The funds from these mining operations are used by both the government and the rebel forces to finance the weapons and supplies used in the D.R.C.’s ongoing Civil War, which has taken over 5 million lives. While the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation strongly dissuaded many mining companies from dealing in “conflict minerals” and financing the warfare, rare earth trade continues to move in and out of the area, especially with China.

Disposal and its Consequences

After extraction, rare earth metals are manufactured into complete products and must be moved over extensive supply chains and across national borders to reach consumers (this has its own burden of CO2 emissions, as does any product involved in international trade). On the other side of extraction is disposal, when the technology is finally thrown away. This happens faster than would be necessary because of product obsolescence, which often involves designing products that break within a few years so a new one must be purchased, and perceived obsolescence, which is a marketing device used to make consumers believe they need newer, better products.

The average life cycle of a cell phone, for instance, is only 18 months. Both product obsolescence and perceived obsolescence are used to fuel the electronics business by ensuring that consumers buy new products regularly, but they cause large shares of electronics to be thrown away every year that could be designed and marketed to have much longer lifetimes.

While all waste comes with an environmental burden, electronic waste, or e-waste, is particularly dangerous to the environment because of its unique components. Rare earth metals themselves can be to the environment, but electronics are also produced with a number of chemicals that are considered extremely hazardous, such as arsenic, lead, mercury, cadmium and polybrominated flame retardants. More than 20 million tons of e-waste are generated each year, with 3.4 million tons coming from the United States alone. Many electronics are difficult to recycle by nature of their design and the chemicals that compose them, which means that more than 60 percent of electronic products have to be disposed of by traditional methods.

E-waste that isn’t recycled and stays in the country where it was purchased, often ending up in landfills where chemicals can leach into local groundwater. Alternatively, e-waste may be burned in incinerators, despite the fact that this releases dioxin, which is one of the most toxic known substances in the world. E-waste that is recycled, however, isn’t generally recycled but rather shipped to developing countries, which will often allow the import of old electronics. Some degree of this is actually recycled and repaired, but huge quantities become pure waste, accumulating in piles that are even less contained than landfills in the developed world. This leads to hazardous chemicals leaching out rapidly and polluting the ground and waterways of the areas they’re dumped in.

The Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Waste and Their Disposal was held in 1989 and entered into force in 1992. The primary purpose of the convention to address the mass dumping of waste from the developed to the developing world. The convention declared that any waste that could be categorized as flammable, explosive, poisonous, toxic, ecotoxic, corrosive of infectious must be disposed of as close as possible to where it was used and in the most environmentally friendly manner. In 1995, an amendment was added that banned the shipment of e-waste and other hazardous waste to the developing world for final disposal. However, the amendment did not ban the same shipment as long as the developing country was in agreement and the purpose of the shipment was recycling and not just disposal. Of course, in reality this leaves room for difference of interpretation and many developing countries willingly accept e-waste; what happens after it is dumped is generally difficult for the Basel Convention to track or regulate with any certainty.

Proponents of exporting e-waste to the developing world argue that it’s a beneficial arrangement in that it gives poorer nations access to repairable technology and metal materials. The recycling industry abroad also provides jobs and income for residents, who often live in the poorest parts of the Africa and Asia and depend on the industry for their livelihoods. Foreign exports also provide access to markets for recycled materials that simply don’t exist in developed countries, arguably ensuring that as little e-waste as possible is actually wasted.

However, it’s also true that the recycling processes abroad are incredibly unsafe for the humans who conduct them, which is why developed countries rarely allow such processes to take place domestically.  The disposal methods are often crude and dangerous and can involve burning circuit boards to isolate the lead material, burning the plastic off wires in order to access copper, and dissolving heavy metals in acids over fresh water. These operations often take place in residential areas and are performed with little to no safety equipment.

Image courtesy of baselactionnetwork via Flickr

Conclusion

The electronics industry has a significant impact on the environment at several important steps in its life cycle. Resource extraction through mining places a considerable burden on groundwater and the atmosphere, especially because most areas where REM mining takes place have very little environmental regulatory oversight. Furthermore, the mining industry can have negative social impacts on unstable countries where government corruption and internal conflict is high. The problem is compounded by the relevance of the mining industry to the economies of many African countries, which both need the revenue and have the ambition of furthering their national resource control to become key players in the electronics industry themselves.

At the end of the life of an electronic device, its disposal poses yet another danger to the environment because of the number of dangerous chemicals that go into each product. Historically, the bulk of the burden of e-waste is felt in the developing world where the waste is dumped. Dangerous chemicals enter the surrounding environment and the workers charged with disposal expose themselves to terrible health risks. While the Basel Convention has had an important influence on fighting international dumping, it’s still practiced widely and e-waste is still a huge problem globally.

Unfortunately, both the problems of extraction and disposal are largely outside of the view of the consumer, giving the issue little salience among most participants in the electronics industry. As the second most valuable industry on earth, the electronics market is certainly not going to slow down anytime in the near future, until perhaps REMs become a truly scarce resource. Since the environmental burdens of electronics are necessary to increase industry profits and the vast majority of the consumer base does not know or care about these burdens, it’s difficult to say whether or not effective solutions to these will eventually be produced.

Resources

African Compass International: Rare Earth Elements 101

Australian Atlas of Mineral Resources, Mines & Processing Centres: Tantalum

The Economist: Planet of the Phones

Electronics Take Back: Responsible Recycling vs. Global Dumping

Electronics Take Back: Where’s the Harm – From Material Extraction?

Eugene Becker, USEF: Mining and Exploitation of Rare Earth Elements in Africa as an Engagement Strategy in US Africa Command

Forbes: China’s Rare Earth Monopoly Needn’t put a Electronics Stranglehold on America

Forbes: What 60 Minutes got Wrong about Rare Earths and China

Geology News and Information: REE – Rare Earth Metals and their Uses

IISD: A Brief Introduction to the Basel Convention

I Fix It: The Problem With E-Waste

The National Geographic: Conflict Minerals

Pew Research Center: Mobile Fact Sheet

Pew Research Center: Device Ownership Over Time

Rare Element Resources: Rare Earth Elements

Statista: Leading Countries in the Electronics Industry in 2012, Based on Market Size (in Billion Euros)

World Health Organization: Electronic Waste

World’s Top Exports: World’s Top Export Products

WTEC: China’s Electronics Industry

World’s Richest Countries: Top Electronics Producers

Yahoo Finance: Consumer Electronics to Reach $289 billion by 2014

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Invisible Burden of Electronics appeared first on Law Street.

When discussing the clean energy revolution, the southern American states are rarely mentioned as progressive leaders. Texas in particular has a longstanding reputation for supporting the interests of the fossil fuel industry. Texas politicians fiercely deny the scientific validity of climate change and the state is home to the headquarters of some of the world’s largest oil and gas companies, such as Exxon Mobile and ConocoPhillips.

However, the Lone Star State actually has a greater Installed Wind Capacity than any other state in the United States. How did this paradox occur?

The Wind Capital of the United States

The proliferation of wind energy in Texas is a relatively recent phenomenon. In 2001, Texas received only 1 percent of its energy from wind. Only 15 years later, wind provides almost 10 percent of the state’s energy and powers over 3.6 million homes. Throughout the state there are 17,713 MW of installed wind capacity; to demonstrate the significance of this number, the second place state, Idaho, only has 6,212 MW and the 3rd place state, California, only has 6,108 MW. The irony behind these numbers is that areas such as California and the North Eastern states have all made political commitments to pursue renewable energy installations, yet they trail far behind one of the most fossil fuel friendly states in the nation when it comes to wind energy. The governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, and both of its senators, Ted Cruz and John Cornyn, all deny climate change, along with 16 of the state’s 36 congressional representatives. The state has also historically been heavily dependent on the fossil fuel industry; in 2014 Texas was the leading producer of crude oil and natural gas.

The Evolution of Renewables in Texas

The policy shift in Texas toward wind can be traced back to 1999 when the state legislature narrowly passed the first Renewable Electricity Standard. To the surprise of many, wind energy turned out to be a reliable and affordable source of electricity in the areas where it was first implemented. Following the success of their first law, the legislature updated it in 2005 to dramatically increase renewables throughout the state. The 2005 Renewable Electricity Standard forced the Public Utility Commission to create Competition Renewable Energy Zones (CREZ), which designated areas in the wind heavy, rural north of Texas for wind farms to be built. The CREZ also created a fund to build gigantic transmission lines connecting these wind farms to the highly populated urban areas of lower Eastern Texas.

To better understand the success of wind, it may be helpful to look at why other renewables, such as solar and hydro, haven’t gained anywhere near as much traction. One of the biggest problems with renewable energy is that it has difficulties matching energy demand. Hydroelectricity will provide fairly consistent power day and night, but solar can only generate electricity during the day, meaning solar panels stop being able to provide energy when the sun goes down. The ideal solution to this may come from advances in energy storage systems, but as of now most battery systems are underdeveloped and simply not capable of handling the amount of energy that would need to be stored for a highly populated area.

The power output of a wind turbine depends completely on the strength of the wind as it blows throughout the day–although its highest output is generally at night–which can be a serious problem in regions with lower wind potential and more fluctuating wind patterns. However, the geographically even terrain of rural Texas (along with the entire vertical band in the center of the United States) has some of the highest wind potential in the entire nation, making wind farms a highly effective technology for the state. While the northeastern states and California have all made political commitments to renewables and are all actively interested in wind energy, their placement on the more mountainous edges of the country means that they have dramatically less access to wind potential.

Interestingly enough, if you look just beyond the U.S. coasts there’s incredibly high potential for offshore wind energy. There has in fact been a growing interest in offshore wind in recent years, especially in the coastal northeastern states, but as of yet there hasn’t been a single offshore wind farm successfully implemented in the United States. This is due to offshore wind’s exceptionally high costs and difficult permitting process, along with high levels of community opposition, especially from beachfront property owners and fisherman.

An unfortunate fact of renewable technology is that its performance is largely dependent on where you want to install its source. While other states may be committed to the environment, (or at least to domestically available energy and protection from future CO2 regulations) it will generally be more cost effective to install wind turbines in the geographical center of the United States than on the outskirts. The 1999 and 2005 Renewable Electricity Standards have been opposed a number of times over the years by fossil fuel interests. A notable example is the Heartland Institute and the American Legislative Exchange Council’s 2013 Electricity Freedom Act, a model bill circulated among state legislators seeking to scale back renewable energy standards in every state. However, a majority of Texas state legislators have voted against these attacks for 16 years, arguing that the wind has created a reliable domestic source of energy, lowered utility rates, and created jobs throughout the state.

“Iowa Wind Turbines” courtesy of Theodore Scott via Flickr

Regulatory Barriers to Renewables

It’s also important to understand that implementing renewable energy is rarely as easy as being a pro-clean energy state. Texas is in a unique situation when it comes to its energy infrastructure and, as a result, it faces fewer technical barriers than the rest of the U.S. when it comes to renewables. The U.S. energy grid is split into three different sections: the Eastern Interconnection, the Western Interconnection, and the Texas Interconnection. The Eastern and Western Interconnections each cover about half of the country as divided by the Rocky Mountains, and each connects the states on its respective side with transmission cables that span entire regions. However, the Texas Interconnection was built completely isolated from the rest of the country. The vast majority of the state has its own grid, called the Energy Reliability Council of Texas, or ERCOT, while the upper panhandle and El Paso have their own, smaller grid operators.

The independent nature of the Texas Interconnection is part of a long-standing battle to achieve independence from federal regulations. The 1935 Federal Power Act gave the Federal Power Commission regulatory oversight over all interstate electricity sales, so Texas avoided these regulations by designing its grid so that none of the power lines crossed state boundaries. While Texas does currently have two connections to the Eastern Grid and three connections to the Mexican grid, ERCOT has to this day managed to remain outside of Federal regulation.

This has a significant impact on the development and growth of energy within the state. Because the other 47 mainland states all exist on larger interconnections, each must undergo highly complex permitting systems if they desire to build a wind farm. A project will need to obtain permits from their municipal and state governments, but also from a number of outside entities. Those entities include its region’s Independent System Operator, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Bureau of Land Management, the United States Forest Service, the Interstate Highway System, the Department of Transportation, the Federal Aviation Administration–which is concerned with any structure over 200 feet tall that might obstruct planes–and many, many more. There are countless additional permits that any given project may also need to obtain based on its proximity to a wetland, the protected environment of a certain species, a national park or other form of federally owned land, or if the turbines could in some way interfere with the migratory patterns of birds.

Because the Texan grid is independent of the rest of the country, developers can avoid many of these national regulatory obstacles. Furthermore, even within the state, the permitting process is extremely streamlined. State environmental organizations, such as the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, do not have oversight on wind farm projects that they would in other states. State, county, and local governments also have no regulatory power when it comes to wind siting; only the landowner and the developer are allowed to make a decision about where a wind farm is built. Texas’s incredibly deregulated electrical market makes it much easier to build a wind farm within the state than anywhere else in the country.

“All Texas” courtesy of Kevin Dooley via Flickr

The Current Political Context

In April 2015, the Texas senate voted 21 to 20 on Senate Bill 931 to end the state’s Renewable Energy Portfolio, both removing the state’s target Renewable Energy Goal and ending the Competitive Energy Zone initiative. The bill is currently pending in the state House of Representatives where a final decision will be made on Texas’ Renewable Energy Portfolio. While many environmentalists see the vote as a major loss to the clean energy movement, Texas is already firmly set on its path toward increasing wind energy. The 1999 and 2005 Renewable Electricity Standards have allowed the industry to grow so dramatically that Texas has far surpassed its original renewable energy goal of 500 MW by 2025 and all of the transmission lines connecting cities to wind farms have already been constructed, making the Senate Bill 931 a largely symbolic victory for fossil fuel companies.

On December 20, 2015, wind turbines generated a record high of 40 percent of Texas’s energy for 17 hours of the day during a low-pressure wind front. This milestone not only indicates the extreme potential of wind within the region but also proves that the newly built transmission lines are capable of handling almost an entire day’s worth of wind energy without malfunction, contrary to the arguments of many fossil fuel advocates.

If Senate Bill 931 becomes law then it may have some impact on future state support of the wind industry; it also comes at an inconvenient time when Texas may have to further reduce its CO2 emissions under Obama’s Clean Power Plan. However, renewables are currently projected to continue to grow in Texas regardless of state support. Currently, wind energy projects constitute 70 percent of all new energy capacity in the state and ERCOT projects that wind will generate another 8600 MW by 2024. As of now, it looks like Texas will continue to remain a major player in the wind energy industry.

Conclusion

Texas has managed to become the nation’s leader in wind energy for two main reasons. The first of these reasons is that the center of America has incredibly high wind potential and Texas reaps the benefits of this in the northern section of the state. The second major reason is that there are fewer regulatory obstacles to building a wind farm in Texas than in the rest of the country, both because Texas exists on its own grid and because the state’s public agencies have very little control over private development. Despite the fact that Texas is led by many politicians who publicly oppose climate change and the fact that the state contributes a huge share of U.S. fossil fuel production, renewable energy still prospers in Texas because it is available, cheap, and easy to implement. While the proliferation of renewables in Texas is certainly positive, the fact that this success is reliant on an unorthodox combination of factors also puts into focus how difficult it is for the rest of the U.S., even for openly pro-environmental states, to achieve the same degree of success.

References

American Wind Energy Association: U.S. Wind Energy State Facts

CNN: Billionaire Brothers Give Cruz Super Pac $15 million

The Desert Sun: In Texas, Different Ideas on Fossil Fuels, Renewables

George Washington Journal of Energy & Environmental Law: Why is Texas the Leading State for Wind Power?

Houston Chronicle: Renewable Energy v. Fossil Fuel

The Atlantic: How Green Energy Won Out over Fossil Fuels in a Red State

National Energy Renewable Laboratory: Wind Maps

Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability: Learn More about Interconnections

Oil and Gas: Texas Oil and Gas Companies

The State of Texas; Texas Wide Open for Business: The Texas Renewable Energy Industry

Texas Tribune: Senate Votes to end Renewable Energy Programs

Texas Tribune: Why Does Texas Have its Own Power Grid?

Think Progress: How Texas Politicians are Ignoring the Climate Change that Could Hurt their State’s Economy

Scientific American: Wind Provided 40 percent of Texas’s Electricity for 17 Hours One Windy Day in December

State Energy Conservation Office: Texas Renewable Energy Resource Assesment 2008: Wind Energy

Windustry: Permitting Basics

Wind Energy Transmission Texas, LLC: Our History

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Mystery of Wind Energy in Texas appeared first on Law Street.

Plastic bags have been demonized by the environmental movement for years. They are considered to be wasteful and unnecessary–why opt for plastic when you could have a reusable grocery bag? Yet within the battle to end the use of plastic bags, there is a camp that often goes unnoticed–animal rights activists. In coastal communities, plastic bags pose a major threat to marine life as animals  can get trapped inside of them and injure themselves. Plastic bags are often mistaken for jellyfish by sea turtles, who harm themselves by eating the bags, and large swaths of plastic bags floating on the ocean’s surface block the sunlight that algae and plankton need to survive.

California and Hawaii have already banned large retail stores from using plastic bags, and activists have now set their sights on Florida. Floridian cities are currently not allowed to control the sale of plastic bags but there are half a dozen online petitions to either ban them entirely or to initiate taxes on plastic bags. Officials from Miami Beach have mentioned several times that they would like to have a bag ban but cannot under Florida law as it stands today. A representative from Miami Beach sponsored a bill to ban plastic bags in certain regions of the state last year, but the bill has yet to get off the ground. Take a look at where plastic bags have been banned and what these laws signify for the potential bag ban in Florida.

Bans in California and Hawaii

In 2015, Hawaii banned the use of plastic bags in grocery stores across the state, encouraging shoppers to choose paper or to bring their own reusable bags from home. Hawaii’s ban came not from the state government but from the county level, as each of the four counties decided separately to enact a ban. Unfortunately, there was a small loophole in the ban that allowed thick plastic bags to be considered “reusable,” which means that the ban is often more theoretical than realistic. There are also exceptions for restaurants, pharmacies, and dry cleaning operations, which are still allowed to use plastic bags for their products. Hawaii’s bag ban, though viewed as well intentioned and unprecedented, has come under fire for not enforcing a drop in plastic use across all sectors of the community.

Meanwhile in California, activists spent years lobbying for a plastic bag ban and thought they had secured a law that would go into effect in the summer of 2016. However, after major pressure from the plastics lobby, the ban has been pushed back–citizens will vote on it during a referendum this coming November. According to NPR, a poll conducted late last year by the University of Southern California and The Los Angeles Times  found that California voters plan to uphold the bag ban by a margin of 59 to 34 percent. Yet in the months before the November referendum, any number of roadblocks could emerge to enacting the ban. Plastic bag manufacturers in other states have a strong interest in retaining the California market and have committed funding to lobbyists looking to further stall the bag ban.

Opposition

It is not only plastics lobbyists who stand against the ban though. San Jose resident Don Williams created the website stopthebagban.com because he considers it an “eco-fad” that inconveniences the public and doesn’t make a substantial contribution to conservation efforts. Although Hawaii and California have led the effort to implement state wide bag bans, their efforts have been stymied to the point that the bans may never have the impact that they were designed to. Plastic bags continue to pile up in landfills–and in the case of these coastal communities, ocean fills. Massive floating islands of garbage have built up in the center of major oceans, leaching toxins into the sea and poisoning sea life. Ocean currents move the plastic bags around the world, spreading pollution and endangering animals across the globe. The British Antarctic Survey reported that it found plastic bags as far south as the Falkland Islands and as far north as Spitzbergen, an island inside the Arctic Circle.

Banning Bags in Florida?

Although individual cities in various states have banned plastic bags, Florida state law prohibits individual cities from doing so. However, as of this January, cities along the Treasure Coast region with less than 100,000 residents are allowed to experiment with plastic bag control. Multiple cities in the region have signed up for a two year pilot program designed to decrease the use of bags, the first such program to emerge in the state. The Florida Retail Association has stated that a bag ban would not be practical. General counsel Samantha Padgett argued that:

‘Millions of visitors come to Florida each year. They are going to purchase items and they have to have some means of carrying those items.’ Reusable bags collect germs. And paper bags ‘can be very inconvenient for consumers on a rainy day.’

Proponents of the bag ban also have latched onto the tourism argument, claiming that when Florida’s famous beaches are covered in litter and the flora and fauna are suffering from being choked by plastic bags, no one will consider Florida to be worth visiting. North Shore Hawaii Turtle Tours is one of a dozen businesses that asks visitors to support the bag ban. The Florida Keys have attempted to get citizens to phase out plastic bags without legislation by launching the “Got Your Bags?” campaign, which asks Florida Keys residents to carry biodegradable and reusable bags with them every time they go shopping. Florida Keys Wildlife Rescue has gone so far as to call plastic bags a “cancer.” According to a study in the Journal of Environmental Research,

About 44 percent of all seabirds eat plastic fragments; 267 marine species (sea turtles, seabirds, marine mammals, and fish) are affected by plastic garbage. From Planet Ark, about 100,000 whales, seals, turtles, and other marine animals are killed by plastic bags each year worldwide. These numbers do not include the land-based victims; even cows have been known to eat plastic bags. Dead and surviving fish and animals, now laced with chemicals from eating plastic, transfer those chemicals to the food chain when other animals (including humans) eat them or their products.

In Cedar Key, volunteers pick up plastic bags off the beach and deposit them in dog curbing stations, so that dog owners can reuse them to pick up after their pets. This practice does not eliminate plastic bags but it does make sure that they are more than single use objects. Creative methods of reusing and recycling are important for communities hoping to limit littering but they do not provide an effective solution to the effects of plastic bags on wildlife. Without a significant reduction in plastic bag use, Floridian animals remain will remain in danger for the foreseeable future.

Conclusion

Although coastal and island communities have the greatest incentive to ban bags because of the potential harm to their wildlife, multiple landlocked states have also expressed interest in a bag ban. In Arizona, Missouri, Idaho, Indiana, Wisconsin and Utah, several Republican lawmakers have moved to block regulation of plastic bags because of the groundswell of support for bag bans. Grassroots movements to decrease or eliminate use of plastic bags operate in all fifty states but coastal communities are particularly crucial battlegrounds. Plastic bags are not simply artifacts of unsightly littering. They also harm sea creatures, block flood control systems and breed mosquitoes. Past bans on plastic bags have been partially successful at best, largely due to the difficulty of monitoring and enforcing the ban on a state-wide level.

Banning plastic bags is a challenging task but that does not mean it is not worthwhile, nor does it mean that there is not a sizable portion of the population that supports the ban. As the United States becomes more aware of its environmental footprint and actively seeks to create useful conservation laws, cities should be granted the autonomy to make their own laws regarding bag bans. Building a consensus on the local and regional level will make it easier to construct bag bans on the state level–perhaps eventually we could even graduate to a national ban. For the moment, states like Florida that prevent communities from cutting down on plastic are only harming themselves, setting up their cities for increased pollution and endangering indigenous wildlife.

Resources

Aljazeera America: Miami’s Plastic Vice: Bagging the Ban on Bag Bans

Huffington Post: Loophole Undermines Hawaii’s Historic Plastic Bag Ban

HuffingtonPost: This Is How Your Plastic Bag Ends Up In Massive Ocean Garbage Patches

Tree Hugger: Hawaii’s Plastic Bag Ban Goes into Effect, But…

NPR: California Plastic Bag Referendum Could Spark Environmental Showdown

TC Palm: Treasure Coast Communities May be Able to Ban Plastic Bags

The Miami Herald: South Florida Officials Seek Help Controlling Plastic Bags

New York Magazine: The Fight Over Plastic Bags Is About a Lot More Than How to Get Groceries Home

Florida Keys Wildlife Rescue: Plastic–A Cancer in Our Environment

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

The post Ban the Bag: Getting Plastic out of Coastal Communities appeared first on Law Street.

A recent aerial survey of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef found that as much as 95 percent of the coral that makes up the northern portion of the reef is bleached. While this may have significance for marine biologists or other people who understand precisely what this means, to most people, bleaching is something you do to your laundry. However, coral bleaching, especially of the Great Barrier Reef, is a huge deal because it is yet another litmus test for the planet and another sign of the current economic challenges facing the environment.

Read on to find out about where the world’s coral is located, what coral bleaching is, and what the consequences are for the future of coral reefs and marine life.

Coral Basics

Coral reefs are located off the coasts of more than 100 countries worldwide. They are primarily located in the tropic region, between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn. In some cases, coral is found outside of this region as long as warm currents flow there. Two examples are around Florida and outside parts of Japan. In total, coral covers approximately 110,000 square miles.

The first thing that must be understood about coral is that it’s not a rock or some type of inanimate object; corals are alive. And while they may look like plants, corals are actually animals. Like other animals, corals need to eat to survive because they can’t produce their own food. They get their nourishment from mutually beneficial relationships with algae, but corals also hunt prey. Using stinging tentacles, a coral paralyzes its prey and then slowly digests it.

Corals reproduce in two ways, they either produce both the egg and sperm to perform the fertilization process themselves, or they produce one of them, release it, and then rely on another colony to provide the other. Corals form when larvae attach themselves to rocks or other hard surfaces upon which they can grow. Coral reefs are made up of colonies of hard coral polyps. This type of coral secretes calcium carbonate, or limestone, to create their hard exoskeletons. Many organisms make up a coral reef but for corals to survive they form symbiotic relationships with  zooxanthellae algae, which is what gives the coral its unique colors.

The coral and the zooxanthellae essentially provide each other with added nourishment. Along with the zooxanthellae, corals also need several other conditions to survive; namely, sunlight, clear water, warm water, clean water and salt water.

Coral reefs are important because of their immense biodiversity. The reefs themselves only cover about 1 percent of the ocean floor yet are home to more than 25 percent of all marine life. To put it another way, there is more biodiversity in coral reefs than there is in tropical rain forests. The coral work in concert with the many species that inhabit the reefs; helping clean the water, provide food to one another, and even make the white sand that lines the world’s most exotic beaches. Coral also has a symbiotic relationship with humans, with as many as six million fishermen relying on the coral ecosystem for their livelihood.

The video below describes coral and its purpose in greater detail:

What’s happening to the Coral?

The attributes that make coral reefs special are also the aspects that face the most significant threats. Namely, because the reef is so biodiverse it is more resilient than a simpler ecosystem. But even with this built-in resiliency, coral reefs are dying at an accelerating rate. The World Wildlife Fund estimates that as many as a 25 percent of the world’s corals are already damaged beyond repair and another 66 percent are in danger of facing the same fate. So what exactly is happening?

Much, if not all, coral reef destruction can be attributed to human activity, the most blatant of which is rising ocean temperatures due to global warming. While coral reefs prefer warm water, they require an equilibrium to exist. This means that if water is too warm it can also be destructive. This is true for two reasons. First, if the water gets too hot the zooxanthellae will either die or be expelled from the coral. When the zooxanthellae are expelled the coral loses it color, which is where the term bleaching comes from. Second, warming water can also lead to harmful algae growth, which can cloud the water. This is problematic because corals need clear water to survive. When algae prevent sunlight from hitting corals, their zooxanthellae can die, killing the coral as well. Overfishing has also contributed to algae overgrowth because it eliminates the algae’s natural predators, removing barriers to growth.

There are also more direct human actions which negatively affect the coral. Dumping pollution in the water can increase nitrogen levels leading to algae overgrowth. Sediment and silt runoff from construction along coastal regions can also smother the corals blocking their access to sunlight. Destructive fishing practices like the use of poisonous chemicals and explosives to fish can also have serious consequences for coral reefs. Finally, tourism can pose a problem for corals because divers and snorkelers can stir up them up and cause damage. Perhaps the most directly harmful action is the direct mining of coral reefs for building materials and even for souvenirs.

The Effects

The impact of the destruction of coral reefs is widespread. Not only do coral reefs provide people with things such as food and building materials, they are also used in the development of many new cancer-fighting medicines. Corals serve as a buffer for the shoreline and filter the water as well. From a more aesthetic viewpoint, corals are also the center of the tourism for many small countries. While the threat currently faced by coral reefs may not directly concern the United States, for smaller countries that depend on tourism as a major part of their economies, the loss of coral reefs could be an economic disaster.

The following video below explains the danger coral faces:

Prevention

While the outlook for the world’s coral reefs is grim, it is not totally hopeless. After all, even when coral is bleached, zooxanthellae may still be able to return to the coral if conditions return to normal, allowing the reefs to survive. There are several efforts underway to protect and restore coral reefs globally. These include Marine Protection Areas, which regulate fishing, coastal development, and pollution. They also focus on raising awareness of the issues affecting coral. The Great Barrier Reef is one place that has been protected since the 1970s; however, even those efforts have had mixed results.

Along with those concerned with protecting the reefs are organizations aimed at restoring them, such as the Coral Restoration Foundation, which supports coral research and grows coral in nurseries to rebuild reefs. Efforts to restore coral reefs are underway in the United States as well. In 1998, the president established the Coral Reef Task Force (CRTF) to protect and restore reefs through mapping, monitoring, and research. As a result of the CRTF’s work, an additional law was passed in 2000, the Coral Reef Conservation Act, which required the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to protect coral reefs.

On a more individual level, there are a number of things the average person can do to preserve coral reefs. These efforts include conserving water; reducing pollution; using organic and ecologically friendly fertilizers; disposing of trash appropriately; diving and snorkeling safely; and even planting trees to reduce run-off. People can also play a role by raising awareness and supporting businesses that promote conservation. The following video details some of the efforts to preserve coral reefs:

Conclusion

Coral reefs are the most biodiverse ecosystems on the planet, yet their very existence is increasingly threatened. Coral reef conditions are some of the most telling measures that humans have to understand the state of the environment. Most of the current threats faced by coral reefs are the products of human activity, and as a result, are in many ways preventable. By raising awareness and stopping harmful activities like dumping pollution, harmful fishing, and climate change, future damage can be prevented. But a considerable amount of damage has already been done and many wonder whether or not it is possible to reverse it. While many are skeptical that the entire situation can be reversed, a significant amount of damage may still be undone.

In light of coral reefs’ importance to marine biodiversity and maybe even modern medicine, protecting them should be a priority for coastal areas. The damage done to coral reefs is emblematic of the larger threats facing the environment. It is up to people to make a concerted effort to preserve, restore, and properly manage their activities to ensure coral and coral reefs remain.

Resources

CBS News: Great Barrier Reef Coral Bleaching Hits “Extreme Level”

Coral Reef Alliance: Where Are Coral Reefs Located?

Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary: Corals are Animals

Coral Reef Alliance: How Reefs Are Made

Coral Reef Alliance: How Corals Reproduce

Coral Reef Alliance: What Do Coral Reefs Need To Survive?

Coral Reef Alliance: Types of Coral Reef Formations

Coral Reef Alliance: Coral Reef Biodiversity

World Wildlife Fund: Coral Reef Threats

Ocean World: Coral Reef Destruction and Conservation

State of the Planet: Losing Our Coral Reefs

The Nature Conservancy: Coral Reefs of the Tropics

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration: Corals

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Future is Bleached: The Trouble With the World’s Coral Reefs appeared first on Law Street.

The United States for the first time in history promised to cut its carbon dioxide emissions when it joined the Paris Agreement. In order to meet those targets, the Obama Administration created the Clean Power Plan to reduce emissions and move American states toward cleaner energy sources. However, the Clean Power Plan is currently being challenged in the Supreme Court and it’s unclear whether or not the U.S. government will be able to make its promises a reality. Read on to learn more about the past, present, and potential future of federal pollution regulation in the United States.

The Current Political Context

Currently, the United States has the second highest rate of carbon dioxide emissions in the world, surpassed only by China. The United States has also historically avoided participating in international climate negotiations and is one of  a small number of developed nations that chose not to ratify the Kyoto Convention. While both industrialized and developing countries around the world have joined onto the convention over the past two decades and made pledges to reduce their emissions, the United States has struggled to make national commitments to reduce its own emissions. This is, in part, because American fossil fuel companies have been able to exert a great deal of influence on political decisions through lobbying and because Congress is divided on whether or not climate change is even scientifically valid.

COP21, the 21st Conference of Parties for the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, marked the first time that the United States made a national pledge to reduce its emissions. However, while the COP21 was hailed as an international victory, it remains unclear if America can actually follow through on its commitments. U.S. policymakers remain divided on the issue of climate change and many believe that the government’s attempts to regulate fossil fuel usage directly interfere with the economy. As of February, the Clean Power Plan, with which the EPA began strictly regulating CO2 emissions from power plants, has been stayed by the Supreme Court and risks being ruled unconstitutional. The United States may have made an international commitment to reduce emissions, but on a domestic level, is it ready for such a change to take place?

A Brief history of Climate Change Negotiations

The first United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, also known as the Kyoto Protocol, was held on December 11, 1997. The convention entered into force on February 16, 2005–90 days after it was ratified by 55 nations emitting at least 55 percent of the CO2 emissions in 1990. The protocol required industrialized countries to make pledges to reduce their emissions by 5 percent before 2012.

Developing nations weren’t required to make pledges in the first incarnation of the Kyoto Protocol, although many did pledge to use aid from the U.N. and World Bank to invest in renewable energy sources. This was decided by the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities,” meaning that since industrialized countries did the most damage to the environment, they should bear the heaviest burden of fixing it. Likewise, since dramatically reducing emissions would handicap growth in developing nations, it’s viewed as unfair to expect them to make the same level of commitment.

The United States did sign onto the Kyoto Protocol but it did not ratify the convention, meaning essentially that it gave its public support but refused to individually reduce its emissions. Decisions not to make emissions pledges from some major nations such as the United States, Canada, and Russia–although Russia did eventually agree to ratify the convention in 2004–are often cited by smaller countries as justification to not participate as well.

“High-level ministerial roundtable under the Kyoto Protocol” courtesy of UNclimatechange via Flickr

In 2012, following the end of the Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period, another conference was held to establish new international pledges. The second conference produced the Doha Amendment, which gathered binding emissions reduction commitments from much of the industrialized world, including the entirety of the European Union and 37 other developed countries. Many developing countries ratified the amendment and made their own commitments, but their participation was on a non-binding basis.

In December 2015, COP21 was held in Paris and attended by representatives from 188 different countries, making it one of the largest international conferences in history. Rather than set specific reduction targets, COP21 let each participating country decide its own emission reduction plan with the ultimate goal of keeping global warming from raising the earth’s temperature by more than 2 degrees Celsius. COP21 was successful in bringing together almost every country on earth to participate in the conference, including a wide range of developing countries and many of the world’s top polluters, such as China, India, Indonesia, and the United States. The United States pledged to reduce its emissions between 26 and 28 percent by 2025, focusing primarily on carbon dioxide but also on methane, nitrous oxide, perfluorocarbons, sulfur hexafluoride, and nitrogen trifluoride.

The Clean Air Act and the EPA’s Role in Emissions Regulations

While COP21 marks the first time that the United States made an international commitment to reduce its emissions, the U.S. government has exercised power internally to regulate emissions since Congress passed the Clean Air Act in 1973. The Clean Air Act gave the EPA the power to create National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for six hazardous air pollutants: nitrogen dioxide, particulate matter, ozone, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, and lead. Each state was required to design a State Implementation Plan (SIP) to upgrade and regulate industrial air polluters in order to meet these NAAQS. The act was amended in 1977 and in 1990, both of which were made to redesign the NAAQS and extend the deadlines for states that failed to reach their goals. The 1990 amendment also set new standards for technology upgrades for large-scale, stationary polluters.

The Clean Air Act addressed both stationary and mobile sources of pollution: power plants were forced to upgrade their technology and install filters on smokestacks and the auto industry was forced to redesign its engines and cars to reduce effects of harmful chemicals released into the atmosphere as well as meet average miles-per-gallon efficiency standards. The act has made a significant impact on air quality in the United States, reducing smog by more than 25 percent since 1990, lead pollution by 92 percent, sulfur dioxide by 71 percent, nitrogen dioxide by 46 percent, and ending the production and distribution of many chemicals that adversely affect the ozone layer.

However, while the Clean Air Act has existed for 43 years, its use to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is a recent development. In 2007, the Supreme Court ruled  in Massachusetts v. the EPA that if it could be scientifically proven that greenhouse gas emissions were dangerous to human health, then it would be the EPA’s responsibility to regulate them. Only two years later, in 2009, scientific evidence proved both that GHGs were harmful to the human respiratory system and that an increase in heat waves due to global warming could be dangerous, especially for the elderly and infirm.

“Smokestack” courtesy of Dean Hochman via Flickr

The Clean Power Plan Explained

The Supreme Court’s ruling in Massachusetts v. the EPA gave the EPA the power to use the Clean Air Act as a viable policy tool to combat climate change and paved the way for the creation of the Clean Power Plan. The United States’ greenhouse gas emissions can be broken down into five major categories: 31 percent comes from electricity generation (also referred to as the power sector), 27 percent from transportation, 21 percent from industry, 12 percent from commercial and residential sources, and 9 percent from agriculture.

If the United States is to successfully reduce emissions by its target of 26 to 28 percent, a substantial amount of those reductions will have to come from the power sector, which contributes the largest share of greenhouse gasses and is also likely where the government can exert the most regulatory control. This has been the guiding logic behind the creation of the Obama Administration’s 2015 Clean Power Plan.

The Clean Power Plan mandates that power plants across the United States reduce their carbon dioxide emissions by 26 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 32 percent by 2030. The plan works differently on a state-by-state basis according to the energy mix used in each state, how efficient and environmentally friendly the current power plants are, and how effective a variety of traditional emission reduction tools can be in the context of the first two factors. The different emissions reductions targets vary widely because of these variables. For example, Montana is required to reduce its emissions by 47 percent while a few states aren’t required to make any changes because they don’t have power plants that the plan applies to. The EPA’s job is only to set these reduction targets; each state is allowed to design its own plan to meet its target. The only condition is that the plans must be submitted by September 1, or the EPA will impose a federal plan on states that failed to create their own.

Each state may choose to pursue the emissions reductions either through rate-based methods, which focus on reducing the amount of carbon emitted per unit of energy; or through mass-based methods, which focus on reducing the overall number of tons of carbon emitted. Regardless of their method of choice, the EPA offers four basic building blocks to aid the construction of each state’s plans: making existing coal plants more efficient; using existing gas plants more efficiently; increasing renewables and nuclear and increasing end-use energy efficiency. These four principles are not binding constraints but rather general guidelines; each state is expected to create a unique plan.

Legal Challenges

Since the release of the Clean Power Plan, 29 states have attempted to sue the EPA but the majority of these cases were quickly dismissed. But in January, one case, West Virginia v. the EPA, may be on its way to the Supreme Court. While the D.C. circuit court initially plans to review the case in June, on February 9 the Supreme Court voted 5-4 to issue a stay to stop the Clean Power Plan’s implementation prior to undergoing judicial review. That stay stops the EPA’s regulations until after a court ruling has determined whether they are within the agency’s authority. A ruling against the EPA could effectively cripple the plan’s intended purpose of combating climate change.

Image courtesy of Phil Richards via Flickr

However, on February 24, less than two weeks after the Supreme Court issued the stay, Justice Antonin Scalia passed away. Justice Scalia led the decision to overturn the Clean Power Plan and his death significantly complicates the plan’s legal future. The Supreme Court now seems to be divided 4 to 4 on the issue, but there has been no mention of changing the decision to stay the case. The issue is also further complicated by the GOP’s refusal to hold hearings on the President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee.

The looming question now is whether or not the Supreme Court will wait to hear the case until after the 2016 Presidential election and/or the confirmation of a ninth justice. The D.C. Circuit Court is currently scheduled to hear the states’ lawsuit this upcoming summer after which point the Supreme Court will decide whether or not it wants to take up the case. If the court refuses to take up the case or issues a 4-4 split ruling, then the circuit court’s decision will stand. However, legal experts note that the court could delay the case until a new justice joins the bench, which would likely lead to a 5-4 decision based on the ideological leaning of the ninth justice.

So What will Happen in the Meantime?

The Clean Power Plan is critical to the United States’ ability to fulfill its COP21 commitments. However, the fact that the plan is currently pending a court ruling does not mean that it failed. Last year, the Clean Power Plan already exerted considerable influence on the American energy systems as states have begun to redesign their energy systems for the future and many power plant operators have already begun retrofitting their plants and designing compliance plans. The primary focus of the Clean Power Plan is to dramatically reduce the use of coal in American energy and that may very well be happening. The implementation of the plan also coincides with a time when we have new access to domestic reserves of natural gas and energy investors have already started to move away from coal toward less expensive forms of energy.

Coal stocks plummeted in 2015 and many plants across America declared bankruptcy. However, this isn’t to say that the Supreme Court decision isn’t important. If the Clean Power Plan is overturned, then a new series of political barriers to regulating emissions may be created.  The decision also sets a dangerous legal precedent, marking the first time the Supreme Court has stayed federal regulations before hearing the case. The EPA’s legal authority to address airborne pollution is the major weapon that gives the United States a real chance to reduce its emissions. If that power is called into question then that may dramatically impede the EPA’s ability to make progress on climate change.

Conclusion

The Clean Power Plan’s emphasis on increasing renewable energy in America is a large part of what makes it an effective weapon against climate change. Coal may still die out on its own, but without the plan in place, it seems likely that energy investors will shift to the more cost efficient natural gas rather than renewable energy. Natural gas releases less CO2 than coal but is still very much a greenhouse gas and a national dependence on methane as an energy source would still result in high levels of GHG emissions.

As long as the Clean Power Plan is in legal limbo it’s difficult to predict what direction American energy will take. Currently, it seems likely that there won’t be a final hearing on the case until after the 2016 election is decided and a new justice is confirmed by the Senate. Whether that new justice ends up being liberal or conservative will most likely make or break the plan and will strongly influence the United States’ ability to meet its Cop21 goals. The next president will also have control over executive branch policy, meaning that he or she could peel back a significant portion of existing regulation or continue President Obama’s efforts and reduce greenhouse gas emissions further.

Resources

The Atlantic: A Legal Win for the E.P.A.

The Atlantic: Will a Reconfigured Supreme Court help Obama’s Clean Power Plan Survive?

The Atlantic: Did the Supreme Court Doom the Paris Climate Change Deal?

The Atlantic: The Supreme Court’s Devastating Decision on Climate Change

CNN: Kyoto Protocol Fast Facts

CNN: Obama: Climate Agreement ‘Best Chance we have to Save the Environment‘

Earth Institute, Columbia University: What is the U.S. Commitment in Paris? 

Environment and Energy Publishing, LLC: Clean Power Plan: A Summary

The EPA.: The Clean Air Act Requirements and History

The EPA: The Clean Power Plan for Existing Power Plants

The EPA: Summary of the Clean Air Act

The Guardian: The Kyoto Protocol is Not Quite Dead

The Hill: Supreme Court Overturns Landmark EPA Air Pollution Law

Inside Climate News: For U.S. and China, World’s Biggest Climate Polluters, It’s Still Business as Usual

Moyers & Company: Here are the 56% of Republicans who Deny Climate Change

NRDC: NRDC Summary of EPA’s Clean Power Plan

United Nations Conference on Climate Change: 188 Countries have Committed to Reducing their Carbon Emissions

United Nations Framework on Climate Change Convention: Status of Ratification of the Kyoto Protocol

Union of Concerned Scientists: The Clean Air Act

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Will the United States be Able to Keep its Paris Agreement Commitments? appeared first on Law Street.

The United States is viewed both domestically and internationally as one of the most water secure nations in the world. The 2011 California drought represents one of the first developments to challenge this notion in many years. California’s four-year rain shortage has brought the realization that a community can’t survive without a water source to the attention of many Americans and that the United States isn’t immune to water scarcity. This year’s El Niño finally brought rain to California, but seemingly just as the drought was temporarily broken on the West Coast, media attention fell onto another water-related crisis: Flint, Michigan.

Flint and Beyond

Three years ago Michigan Governor Rick Snyder appointed Darnell Earley as the Emergency Manager of Flint, giving him complete control over the city’s budget and charged him with saving the city from bankruptcy. In 2014, in a move calculated to save the city millions of dollars, Earley made the executive decision to relocate the city’s drinking source from the distant Lake Huron to the much closer Flint River. While the Flint River may have been more economically convenient, the water was not properly treated with an anti-corrosion chemical to prevent erosion of lead pipes. The water was understood to be toxic from years of being used as a chemical dumping ground by Flint’s now extinct automobile industry, which also made it significantly more corrosive than most sources.

The water looked and smelled unpleasant, and while it wasn’t fully understood at the time the switch was made, water in Flint contained dangerous quantities of lead residue from local pipelines. After the switch, Flint residents experienced hair loss and fell seriously ill, leading them to quickly contact city officials. Earley, the Governor’s office, and the State Health Department were all contacted but largely ignored complaints. It took two entire years before a team of researchers from Virginia Tech did an official study that proved the water was highly toxic. The health consequences of those two years will last a lifetime for the people of Flint, and has rendered the entire community unstable.

Flint serves as a chilling example of how dependent an area and its people are on their water source and marks a shift in national attention toward the idea of water instability in America. The story of the Flint water crisis went viral and has been covered widely since the revelations. In January 2016, Time Magazine published an article on Flint titled, “The Poisoning of an American City,” which was featured on its cover.

Flint became one of just a few nationally-circulated stories of a community experiencing water pollution since before the Clean Water Act was passed and in the months following the Flint crisis, similar stories have been popping up all over the country. On January 23, attention turned to St. Joseph, Louisiana, where the drinking water runs brown from aging and malfunctioning pipelines. Then on February 21, CNN covered a story on Crystal City, Texas where the faucets and showerheads dispense sludge due to sediment buildup in their storage tanks.

A History of Water Legislation in the United States

Many will argue that America is currently experiencing its most water-secure period in history. Prior to the 70s, the United States had essentially no regulation for pollution and chemical dumping was widely practiced by the industrial sector. In the late 60s only about one-third of U.S. waters were considered safe to swim in and fish from. According to a 1970 report from Bureau of Water Hygiene, a sample of American tap water supplies found that 36 percent exceeded the limits of established drinking water standards. It required several major tragedies to change the political attitude toward water as a public health issue, including toxic spills and oil leaks. Perhaps the most memorable of these events happened in 1969 in Cleveland when the Cuyahoga River lit on fire due to its high quantity of flammable waste. The image of a burning river emblazoned Time Magazine and led to a national outcry.

America’s first water-related piece of legislation was the Federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948, which was followed by five additional bills written between 1956 and 1970. In 1972, in response to major pollution disasters, the Federal Water Pollution Control Act was revised and expanded in order to give it a much larger scope of control. The newly dubbed Clean Water Act of 1972 was passed with bipartisan support and in spite of a veto from President Nixon, representing the most influential piece of water-related legislation in American history.

While previous water quality bills ultimately held the states responsible for interpretation and enforcement, the Clean Water Act marked a departure from this line of thinking–giving the federal government direct authority to regulate water quality. The act gave the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) the power to set industrial wastewater standards, made it illegal for individuals to dump waste in navigable waters, and forced industrial and municipal facilities to obtain permits to discharge their waste. These permits could also be revoked–effectively shutting down a business if the discharges were found to exceed EPA standards. Industries across America were forced to upgrade their technology in order to generate smaller waste streams and use a secondary treatment on the waste that they did create. The Clean Water Act targeted the largest sources of pollution–toxic waste dumping, oil spills, and large sewage leaks–using better technology as the primary solution.

The Clean Water Act was amended three times during the 70s and 80s to strengthen its ability to regulate waste. The EPA’s power was further increased by the Ocean Dumping Act in 1972 and the Safe Drinking Act in 1974. These efforts had a huge influence on reducing large scale pollution and has successfully increased the percentage of swimmable and fishable waters in the United States from one-third to almost 60 percent, as well as dramatically decreasing the load of contaminants in drinking water across the nation.

So Where Are We Now?

While considerable progress has been made, the Clean Water Act was written with the goal of making the United States’ waters swimmable and fishable by 1983. However, in 2016 the EPA has admitted that over 40 percent of U.S. waterways don’t meet national standards. While regulations have significantly improved, they’ve failed to protect many communities from pollution. Flint, Crystal City, and St. Joseph are extreme examples of water sources gone wrong, but they’re far from unique. Citizens across the country are regularly exposed to dangerous chemicals through the drinking water. The Natural Resource Defense Council studied major cities all across the United States and found that many of them had tap water that contained a number of contaminants. The most common and deadly of these contaminants were lead, pathogens, arsenic, radon, and perchlorate rocket fuel.

The D.C.-based Environmental Working Group conducted a similar study that took place over the course of five years, testing for 316 different contaminants in water supplied to 48,000 communities throughout the country. They found the same trend of pollutants appeared regularly in drinking water throughout the country, especially in concentrated urban areas. They ranked different communities on the percentage of chemicals found in the water, the number of different chemicals present, and the level of danger of each individual community.

Both the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Working Group found that some of the most severely polluted areas in the U.S. were major cities, including San Diego, Las Vegas, Jacksonville, Albuquerque, Houston, and Denver, all of which had a number of dangerous contaminants in their drinking water exceeding the EPA’s safe limits. Across the nation, cities have been using inaccurate water testing practices, withholding information from their citizens, and completely bypassing EPA guidelines.

“Sewage Contaminated Water” courtesy of Tony Webster via Flickr

Obstacles to Keeping Water Clean

Regulating the discharges of America’s entire industrial and municipal sectors is a task of momentous proportions and many dangerous chemicals don’t specifically have regulations attached to them. As such, many companies can get away with dumping illegally. If an industry is particularly critical to the economy of an area, it may have a blind eye turned to its actions, at least from local governments. Furthermore, there are also cases like Flint where much of the damage had already been done. The auto industry responsible for the majority of the dumping in the Flint River, with the exception of Flint Motors, died out long ago. All the companies that could now be fined or forced to pay for the cleanup have gone bankrupt.

There are also several legal loopholes that certain industries can use to legally pollute groundwater. Perhaps the most significant of these is the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which allocated federal subsidies to different energy sources with the majority of the funds going to the fossil fuel industry. However, beyond covering subsidies, the act also gave hydraulic fracturing companies the privilege to legally inject water based pumps into the ground without publicly releasing the chemicals used in the underground pumping process. This became known as the Halliburton Loophole, due to the fact that the Energy Policy Act was designed by a team directed by Vice President Dick Cheney, a former CEO of Halliburton.

A large part of the problem is also that the Clean Water Act regulates pollution that comes from point sources, or identifiable and quantifiable streams of pollution, such as oil leaks or sewage streams. However, up to 50 percent of America’s pollution is estimated to come from non-point sources, which are widespread and difficult to track or control. Pollution can often enter water sources simply by getting carried along with rainwater. Non-point sources include animal feces, particularly from livestock and pets (whose feces contain different, more harmful bacteria and pathogens as a result of their unique diets); nitrogen and phosphorus from lawn fertilizers; and agricultural pesticides, dirt, general sediments, and rock salt; the leaking residue of aging septic tanks; and numerous other examples. Aging and deteriorating piping systems can also transport contaminants directly to your home as water moves through them.

The problem is not just with water pollution but also with excessive over-withdrawal from water sources. A body of drinking water is restored naturally with rainfall that runs–both as surface water and groundwater–into lakes, ponds, and reservoirs. However, if a community continuously withdraws water at a faster rate than the watershed can restore it, the level of accessible drinking water will lower and lower until the body of water is completely undrinkable. This problem is seen at its worst in highly populated urban areas and tourist destinations where large water withdrawals are necessary to sustain the community.

Major American waterways such as the Colorado River and Lake Mead, both of which provide water to tens of millions of people, are at risk of drying up within the next few decades. Long-term water use is often not taken into account by city planners; for instance, Los Angeles and Las Vegas are currently America’s two fastest growing cities and both are built on literal deserts. El Niño’s unorthodox rain patterns have brought temporary relief to these areas, but the pattern of dry, arid weather will eventually resume and the California drought shows every sign of resurfacing. These problems are also not limited to the West–40 out of 50 states are currently predicted to have one or more regions that will experience water shortage within the decade.

Recent Policy Developments

The most relevant recent water-related policy development happened in 2014 when the Obama Administration passed the Waters of the United States Rule, also known as the Clean Water Rule. The purpose of the rule was both to give more regulatory oversight to the Environmental Protection Agency and to expand the definition of protected waters beyond lakes and rivers to also include smaller waterways such as streams and tributaries, which ultimately flow into lakes and rivers and thus impact the health of our drinking water.

Republican members of Congress have objected to the Clean Water Rule on the grounds that it unfairly increases federal power where the government has no right to assert control over businesses, farmers, and private landowners. The rule’s opponents have attempted to overturn it using the Congressional Review Act, and on January 13, the House of Representatives effectively voted to overturn the rule. Only six days later, on January 19, President Obama responded by vetoing the overturn. Without the necessary two-thirds majority required to override his veto, the Clean Water Rule will continue to be U.S. law.

Conclusion

With the rate and severity of droughts increasing, so does our understanding of the sheer volume of polluted water sources throughout the nation, and it’s more important than ever to take water instability seriously. Despite some progress in the past few years, the same dangers are just as alive today as they were in the pre-seventies era. This is illustrated well by the fact that in 1969 the burning Cuyahoga River made the cover of Time magazine and 57 years later we see yet another polluted waterway–this time the Flint River–back on the magazine’s cover. If there’s a positive side to the recent surge in media attention toward these events it’s the idea of a water crisis as a tangible, possible thing that could happen in America may now be present in the minds of American citizens and voters.

There is no silver bullet to water instability; any approach to making American watersheds sustainable must involve a number of different methods. Some cities in America have banned the use of chemical rock salt for roads and others have banned the use of phosphorous and nitrogen-based fertilizers. In response to the drought, California set strict laws regulating the amount of water each citizen was allowed to use and that each establishment was allowed to offer. As the population continues to grow, especially in urban centers, more and more areas may have to regulate water withdrawal with an eye to the future. Perhaps one of the most needed changes is for more and more areas to regularly test their water for contaminants to determine its safety and create a baseline measure to determine changes. The most important element of water sustainability is to act now and plan for the future, understanding that the health of a community directly correlates to the health and security of its water source.

Resources

ATTN: U.S. Cities are Underreporting Heavy Metals in their Water Supply

Daily Finance: 10 American Cities with the Worst Drinking Water

Encyclopedia.com: Clean Water Act of 1977

EPA: Summary of the Clean Water Act

EPA: What the Clean Water Rule Does

The Guardian: Flint Water Crisis: Congressman says EPA guilty of ‘Flat-out Incompetence’

NRDC: Study Finds Safety of U.S. Drinking Water at Risk

The New York Times: A Question of Environmental Racism in Flint

The New York Times: Events that Lead to Flint’s Water Crisis

The New York Times: Unsafe Levels of Lead in Tap Water Not Limited to Flint

Salon: It’s Not Just a Flint Problem: Other U.S. Cities are Suffering from Toxic Water

Salon: America’s Water Crisis is so Much Bigger than California

Water Encyclopedia: Clean Water Act

The Water Project: Water Scarcity in U.S.

Earth Works Action: The Halliburton Loophole

CNN: Water Runs Black in Texas Town Already Wracked by Corruption Arrests

Environmental Protection Agency: Natural Gas Extraction – Hydraulic Fracturing

The Hill: House Votes to Overturn Obama Water Rule

Time: The Burning River that Sparked a Revolution

USA Today: Obama Vetoes Attempt to Kill Clean Water Rule

The News-Star: Water Woes Plague St. Joseph

Kyle Downey

Kyle Downey is an Environmental Issues Specialist for Law Street Media. He graduated from Skidmore College with a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies. His main passions are environmentalism and social justice. Contact Kyle at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Water Instability in the United States: Can Anything be Done? appeared first on Law Street.

The precipitous decline in the price of crude oil and its effect on the stock market have caught the interest of the energy community, Wall Street, and the American public. What may be lost in all this is that even while oil prices plummet, renewable energy sources are closing the gap and becoming increasingly affordable thanks to a combination of things such as improved infrastructure and beneficial policies, just to name a few. In fact, renewable energy’s recent success even got a mention in President Obama’s final State of the Union address. This article will look at how renewable energy turned the corner and has become a beacon of light for the future of American power.

Sources of Renewable Energy

The outlook for renewable energy has improved significantly in the United States. President Obama noted in his State of the Union Address, “in fields from Iowa to Texas, wind power is now cheaper than dirtier, conventional power.” While the validity of this quote only applies to select places and not the entire nation, the fact that it has any truth behind it at all is a sign of major change.

Wind

Wind power, in particular, has seen massive growth in the past few years. Last December, wind energy production passed the 70 gigawatts threshold. To put this in perspective, this means that the power generated from wind can supply 19 million homes. The leap forward in production is the result of a combination of events, including the expansion of wind infrastructure. Wind power now has 50,000 working turbines in 40 different states and Puerto Rico. It is also thanks to tax credits, namely the Renewable Energy Production Tax Credit, which was extended after a brief lapse as part of the latest budget. This increase had led to a drastic decrease in the price of wind power, dropping 66 percent from 2009 levels. It has also meant a large jump in its share of the energy market going from less than 1 percent in 2007 to between 4.5 and 5 percent this year. The U.S. Department of Energy predicts that wind’s production and share of the energy market will increase dramatically in future.

Solar

Like wind power, solar power has grown rapidly over the past few years. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, solar energy provided 40 percent of all new electrical generating capacity in 2015. This growth has translated into 22,700 megawatts of capacity, or enough to power 4.6 million American homes. As a result, the price of solar installations have dropped 73 percent since 2006 and 45 percent for residences since 2010. Much of that decrease in cost has been fueled by the Investment Tax Credit, which took effect in 2006 to help promote growth in the renewable energy industry.

Hydroelectric Power

Another major source of renewable energy is hydroelectric power. Currently, the total capacity for hydroelectric power is 79,000 megawatts. This production is spread across 2,400 facilities throughout the United States, although the majority are located along the West coast. From 2000 to 2010, hydroelectric power accounted for somewhere between 5.8 and 7.2 of the total energy produced in the U.S., and about 17 percent globally. Initially, hydroelectric power accounted for the vast majority of all renewable energy sources, though that number is falling as additional renewable sources produce more power. Hydroelectricity is incredibly cheap and flexible, especially in comparison to solar and wind units, though their prices have been decreasing in recent years.

Biomass

Wind, solar, and to a lesser extent hydroelectric, get most of the attention, but when it comes to production, biomass is the leader in terms of energy output. This may come as a surprise because exactly what biomass is can be somewhat confusing. The way that it has garnered such a share of the market is largely through ethanol fuel, which in 2013 made up 43 percent of all fuel used in the United States. In fact, that the same year, biomass made up nearly half of all non-renewable energy used–twice as much as the second highest, hydroelectric power. This notion that biomass is the leader in renewables should not be particularly surprising because for most of human history, biomass, namely wood, was used primarily for energy, with the conversion to coal only coming fairly recently. But it is important to note that while most renewable energy sources are touted as environmentally friendly, biomass energy sources are not completely carbon neutral.

Geothermal

Another growing renewable power source is geothermal energy. The United States has approximately 3,000 megawatts of geothermal generating capacity, but it accounts for less than 1 percent of the total U.S. energy output. Growth in geothermal has been relatively slow in recent years, although scientists argue it could be a major source of electricity in the future.

The video below explains how the different types of renewable energy work:

Regulations

On the Federal Level

Starting at the federal level, there are a number of programs and regulations in place to monitor and encourage the growth of renewable energy. One example is the Federal Energy Management Program, which aims to reduce emissions by government vehicles and in government buildings. The Environmental Protection Agency also has a number of programs in place to reduce emissions, conserve the environment, and encourage the use of renewable energy. One is the Green Power Partnership, which provides free advice, training, and support to companies who want to better utilize renewable energy. Another is the Landfill Methane Outreach Program, which seeks to protect the environment, helping landfills reduce emissions and capture methane for use as a renewable energy source. The EPA’s AgStar program also promotes the recovery of methane, this time from animal feeding areas. Lastly is RE-Powering America’s Land, which encourages developing renewable energy projects on the sites of previously contaminated areas.

State and Local

There are also a number of beneficial policies at the state level. Some of the most significant state-level policies are Renewable Portfolio Standards, which require utility providers to provide a certain percentage of renewable energy to their customers. These standards help encourage the growth of renewable energy and allow for a more localized approach to setting requirements.

Public Benefits Funds for Renewable Energy create a pool of money to invest in renewables. The funds are supported by a special charge on customers’ energy bills and can help encourage local renewable production. Output-Based Environmental Regulations define limits on how much energy can come from any one source. In doing so, states can encourage utilities to expand their energy portfolios to provide electricity from new sources. Many states also have Interconnection Standards to help ensure that new energy sources have easy access to the electrical grid. Another policy that is particularly rewarding is Net Metering, which allows customers who have a renewable system in place, like rooftop solar panels, to be paid for any energy they provide back to the power grid. The combination of interconnection standards and Net Metering helps make it cost-effective for homeowners to adopt sources of renewable energy. Along similar lines are Feed-in-Tariffs, which force electrical companies to pay a premium to individuals that provide renewable energy to the grid.

The Future of Renewables

With all the growth in renewables, it is not surprising that the future looks very green. The U.S. Energy Information Administration projected that renewable energy will be the fastest-growing energy source through 2040. Additionally, while the industry still relies on tax credits, it seems on the verge of weaning itself off of them, as growth in renewable energy has caused some renewables to be competitive, if not cheaper, than fossil fuel sources in some parts of the United States. Companies are also on the verge of improving storage solutions, which is one of the major problems with solar and wind energy currently. The accompanying video looks at the future of renewable energy:

It is no surprise then, that according to a Renewable Electricity Futures Study, renewable energy could provide as much as 80 percent of all U.S. electricity by 2050. In the process, this transformation will have significant benefits for the climate, economy, and public health. By switching to these forms of energy production, the United States will also see a drastic reduction in its water consumption because large quantities of water are currently needed to cool traditional power plants.

The efforts supporting renewable energy will likely benefit from last year’s Paris Climate Conference. During the conference, nations across the world vowed to reduce emissions and invest more in renewable technology in an effort to prevent the planet’s temperature from rising 2 degrees Celsius. The following video looks at the specifics of the Paris Climate Conference and its impact on the future of renewables:

Criticisms/Setbacks

While renewable energy sources are growing and expanding, it is still not full steam ahead–even renewables come with caveats. The main issue currently is cost and investment. While wind and solar are thriving, they are doing so with the help of generous tax breaks. While many applaud the growth of solar power, supporters also warned that growth could start to decline if tax breaks do not continue. There are many examples of failed renewable energy companies. Perhaps the most notorious example is Solyndra, a solar panel installation company, which was given a $535 million loan by the Department of Energy, but ended up defaulting. There other examples too, including Abound, a solar company, and Fisker, an electric car company.

The many forms of renewable energy production have their own challenges. Hydroelectric power, for example, is very useful but few, if any, new projects have been planned for the future. Biomass also has accompanying issues, namely that production requires valuable land and resources to grow the corn used in ethanol, which could potentially be better used to grow crops for food. Plants burning biomass may also produce more pollution than traditional energy plants that burn coal or natural gas. Even solar and wind, while not nearly as hazardous to the local environment, are have trouble storing any energy produced in excess of existing demand.

Conclusion

Production from renewable energy sources has seen dramatic growth in recent years and estimates suggest that growth will only continue, if not speed up. But despite the recent success of the renewable energy industry, as oil prices remain low money could easily move back toward traditional sources power. Yet doing so would almost certainly be bad for business–the decline in oil’s price is not the sign of a prosperous future, but a perilous one. Renewable energy sources are growing quickly and are already becoming competitive with traditional, dirty sources of electricity. Even much-publicized failures are showing signs of improvement–the Department of Energy’s loan program, which gave the infamous Solyndra loan, is now turning a profit from interest.

Renewable energy certainly has many hurdles to jump through as far as environmental impact, scale of production, and effective storage. The industry will also need to become less dependent on tax breaks, though signs of that are already emerging. If state and federal programs continue to support the growth of new energy sources, the United States may be able to meet its goals for renewable energy production in the coming decades.

Resources

FactCheck.org: Obama’s Wind Energy Claim

NPR: Wind Power Continues Steady Growth Across The U.S

Solar Energy Industries Association: Solar Industry Data

Center for Climate and Energy Solutions: Hydropower

The Break Through: Growth of Biomass far outstrips Growth of Solar and Wind

Geothermal Energy Association: 2015 Annual U.S. & Global Power Production Report

Energy.gov: About the Federal Energy Management Program

EPA: State and Local Climate and Energy Program

Scientific America: Strong Future Forecast for Renewable Energy

Union of Concerned Scientists: Renewable Energy Can Provide 80 Percent of U.S. Electricity by 2050

The Huffington Post: The Paris Climate Conference is Over, but the Renewable Energy Transformation Has Kicked Into High Gear

NPR: After Solyndra Loss, U.S. Energy Loan Program Turning a Profit

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Going Green: The Future of Renewable Energy is Getting Brighter appeared first on Law Street.

Rivers from Texas to Illinois have flooded as a severe storm system moves through the Midwest. There have been numerous flood related deaths in Missouri and Illinois; many of these deaths were related to drivers being trapped in their cars as the flood waters rose. The Midwest is currently recuperating during a brief reprieve from rain but Southern states have begun preparations for massive flooding. Thousands of people have been displaced by the evacuation process, seeking shelter in hotels or with family members while their homes are claimed by the rising water. The Midwest is usually hit by flooding hardest in the spring and summer, and was expecting snow during December rather than rain. Whereas summer floods are easily contained and property damage is often minimal, the winter flooding has been catastrophic. Read on for a look inside the disaster relief process that has swung into action over the past few weeks.

FEMA and El Nino

Earlier in December, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) organized a specialized El Nino task force to tackle the oncoming weather phenomenon. FEMA operates under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security, coordinating efforts between regional, state and federal relief teams. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,

An El Nino is a weather phenomenon in which warmer tropical Pacific Ocean waters cause changes to the global atmospheric circulation, resulting in a wide range of changes to global weather. Over North America, the Pacific jet stream (a river of air that flows west to east) often expands eastward and shifts southward during El Nino, which makes precipitation more likely to occur across the southern tier of the United States.

El Nino is also responsible for the nationwide temperature spikes that have made this winter season relatively mild for most of the Eastern seaboard. The current El Nino moving through the Midwest is the strongest since 1998. El Nino’s impacts do not only impact the Western hemisphere. According to BBC News,

Aid agencies like Oxfam are worried that the impacts of the continuing El Nino in 2016 will add to existing stresses such as the wars in Syria, South Sudan and Yemen. They say that food shortages are likely to peak in Southern Africa in February with Malawi estimating that almost three million people will require humanitarian assistance before March. Drought and erratic rains have affected two million people across Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua. More floods are expected in Central America in January.

Weather services provide FEMA with consistent updates on El Nino weather patterns, information which FEMA then uses to design response plans for individual states and regions. FEMA coordinates with regional and federal officials to manage disaster response and evacuation. After Governor Jay Nixon declared a state of emergency and deployed the National Guard in Missouri, he spoke with President Obama to discuss federal aid and intervention. According to a recent NASA report, the El Nino pattern is not waning and will continue to hit the country with significant force in the coming week. NASA satellites have tracked sea surface heights and temperatures over the past several weeks and will continue to work with disaster relief teams throughout the duration of the floods.

The History of FEMA

FEMA was founded in 1979, created via an executive order by President Carter. The federal government had completed informal disaster relief for domestic weather emergencies since the 1930s but the establishment of FEMA merged multiple agencies and marked an official commitment to aiding communities. In 2003, FEMA became part of the Department of Homeland Security, largely as a result of 9/11. According to FEMA’s website,

The agency coordinated its activities with the newly formed Office of Homeland Security, and FEMA’s Office of National Preparedness was given responsibility for helping to ensure that the nation’s first responders were trained and equipped to deal with weapons of mass destruction. Within months, the terrorist attacks of Sept.11th focused the agency on issues of national preparedness and homeland security, and tested the agency in unprecedented ways. Billions of dollars of new funding were directed to FEMA to help communities face the threat of terrorism. Just a few years past its 20th anniversary, FEMA was actively directing its ‘all-hazards’ approach to disasters toward homeland security issues.

But in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, FEMA was criticized for a number of reasons. Critics claimed that the evacuation process was not coordinated well enough and the number of supplies set aside for evacuees was not sufficient. Attempts to ensure that the process was running smoothly were in some cases interpreted as massive mistakes that slowed down the relief process on purpose. FEMA was considered to be uncoordinated on the ground, and images of New Orleans’ citizens baking in the heat of the SuperDome became synonymous with an ineffective FEMA response.

Hurricane Katrina was FEMA’s first massive challenge after becoming part of the Department of Homeland Security and was considered an embarrassment both for the agency and the Bush administration as a whole. FEMA director Michael Brown was considered by some to be insufficiently experienced in disaster management, although he claims that he did not have access to a great deal of information on the ground until days after evacuation began. The difficulties of Katrina evacuation and aid were not solely FEMA’s but the agency became the poster child for bureaucratic inefficiency.

The Difficulties of the Current Evacuation

As evacuation orders went into effect across the region, escaping the oncoming surge was made difficult because of compromised transportation routes. Interstates flooded, forcing travelers onto local roads that quickly became jammed. Trucks transporting commodities along set driving routes got stuck on the flooded roads and drivers were forced to abandon their cargo as the waters rise. Police forces and volunteers have been adding sandbags to major roads in preparation for flooding but the effects of these preventative measures have been minimal as multiple levees have broken across the region. Evacuees are forced to abandon their cars on the road, often after waiting on the roofs of their vehicles for hours for rescue teams. The majority of businesses and buildings have shut down during the floods, essentially turning several counties in Missouri and Illinois into ghost towns. People who tried to stay in their homes to wait out the flood found themselves fleeing to higher stories to escape more than water–untreated sewage filled the water of towns in Missouri and thousands of people were left without access to drinking water. In agricultural areas, pigs, horses and other livestock are often casualties of massive flooding. U.S. News reported yesterday that:

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says it is not planning to open a southeastern Missouri floodway in response to the swollen Mississippi River – at least not yet.

Opening floodways to divert the flow of water is one solution to local flooding but it will likely not be significant enough to impact the whole state. When flooding occurs this heavily over such a wide stretch of land, there is no easy solution. Even if water can be diverted out of certain communities, it would be held by levees that may be incapable of successfully containing the rivers, endangering other towns further downstream. The activation of the National Guard should provide extra manpower and resources for evacuation efforts but as long as the El Nino weather pattern persists, the flooding will continue in full force. Without an end to the incessant rain and flooding, conditions will likely only worsen in the Midwest and South.

 Conclusion

The flooding in the Midwest presents a daunting challenge for rescue teams across the country, but if FEMA has learned from Hurricane Katrina, it will tackle it efficiently and quickly. Evacuation is a challenging process that requires dozens of teams to coordinate transportation and rescue efforts during any time of year, but winter weather conditions make the task Herculean. Flooding is only expected to increase and expand to the South in the coming days. As FEMA, the National Guard and various regional officials coordinate their efforts, thousands of residents await aid as their homes sink deeper and deeper under the flooded rivers. If handled correctly, these floods may redeem FEMA’s public image and create a functional template for future evacuation scenarios. If handled poorly, these floods may cement FEMA’s reputation as ineffective and disorganized in the face of tragedy.

Resources

Primary

FEMA: About the Agency: A New Mission: Homeland Security

Additional

ABC News: 22 Dead, 2 Missing in Record Flooding Across Midwest

Reuters: Midwest Braces for More Flooding as Rain-swollen Rivers Rise

Eastern Arizona Courier: FEMA preparing for possible El Nino disasters

Scientific American: Record Flooding Hits U.S. Midwest, Threatens South

PBS News Hour: FEMA Faces Intense Scrutiny

BBC News: El Nino Weather: Worries Grow over Humanitarian Impact

US News: The Latest: Flooding Forces Closure of 3 Historic Sites in Illinois Because of Unsafe Roads

Hexa News: Missouri Residents Told To Evacuate Immediately Due To Flood Danger

NBC News: ‘Historic’ Floods Threaten 19 Levees Along Mississippi River

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

The post Flooding in the Midwest: The Challenges of Disaster Relief appeared first on Law Street.

Beijing currently resembles a scene that could be from an apocalyptic horror movie: sidewalks deserted, citizens wearing masks, and an impenetrable layer of gray smoke flowing through street corners. Beijing recently announced its first “red alert” for smog, which led to the closure of schools and construction sites and a restriction on the number of cars on the road.

Since Beijing issued its red alert, Shanghai has issued a “yellow alert” and has taken to curbing factory work and suspending outdoor activities at schools. Elderly, young, and sick citizens are asked to stay indoors while the smog alert is in effect–but smog can take days or weeks to clear, leaving these residents essentially trapped in their homes. China’s smog problem has been growing for years but it is reaching a critical level wherein smog actually interferes with the daily behaviors of Chinese citizens. Read on for a look at how the smog problem developed and what the red alert signifies for the future.

The Meaning of the Red Alert

Although the Chinese government never instituted the red alert before this year, Beijing has had higher levels of pollution in the past. Beijing has reached the next-highest level, orange alert, several times but always stopped there. It has been speculated that the government decided to issue the red alert as a nod to public sentiment regarding the smog problem. According to the South China Morning Post,

A red alert marked official acknowledgment of the public perception that previous bouts of bad air had been played down. Some state media tried to put a positive spin on the development, with China Daily editorialising that ‘with the first such red alert, the capital has set a good example in this respect.’ But others took a darker view. China.com.cn, a news portal run by the State Council Information Office, said smog had damaged the government’s image, and Xinhua contrasted photographs of the city on pollution-free days and the depths of the alert.

Smog interferes with the image of a modern, progressive China. Pollution impacts not only the environment and the healthcare of the Chinese population, it also leads to a decline in economic growth. Smog limits the number of days workers can leave their homes and causes health problems for those who do work in urban centers. Toxic air means that life expectancy is an estimated five years shorter for a person living in Northern China than a person living in Southern China.  In addition, China’s brain drain–a phenomenon where educated professionals emigrate to other nations rather than working in their country of origin–has been largely linked to pollution. Educated young workers want to start families in countries where the air is better. Chinese youth have an altogether different concept of outdoors than their parents do. In an interview with the New York Times, a cafe manager named Kan Tingting said that

What bothers me the most is that my child may have a very negative view of nature. She loves nature much less than she would in a normal environment. I don’t want her to grow up thinking nature is ugly.

In a country where “smog days” are akin to snow days in the United States, many children are growing up thinking of smog as a part of their daily life rather than an environmental hazard.

 Smog in the Cities

China’s air pollution comes largely from the use of coal in its major industrial cities. China’s economic boom has generated massive economic growth, but that led to a parallel spike in airborne pollutants. Coal pollution is compounded with car emissions to create a toxic atmosphere, only exacerbated by dust storms and construction dust that floats in the air of most urban centers. Beijing recognized the sources of its pollution and has striven to use coal substitutes and limit the use of cars, but those solutions have yet to create lasting change in the smog levels.

Yang Weimin, Deputy Chair of the Central Leading Group on Finance and Economic Affairs, stated earlier this week that China will need to build ten new mega-cities to offset the pollution and traffic pressures of Beijing. Mainland China has six mega-cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Tianjin and Chongqing) and the Chinese government has recognized the need for shifting growth to other areas of the country. However, building these cities is a twofold challenge. First, it will be difficult to convince people to relocate to new cities without stable job prospects so the government will need to convince major companies to set up headquarters in this new set of mega-cities, but at the same time, they will need to retain the job sector in the existing cities. Second, building new cities requires a great deal of construction, which creates hazardous dust and only contributes to negative air quality in the short term.

Cleaning Up Before 2022

China will host the Winter Olympic Games in 2022 and officials have already stated that they plan to welcome athletes from around the world to a city with healthy air. The Beijing Olympics of 2008 were an unforgettable marvel that China hopes to match with the Winter Games, but air pollution has made athletes and coaches worry about the safety of competing there. When China made its bid for the 2008 Games, it promised to cut down on pollution in Beijing, and was largely successful in meeting its goal–during the Olympics, Beijing air quality was the best it had been in a decade. Beijing is clearly capable of reducing smog in the short-term, but the return of smog in the wake of the 2008 Games has left many pessimistic about the probability of long-term smog reduction. Although organizers of the Olympics have stated that they are treating the smog as a serious threat and plan to mitigate before athletes arrive, they have not outlined a precise plan for what they will do to reduce smog.

Profiting off of China’s Plight

This week, a Canadian company made headlines for charging up to $28 for bottles of “clean air” on the Chinese market. Vitality Air, which bottles air from Banff and Lake Louise, has seen a massive spike in sales in China over the past two months. Vitality Air began almost as a joke–co-founder Moses Lam listed a Ziploc bag of air on Ebay to see how much he could get from it, and then ran with the idea of “selling air”. Vitality Air prides itself on being hand-bottled and is supposed to be used to fight hangovers, lethargy and now, pollution.  Bottled air may seem to be a ridiculous concept but according to the Times of India:

Vitality Air is not the only business cashing in on China’s pollution problem – a restaurant in in Zhangjiagang city recently started charging patrons for fresh air, after owners bought air filtration machines for the establishment and added a surcharge to people’s bills for the operation costs.

Selling air like it is any other commodity may be a fad sparked by the introduction of the red alert, but it raises interesting questions about the future of commodities in China. What products are Chinese citizens willing to buy in order to feel safe, and does that make them a target for companies that seek to profit off of their distress? Will foreign countries take advantage of China’s environmental weaknesses to sell them unexpected products or will they commit valuable technology to solving the pollution problem?

 Conclusion

As the world celebrates the major climate agreement made in Paris this week, managing pollution and reducing smog seems like a more manageable task. Yet in China, the damage may be irreversible and a new generation may grow up without access to clean air. It is tempting to accept China’s air pollution as a problem too monolithic to tackle but considering the impressive reduction in smog that the country enacted before the Olympics of 2008, mitigating smog is possible. It will require political action and firm commitments to reach the government’s goal of reducing smog by 2022. China’s leading officials need to seek immediate, effective changes before the red alert becomes a commonplace event in Beijing.

Resources

CNN: Smog in China Closes Schools and Construction Sites, Cuts Traffic in Beijing

The Guardian: Smog Envelops Beijing: Before and After Pictures as City Goes on Red Alert

New York Times: Smog So Thick, Beijing Comes to a Standstill

South China Morning Post: China Needs to Build 10 More Megacities to Ease Pollution and Traffic Pressure on Beijing, Top Planner Says

South China Morning Post: Winds of Change: After Years of Denial, China’s Politicians Have Finally Woken up to Nation’s Concerns Over Hazardous Air Pollution

USA Today: Punchlines: China’s Smog Days Beat Snow Days

ABC News: Hazardous Smog Blankets Shanghai, China Pledges to Clean up by 2022 Winter Olympics

Times of India: Canadian Company Sells Bottled Fresh Mountain Air in China as Smog Levels Worsen

CNN: Canadian Start-up Sells Bottled Air to China, Says Sales Booming

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

The post Red Alert in Beijing: Smog’s Debilitating Impacts appeared first on Law Street.

October 19 marked the first time in history that the Svalbard Global Seed Vault was opened up for a withdrawal. Often referred to as the “doomsday vault,” the seed vault was built to serve as a backstop for plant extinction, storing seeds for individual countries to ensure that plant diversity is not lost in a catastrophe. While weather disasters and global warming pose significant threats to the future of agriculture, the recent withdrawal was the result of the war in Syria. Researchers sought additional seeds as the multi-year war significantly reduced their supply of drought-resistant wheat.

The idea of a last-resort vault full of the world’s seeds may surprise many, but the planning and implementation of the world’s seed bank have been a long and thought-out process. Read on to learn about the process that created the vault and ultimately how it will be used in the future.

History

Seed Storage

The practice of protecting and storing seeds dates back as far as the start of agriculture itself. The exercise started with farmers in the fertile crescent keeping a surplus of seeds, from harvest to harvest, in a variety of secured locations to ensure the survival of their crops.

The process of securing seeds continued in the modern era and the technology has advanced. Today, many seeds are kept in gene banks. According to the Crop Trust, there are currently over 1,700 such gene banks worldwide, which house a variety of different seed species for protection and research.

The groundwork for the international seed vault was laid with the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture in 2001. The treaty was a product of the Food and Agriculture Organization at the United Nations and sought to promote international cooperation to preserve plant diversity. Because issues like climate change and water availability highlighted the threats to seed banks on a local level, researchers sought to create the universal vault that could protect diversity in light of the emerging threats.

The Vault

The seed vault was established in 2008, as a way to prevent the extinction of plant species used for crops. It earned its nickname, the “doomsday vault” because it is designed to survive nearly any catastrophe imaginable. From earthquakes to nuclear war, the vault was built in the permafrost on an island north of Norway. While its nickname sounds like something out of a movie, the location of the vault appears to justify it.

The vault itself sits in Svalbard, Norway on the side of a frozen mountain. In fact, the facility is so remote that it is closer to the north pole than it is to Norway. In addition to being remote, the facility it is also heavily secured with four locked areas between the vault and the outside world.

The site itself was also strategically designed. The vault is located in an area with low humidity and notable geological stability, which protects it from earthquakes. Additionally, it is high enough up in the mountain that there is little risk of flooding, even in the event of rising seas due to global warming. The seeds are contained in foil packages inside of boxes on shelves within the vault. The following video provides a look into the vault:

Usage

Since its opening in 2008, the vault’s storage has accumulated approximately 865,000 seeds from seed banks all over the world. The facility has the capacity to hold up to 2.5 billion total seeds, which is equivalent to 500 seeds for each of the roughly 4.5 million crops grown on the planet. The seeds themselves are kept at 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit, but in the event of a power outage its location in permafrost will preserve the seeds naturally for long periods.

While the recent withdrawal may seem like cause for concern, it is actually an example of why the vault was originally built. Researchers at the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) withdrew some of their seed deposits from the vault in order to move their research to new facilities in Lebanon. The withdrawal will help researchers replenish their supply and continue to improve drought resistant wheat, an essential crop for the region. Seed banks like this are able to improve and adapt crops to emerging agricultural challenges and the vault provides a backup copy in case a seed bank’s supply is threatened.

The accompanying video details the Syrian withdrawal:

Who Runs the Vault?

The facility is joint-operated by the Norwegian government and the Global Crop Diversity Trust. Any individual, group or country, who deposits seeds must do so under nationally and internationally agreed-upon laws. The vaults depositors, typically individual countries or seed banks, maintain full access and control of their seeds while in the vault. The Nordic Gene Bank maintains public records for all of the seeds deposited in the vault to help promote information sharing between depositors.

Future of Vault

While the vault serves an important purpose–holding a backup supply for crucial crops around the world–it has other benefits. Namely, in the current era of mono-cropping, many gene varieties have been lost as a few robust strands of crops such as corn or rice are grown in greater and greater amounts. While these versions may offer higher yields or are generally more robust due to little genetic variation, a single blight could wipe them all out at once. The vault also serves the role of preserving less commercially viable types of seeds which keep the gene pool more diverse and, therefore, resilient. Preserving this biodiversity may also be crucial to meeting growing food needs, as researchers will be able to develop more productive strains of plants to increase their yield.

While research and genetic diversity are valuable pursuits, the vault was ultimately designed to protect the world’s crop supply in the event of a disaster. Arguably the greatest long-term threat is global climate change, which may change life on earth as we know it and significantly alter global agriculture. The video below details the uses of the vault:

Conclusion

Due to the Svalbard Vault’s nickname, the doomsday vault, it is generally considered a source of last resort. While the first withdrawal by ICARDA in the Middle East does not indicate the end of the world, a vault is able to support regional seed banks in their efforts to develop and improve crops. In fact, the recent withdrawal proves the facility is performing the way it should. Not only is the vault designed to safeguard seed diversity, it was also designed to serve as a depository for scientists who may call upon its stock in order to improve their current varieties.

The notion of climate change has been overwhelmingly accepted by the scientific community. While the international community has not yet been able to address the impending challenges, scientists may be racing to build up the vault’s supply as challenges mount. Not only are current strands of crops under threat from disaster, they also face risk from farmers’ own growing habits. While a small number of crops have become essential to global agriculture, climate change may increase the need for diversity to meet ecological change.

Rarely do North Korea and the United States agree on any initiatives and even more rarely do these two governments receive support from large non-profits, such as the Gates’ foundation. The Svalbard Seed Vault is a notable exception. While people may still argue over the best way to preserve biodiversity this endeavor marks an important point of progress in securing that goal.

Resources

Primary

Crop Trust: Svalbard Global Seed Vault

Additional

CNN: Artic ‘Doomsday Vault’ Opens to Retrieve Vital Seeds for Syria

The Newyorker: Sowing for Apocalypse

NBC News: ‘Doomsday’ Seed Vault: The Science Behind World’s Arctic Storage Cube

Live Science: Science Behind World’s Artic storage Cube

Wired: That Arctic Seed Vault isn’t Just There for Doomsday

Washington Post: The ‘Doomsday’ Seed Vault That Preserves the Food of the Past and Ensures its Future

Union of Concerned Scientists: Global Warming Impacts

The Guardian: The Doomsday Vault: The Seeds That Could Save a Post-Apocalyptic World

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Seeds of Hope: Inside the Doomsday Seed Vault appeared first on Law Street.

At the end of November, UN delegates will gather in Paris for the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP) and engage in the annual Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Nearly two decades after the Kyoto Conference and 10 years since the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol, the United Nations is still struggling to create a legally binding solution to climate change. As Paris looms, there’s a sense of cautious optimism that this conference may finally promote the action to avert the climate change threat on the horizon. Read on to find out about the major events of the conferences over the last 18 years and the impacts they have made.

What can we expect from this year’s Climate Change Conference?

Why Climate Change Matters to World Leaders

Scientific consensus has concluded that the human production of greenhouse gasses (GHGs) beginning with the industrial revolution have impacted, and are continuing to impact, the global environment. GHGs include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, sulfur hexafluoride, hydrofluorocarbons, and perfluorocarbons.

A 1995 report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that “the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.” In 1997, the Kyoto Conference produced the Kyoto Protocol, which attempted to establish caps on industrialized nations’ carbon emissions. Most European countries agreed to the legally binding treaty, but the U.S. Senate failed to ratify it. In 2001, the Bush administration formally rejected the Kyoto Protocol.

Climate change currently holds a prominent place in the U.S. Intelligence Community’s annual Worldwide Threat Assessment. Global climate change threatens strategic resources, habitable coastal regions, food supplies, promotes the spread of infectious diseases, leads to more extreme weather events, and exacerbates humanitarian crises. The generally accepted figure for average global temperature rise in the last century is 0.8 degrees Celsius and the projected rise in the next century will be an additional 1.2 degrees. However, many scientists fear the temperature rise could be more severe, projecting as much as a 4 degrees Celsius rise from pre-industrial levels by 2100.

Such an increase would reduce the amount of habitable land available, cripple agriculture, and lead to major flooding in coastal regions. Nations previously resistant to the idea of a severe climate change threat are coming around to engage in the international discussion.

History: Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Kyoto (1997)

After the 1995 report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that the evidence supports the existence of human-influenced climate change, the United Nations sought to create a treaty to deal with the issue. In 1996, U.S. undersecretary for global affairs Timothy Wirth stated that the Clinton Administration accepted the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and called for legally binding targets for greenhouse gas reductions to be drafted. In 1997, the Conference of the Parties met again, this time adopting the Kyoto Protocol. The conference acknowledged that the majority of the burden to halt climate change fell on the industrialized Annex-I countries (developed countries like the United States, Japan, Russia, and most of Western Europe). Several developing (Annex-B) nations also accepted the stipulations of the Kyoto Protocol.

The Kyoto Protocol introduced mechanisms such as emissions trading, a global fund–to assist developing countries to minimize their emissions–and a monitoring system to measure emissions and ensure compliance. Nations that ratified the agreement had to independently find solutions to cut their emissions. However, the Protocol allowed for flexibility, acknowledging that the cost of reducing emissions varied among countries.

Enforcement of the Protocol was relatively weak, but still present. A nation failing to hit its initial emission reduction target would be required to increase its secondary target by 30 percent and would be barred from the emissions trading program.

Although President Clinton signed the agreement, the Senate refused to ratify the Protocol due to the exemption of countries like China and India, which the protocol classified as developing. Ultimately, the United States feared that the protocol would damage its economic competitiveness.

Bonn (2001)

Early in his presidency, George W. Bush rejected the Kyoto Protocol for the same reasons the 1998 Senate refused to ratify it. The United States also did not participate in the 2001 Climate Change Conference held in Bonn, Germany, choosing to observe.

The previous conference in the Hague in 2000 devolved rapidly into an argument over enforcement policies and political disagreements. The disagreement created between the United States and the European Union eventually caused the talks to be suspended and resumed at a later date. As a result, there were low expectations for the 2001 conference. One of the major remaining issues was the role of carbon sinks in net carbon reduction (championed by the United States) versus direct source reduction (preferred by the E.U.). With the U.S.’s withdrawal in 2001, many feared the Kyoto Protocol would collapse.

The Protocol could only be ratified if agreed upon by nations making up 55 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions from 1990. The United States was responsible for 35 percent of GHG emissions in 1990, so its withdrawal meant that countries such as Russia (17.4 percent) and Japan (8.5 percent) had strengthened negotiating positions. Without either of these two nations, the Protocol would likely collapse.

Despite the high stakes and low expectations, an agreement was reached. The Bonn agreement allowed for nations to use various mechanisms, such as carbon sinks, to achieve their target emissions reduction without necessarily reducing their GHG production. The agreement tackled forest and crop management which had proved significant to negotiation breakdowns at The Hague, allowing for countries to credit land allocations toward their GHG reduction, but included a hard cap to these credits. The success of the negotiations at Bonn set the Kyoto Protocol on the path to international ratification.

Nairobi (2006)

In 2005 in Montreal, Canada the Kyoto Protocol entered into force at the first annual Meeting of the Parties. The Protocol was extended beyond its initial 2012 expiration and set in motion plans to negotiate deeper cuts to GHG emissions. The optimism for the future of the Kyoto Protocol dimmed a little in Nairobi the following year. While certain steps were taken to include developing nations in the Protocol, the negotiations also faced criticism. Observers like BBC corrospondent Richard Black criticized many delegates for failing to effectively discuss cutting emissions for fear of economic costs and competitiveness. This has been a recurring criticism of the global effort to reduce GHG emissions.

In order for countries to pursue solutions based on national interests, they would need to see climate change mechanisms as opportunities to increase economic growth rather than costs. The concern is always that making money, rather than reducing emissions, is the priority for governments at these conferences. The Nairobi conference also raised questions as to whose climate problem the U.N. is solving. The responsibility to reduce emissions lies largely with the wealthy, developed nations while the impact is most strongly felt by poorer, less developed nations.

These concerns eventually led the international community to re-evaluate the Kyoto Protocol and begin new negotiations on emissions cuts, suggesting global emissions would need to see a 50 percent cut in the near future. Work on technology transfer to developing countries was extended but only on a limited basis.

Copenhagen (2009)

Prior to the 2009 Meeting of the Parties, most anticipated that an emissions reduction goal would be agreed upon, as the first commitment period to the Kyoto Protocol was to end in 2012. However, leading up to the conference, world leaders elected to put off the crafting process for a later date. Most of the major negotiations fell short and one of the few takeaways from the Copenhabgen conference was an external agreement between the U.S., China, South Africa, India, and Brazil. This conference is widely considered a failure by those preparing to attend the 2015 Paris Conference.

Because the five-nation agreement was external, it was not considered binding by the U.N. Although it calls for individual nations to track pollution-related goals and allocate funds for developing nations, the agreement failed to produce the long-term goals. Developing nations felt excluded, as did the E.U., while all parties felt the conference itself was sub-optimally organized and run.

Durban (2011)

The Durban conference set in motion the events leading up to the Paris conference of this year. It was agreed that a legally binding deal would be ratified by all countries in 2015 to take effect in 2020. Additionally, the framework for the Green Climate Fund (GFC), which had been established the previous year, was adopted. The GCF would assist poorer countries adapt to the climate change challenges. The president of the conference declared the Durban Meeting of the Parties a success, though scientists warned that more drastic action was needed to avert the 2 degrees Celsius increase predicted for 2050.

What to Expect from Paris

So far, 148 out of 196 countries have met the U.N. deadline to submit emissions reduction plans leading up to the Paris conference. The U.N. argues that if more countries submit these plans, it is more likely that the conference will result in a strong global treaty. India’s plan drew attention by stating that the country would require 2.5 trillion USD to meet its emissions goals. While it is unclear how much of that money India intends to draw from foreign investments, it is clear that it will have to be a significant amount.

As more plans are submitted, temperature predictions have been established and updated. At present, the current projection for global temperature rise is 2.7 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels–an improvement from the earlier projection of 3.1 degrees Celsius.

The IPCC has also elected a new chairman for the first time in 13 years. Hoesung Lee of South Korea will chair the Paris conference. While it is still very early, many have approved of the selection, suggesting he could serve as a link in negotiations between the developed and developing countries.

The Paris conference will be tasked with ratifying a legally binding treaty much like the one produced at Bonn in 2001. While almost all of the U.N. member nations have accepted the reality of human-influenced climate change, there will likely be intense debate over how net emissions ought to be reduced. As always, the weight of economic and competitive costs will weigh on the minds of delegates from developed countries while delegates from developing countries will continue to press for climate change adaptation funds. There is currently a very real sense from the global community that something must be done and a cautious sense of optimism that something will be.

Conclusion

The history of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change is long and messy. While most agree on the necessity for global emissions reduction, there are numerous disagreements over how to do so and who is primarily responsible. Most agree that the primary blame for climate change lies with the developed nations, but there are questions regarding how much these nations should help those that are currently developing. The role of emissions sinks has been contested before and may come up again in Paris. Meanwhile, India, China, and the United States will play major roles in determining the success of the Paris conference, and the ultimate effectiveness of any agreement reached. While the UNFCCC has been successful in reducing global emissions over the last 10 years, there is still much more work to do, and only time will tell if the nations of the world are up to the challenge.

Resources

Primary

UNFCCC: Durban Climate Change Conference

UNFCCC: The Green Climate Fund

UNFCCC: Provisional Agenda for the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties

The White House: President Barrack Obama at UN Climate Change Summit

The White House: President Barrack Obama’s Climate Change Plan 2015

105th Congress: Byrd-Hagel Resolution

Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency: Trends in Global CO2 Emissions 2014 Report

Senate Armed Services Committee: Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community

IPCC: Climate Change 1995 The Science of Climate Change

UNFCCC: The Kyoto Protocol

Additional

BBC: Climate Talks a Tricky Business

NYTimes: Many Goals Remain Unmet in 5 Nations’ Climate Deal

NYTimes: Leaders will Delay Deal on Climate Change

The Guardian: Durban Deal will not Avert Catastrophic Climate Change, says Scientists

Hoesung Lee: The Risk of No Action

BBC: UN Battle Looms over Finance as Nations Submit Climate Plans

BBC: Paris Climate Summit: Don’t Mention Copenhagen

BBC: Why did Copenhagen Fail to Deliver a Climate Deal?

Matthew Vespa: Climate Change 2001: Kyoto at Bonn and Marrakech

Ehsan Masood: United States Backs Climate Panel Findings

BBC: Kyoto: Why Did the US Pull Out?

TedxTalks: Climate Change is Simple: David Roberts

TedxTalks: The Reality of Climate Change: David Puttnam

Samuel Whitesell

Samuel Whitesell is a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill having studied History and Peace, War, and Defense. His interests cover international policy, diplomacy, and politics, along with some entertainment/sports. He also writes fiction on the side. Contact Samuel at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Paris Climate Change Conference: What Should We Expect? appeared first on Law Street.

Anyone tuning into the first Democratic debate heard hopeful Bernie Sanders’ shout out to Denmark–and Hillary Clinton’s subsequent dismissal of applying standards that work in Denmark to the United States. It’s become common practice for politicians from around the world to constantly applaud Northern Europe as a set of model countries: their healthcare, their political participation, their education, and their commitment to environmental protection. On the environmental front, Northern Europe is a heavyweight that puts its money behind implementing policy that results in substantive change. Denmark, for example, has funneled time and funding into wind energy nationwide and seeks to use 100 percent renewable energies by 2035. No one is claiming that Northern Europe deserves anything less than respect for its efforts–but let’s step away from the Prom Queen of Electric Energy for a moment and talk about the wallflower making moves without attention from the global media. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s turn to Uruguay.

Uruguay is a powerhouse of hydroelectric and wind energy in Latin America, hosting dozens of projects that are pushing alternative energy to the forefront of the country’s economy. In the past fifty years, the country has transformed from an unstable agrarian community plagued by insurgency and economic instability into a thriving, stable leader in the Western hemisphere. Yet because Uruguay is located in “the Global South,” the international community rarely takes the time to applaud its commitment to green energy. Let’s take a minute to catch up on what you’ve been missing in Uruguay:

Uruguay’s Accomplishments

Uruguay, with a population of approximately 3.3 million people, is the second-smallest country on the continent. Good things come in small packages: the State Department ranks Uruguay first in Latin America for democracy, quality of living, peace, press freedom and a host of other attributes. Uruguay is a beacon for political liberty, a financial powerhouse and a force for peace both in the region and abroad (it is one of the highest contributors to UN peacekeeping forces). Plus, Uruguay has legalized marijuana, same-sex marriage, and abortion. Healthcare is both high quality and affordable, as is higher education, and Uruguay considered the safest country in Latin America. The icing on the cake is that Uruguay’s former President José Mujica, who just stepped down in March, was known as the “world’s humblest president” because he lived an extremely modest lifestyle and donated the majority of his salary to charity. Although it’s obviously not perfect, Uruguay has a lot to be proud of: particularly its commitment to alternative energy.

Uruguay and Alternative Energy 

Denmark better watch its back–Uruguay is aiming to get as much as 38 percent of its national power from wind energy by 2017 and that goal appears easily within reach. In comparison, Denmark started shifting to alternative energy in the 1970s and currently gets about 30 percent of its electricity from wind power. Uruguay is aiming to hit the same energy goal in half the time–ambitious, yet seemingly plausible if wind turbine development continues at aggressive rates. Uruguay exists outside of the ongoing tug-of-war between electric energy and fossil fuels that rages in most of South America–as a nation with no significant coal, oil or gas deposits, alternative energy was a necessity. Historically, Uruguay was dependent on Argentina and Brazil for energy imports but the shift to alternative energy is granting Uruguay a path of economic self-reliance at an astounding rate. In fact, Argentina and Brazil may start importing energy from Uruguay soon.

Starting in 2005, Uruguay invested over 3 percent of its GDP each year in overhauling the energy system. This has transformed the nation into a major center for wind turbines and hydroelectric energy. Uruguay’s flat landscape makes it ideal for wind energy, which proved especially important when major droughts disrupted hydroelectricity productivity in 2014. Billions of dollars have flooded into Uruguay in recent years as UTE (the state-owned electric company) grants projects to international bidders looking to create large-scale wind farms. Uruguay has the highest clean energy growth on the continent and it has created this growth without excluding native workers. Uruguay requires that the control centers of these projects are built in Uruguay and that after the first year of operation, 80 percent of maintenance jobs go to local employees. Expanding the job market for local workers is giving the country traction on its path to energy independence. Beyond wind energy, Uruguay has two unique projects in the works: making Carrasco International Airport the world’s first sustainable airport and using electric energy to power all public transport by 2030.

Oil on the Horizon

The 2005-2030 energy plan that Uruguay has been committed to has performed incredibly so far, but national governments have to plan for worst-case scenarios. Uruguay’s worst-case scenario would be abandoning green energy for fossil fuels.  Uruguay, despite its lack of on-shore resources, has been scouted for off-shore drilling to the tune of over $1.6 billion in 3 years. The current administration wants to reach a consensus before committing to oil ventures but with companies such as BP, BG Group, and Tullow Oil knocking on Uruguay’s door, the pressure is rising. Alternative energy is working for Uruguay, but the lure of oil investment is no doubt tempting for the small nation. The transition to oil would lead to a huge shift in the political culture of the country, as new lobbies and political partnerships would open the door for corruption and conflict. Uruguay has made almost unparalleled strides in energy development, yet all those efforts may crumble if the country turns to oil development.

So, Why is No One Cheering for Uruguay?

Why is Uruguay flying under the radar while Northern Europe is lauded on the world stage for its work on alternative energy? One could argue it is because of the size of Uruguay–who is keeping track of a country that small? Well, Latvia and Estonia are both smaller than Uruguay but a quick Google search will turn up a dozen listicles praising these nations’ commitment to green energy. Uruguay may have a small population but that doesn’t mean we dismiss it out of hand. Uruguay has done nothing to anger the international community, on the contrary, it has upheld essentially every possible standard of good governance. So why isn’t everyone planning to retire to Montevideo?

Instead, many suspect that it all comes back to the global North-South divide. The North (Europe, North America, Australia–“the first world”) and the South (Central and Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East–“the third world”) developed in different ways but although economic prosperity has been redistributed over recent decades, the North is still considered the ultimate authority on economic matters. We shed attention on successful European countries that already hold our attention because historically the “global South” has been years behind us in development. We like to think of Latin America in terms of coconuts and jungles rather than a diverse continent with a set of booming economies that rival our own. We are used to Northern European countries succeeding at everything they try their hand at, so watching them succeed at alternative energy implementation is par for the course. However, Uruguay’s success is all the more impressive because it didn’t come from the more stable economy of Northern Europe. Uruguay rebuilt itself after the turbulence of the 1970s–the Tupumaros Marxist guerilla movement, of which Mujica was a part, led a nation-wide insurgency for over a decade–and transformed into not only a regional leader, but to perhaps the most impressive wind development center of the hemisphere. Uruguay is overturning the stereotype of a Latin-American nation plagued by corruption and violence that lags behind the rest of the world. Hopefully, the continuing growth of wind energy in Uruguay will grant it a larger spotlight but until then, the pressure from oil investment places the fate of Uruguay’s energy plan in a vulnerable position. In order to continue creating incredible energy changes, Uruguay must receive more international attention–the media must promote the nation as an ideal location for investment. In the meantime, politicians are going to keep writing love letters to Denmark while Uruguay creeps towards being the most environmentally friendly nation in the world.

Ignoring Uruguay’s achievements is not only insulting to the country, it increases the probability that Uruguay will turn to oil dependency. A concerted effort to recognize Uruguay’s energy achievements will give the nation the public support that it needs, and deserves, to meet its energy goals.

Conclusion

Uruguay is a much-overlooked dark horse when it comes to energy independence. The country’s move toward clean energy threatens to pass its European counterparts, but it doesn’t get nearly as much recognition as European nations. While that may, in part, be because of endemic biases in the United States and Europe, it’s important to recognize the innovative technology being used in the Latin American green-energy haven.

Resources

Primary

Embassy of the United States-Montevideo, Uruguay: Uruguay Rankings

Additional

CountryStats: Uruguay-Introduction

IRENA: Renewable Energy Policy Brief Uruguay

Jean-Pierre Lehmann: Bridging the 21st Century’s North-South Divide

Katell Abiven: Latin America Divided between Oil and Green Energy

Ken Parks: Uruguay Spends $2.6 Billion to Become South America Wind Leader

MercoPress: Uruguay Among the World’s Top Ten Greenest Countries

Pulsamerica: Uruguay:A Record Breaking Wind Power Revolution

Jillian Sequeira

Jillian Sequeira was a member of the College of William and Mary Class of 2016, with a double major in Government and Italian. When she’s not blogging, she’s photographing graffiti around the world and worshiping at the altar of Elon Musk and all things Tesla. Contact Jillian at Staff@LawStreetMedia.com

The post Uruguay’s Green Energy Policy: The World’s Best Kept Secret? appeared first on Law Street.

Much controversy has arisen over Cecil the lion, who was killed, skinned and beheaded by a dentist from Minnesota looking for a trophy. The slaying of a protected and revered animal drew criticism from national media and social media and forced the man responsible into hiding. However, this is just one example of an exotic animal killed for its skin, head, or body parts. These unique species are often smuggled or illegally traded, transported through grueling conditions, and forced into unnatural environments . Read on to learn about the exotic animal trade–from hunting to breeding and trafficking.

Live Animal Trading

Traded animals come from a variety of sources, including from being captured in the wild to being sold as surplus from zoos or zoo-like institutions. These animals are then sold over the internet or through live auctions. Both marketplaces are poorly regulated, although auctions are regulated through the Animal Welfare Act and any state regulations that might also apply.

In addition to acquiring these animals through smuggling, Americans began breeding their own exotic animals beginning in the 1960s and 70s. Due to the high profitability of selling these animals, breeding has become a successful industry. The increased value often comes from restaurants seeking alternative types of meat or for hides.  High import taxes, which have  reduced poaching, also make breeding a profitable option for American sellers who can potentially benefit from decreased competition and expenses.

Wherever animals are bought and sold, they often face poor treatment from their new owners, even unintentionally. For companies, this is frequently a result of economics–it is usually cheaper to let an animal die or not treat it than it is to pay for a veterinarian. In the case of private individuals, animals are often bought without the knowledge of how to care for them, particularly in the case of exotic species. Unsurprisingly, this can lead to a high rate of abnormal behavior, sickness, and even death amongst animals living in new environments.

Perhaps the most gruesome and public incident occurred four years ago in Zanesville, Ohio. In 2011, a caretaker of large exotic animals released many of them before killing himself. Most of the animals were then subsequently killed by authorities, including endangered species such as lions, tigers, bears, and wolves.  In this case, local authorities unfamiliar with how to trap these exotic species resorted to killing them in order to protect the public.

Transporting animals illegally also presents significant challenges. When shipping animals to evade authorities, many of the animals transported actually die in transit.  While exact figures are not entirely clear and are often exaggerated to drum up action, the laundering of animals in ways such as the one used by a man who strapped lizards to his chest when passing through LAX can lead to high mortality rates. The following video gives an inside look into the exotic animal trade:

Fur and Pelt Trade

In the Wild

Various animals and plants are hunted for a number of reasons. However, continued hunting has left many of these animals and plants at endangered levels or very near to it. Perhaps the most affected are large mammals, as well as sharks and whales. While these animals can be hunted for meat, more often they are hunted for sport, either for the head or other body parts.

While it is illegal to hunt these animals without a permit, if the hunter is willing to pay enough he or she can hunt virtually every animal on or approaching the endangered species list; the idea is the money spent killing them can then be used in protecting healthier members of the same species. This includes lions and even black-horned rhinos, one of the most endangered species in the world.  In fact the right to kill one such rhino last year, a rhino past his effective breeding age, generated 350,000 dollars for Namibia to use for its conservation efforts.

In Captivity

As an alternative to the wild, exotic animals are also bred on farms. These farms often exist for the express purpose of producing furs. The value of animal furs cannot be understated in history, as it was a main source of development for Europeans in modern-day North America and Russia. Currently, most of the furs used for clothing come from animals raised on fur farms. The United States is home to many such places, however, China is quickly dominating more and more of the fur farm market.  The following video provides some details on the lives of animals raised on fur farms:

Aside from raising animals on farms for fur, they are also being bred on ranches. In this case, for half a century exotic animals have been brought up in ranches in Texas with the express purpose of hunting them. In the view of those running such ranches, this allows hunters to get out their desire to hunt these animals in a controlled setting and thus reduce the need for killing them in the wild.  The video below looks at the ranches in  Texas:

Method to the Madness

The reasons why people kill these exotic animals include use in religious ceremonies, for food or clothing, and even to use them as trophies. The most common underlying motive, though, seems to be for profit. Killing most animals is allowed by governments for the right price and with the proper licensing.  Walt Palmer, the dentist who shot Cecil the lion for example, reportedly claimed to have paid more than $50,000 dollars and obtained the proper permits to kill the animal. The return on this investment–whether it be a trophy, skin, or head–to the hunter can more than make up the cost in hunting, especially if the hunt is orchestrated illegally.

Tigers, for example, can fetch as much as $15,000 for their skins. In fact, the profitability of killing and selling animals is so great that is has become the sphere of organized crime. These professional criminals employ every means from using helicopters to night-vison goggles to body armor to kill their prey.

Regulating the Animal and Fur Trade

According to the Michigan State Animal Legal and Historical Center, while few states require anything more than permits for hunting, the United States has several federal laws that seek to prevent the killing of animals for fur, including the Lacey Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, the Fur Seal Act and the Endangered Species Act deal. Additionally, the Fur Products Labeling Act requires precise labeling on clothing of exactly what type of fur is being used. There is also the Dog and Cat Fur Protection Act, which prevents using fur from those animals in clothing. However, these laws are ultimately aimed at stopping the fur trade from wild animals, not those bred on fur farms.

The U.S. government sees fur farms like most other farms, leaving them under the authority of the Department of Agriculture. While the United States has laws against animal cruelty, there are very few other protections in place. However, some other countries have much stricter fur regulations. In fact, the UK, Austria, and Croatia ban fur farms entirely.

Conclusion

Killing and illegally transporting is a problem, but a problem that begs the question: how much more can be done? More laws and agencies can continue to be created with the goal being to stop this industry, but like with drugs or gambling, after a while more restrictions stop having any more effect.  Existing laws have been somewhat successful, particularly using the money for the right to kill animals to reinvest in protecting them, a fact even acknowledged by the World Wildlife Fund. Furthermore, like those industries, these laws fail to get at the root of the problem: the demand for these animals and their skins. No matter how many poachers or hunters get arrested there will always be someone else to take their place, especially when it offers a lucrative job for a person in need.

There are several alternatives to the hunting and poaching of these animals in the wild, like fur farms and ranches. However these also draw a great deal of criticism which puts hunters in a somewhat difficult position where they face criticism for hunting animals in the wild and on ranches whose sole purpose is hunting.

Either way, while major news outlets and social media platforms crackle with indignation over the death of one lion, it appears if people at times lose track of more important issues. While high-profile events like the killing of Cecil the lion gain a lot of attention and may even spark public outcry, focusing on individual cases may cause people to lose sight of the issues with the animal trade as a whole. The industry is likely to continue as long as people have a desire to hunt, the price is right, and society lacks a proper understanding of how these animals are treated.

Resources

Born Free USA: The Dirty Side of the Exotic Animal Trade

Michigan State University Animal Legal & Historical Center: Fur Production and Fur Laws

Chicagoist: Minnesota Trophy Hunter Accused of Killing Beloved Lion

Discover News: Trophy Hunting Is There Any Benefit to Conservation?

USA Today: Fury Over Cecil the Lion also Sparks Race Controversy

PETA: Inside the Exotic Animal Trade

The Center for Consumer Freedom: FBI Anti-terror Unit Investigated PETA

USA Today: Years later Effects of Exotic-Animal Tragedy Still Felt

Dr. Steve Best: Top Five Animals that Face Extinction Satisfying Human greed

CBS News: Can Hunting Endangered Animals Save the Species?

National Wildlife Federation: Overexploitation

List Verse: 8 Endangered Species Still Hunted

Priceonomics: The Exotic Animal Trade

UC Small Farm Program: Exotic Livestock

Humane Society: Dangerous Exotic Pets

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Lions and Tigers and Bears: Inside the Exotic Animal Trade appeared first on Law Street.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) leads the United States environmental community’s fight against power plant emissions. Its main priority? To reduce carbon pollution, which, among other greenhouse gas pollutants, is detrimental to the Earth’s climate and the health of every global citizen. In recent years, the EPA has taken strides like never before to combat unchecked power plants across the country that produce harmful gases into the atmosphere. With the backing of the Obama Administration, environmental efforts are at the forefront of America’s priorities.

 The EPA and Carbon Pollution

What is the EPA?

The Environmental Protection Agency is tasked with protecting human health and the environment by writing and enforcing U.S. regulations based on environmental laws passed by Congress. Nearly half of the EPA budget is directed to grants for state environmental programs, non-profits, educational institutions, and other entities that align with its mission. The EPA also conducts and shares its own scientific studies, sponsors partnerships within the environmental community, and educates the public.

What are carbon pollutants?

According to environmental scientists, carbon pollution is the primary contributor to long-lasting climate disruption. Carbon pollutants and other greenhouse gas pollutants (gases that trap heat in the atmosphere) exacerbate natural weather conditions like floods, wildfires, and droughts and negatively impact human health. Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) makes up nearly three quarters of greenhouse gas emissions worldwide and accounts for 84 percent in the United States. Other greenhouse gases include Methane, Nitrous Oxide, and synthetic fluorinated gases. The severity of damage these pollutants cause to climate depends on the abundance and strength of the gas and duration its duration in the atmosphere. Carbon Dioxide is by far the most abundant and therefore the most dangerous.

CO₂ passes into the atmosphere through “burning fossil fuel (coal, natural gas, and oil), solid waste, trees, and wood products, and also as a result of certain chemical reactions (e.g. manufacture of cement.)” In the natural carbon cycle, CO₂ is removed from the atmosphere through plant absorption. Carbon pollutants alter the natural balance; carbon dioxide is entering the atmosphere at a higher rate than it is leaving.

CO₂ emissions have been on the rise since the Industrial Revolution, but between 1990 and 2013, CO₂ emission increased by seven percent due to energy use and transportation emissions. NASA’s video below shows a visual simulation of CO₂ emissions.

Main Source of Carbon Pollution

Human reliance on electricity is to blame for an estimated 37 percent of CO₂ emissions. Transportation and industry account for most of the rest. The combustion of fossil fuel to create energy is the primary source of carbon emissions. The burning of coal, in particular, emits the most CO₂ compared to oil and gas. Therefore, coal-burning power plants are the leading cause of carbon emissions in the United States.

Coal-fired power plants first burn coal to create extremely fine talcum powder, which is blown into the firebox of the boiler with hot air. The burning coal and air combination creates “the most complete combustion and maximum heat possible.” Water, pumped through the pipes inside the boiler, turns into steam, which can reach 1,000 degrees F and has a pressure of up to 3,500 pounds per square inch. At this point, the steam is piped to the turbine generator where the pressure turns the turbine blades, therefore turning the turbine shaft connected to the generator. Inside the generator, “magnets spin within coils to produce electricity.” Lastly, steam turns back into water inside a condenser.

In a given year, an average 500 megawatt coal-fired electricity plant emits 3.7 million tons of CO₂, 220 tons of hydrocarbons (which creates smog), and 720 tons of poisonous carbon monoxide. This results from burning 1,430,000 tons of coal a year. Aside from carbon emissions, the plant will also release 10,000 tons of sulfur dioxide, 10,200 tons of nitrogen oxide, 125,000 tons of ash, and 225 pounds of arsenic.

Negative Impacts of Carbon Pollutants

According to the EPA, carbon pollution causes rising global temperatures, rising sea level, changes in weather and precipitation patterns, and changes in ecosystems, habitats, and species diversity. High levels of CO₂ can cause an increase or decrease in rainfall depending on location. Rainfall influences agriculture crop yields, water supplies, energy resources, and forest and other ecosystems across the globe.

Carbon pollution causes an increase in heat waves, drought, and smog (ground-level ozone pollution). It can lead to increasing intensity of extreme events, i.e. hurricanes, precipitation, and flooding. It can also increase the “range of ticks and mosquitoes, which can spread disease such as Lyme disease and West Nile virus.” Younger children, those with heart or lung diseases, and people living in poverty could be at risk the most for feeling the effects of climate change.

Laws and Proposed Regulations

The Clean Air Act

One of the first pieces of hard-hitting environmental legislation was the Clean Air Act of 1970, which was most recently revised in 1990. The Clean Air Act authorizes the EPA to establish and enforce National Ambient Quality Standards. The 1990 amendments, led by the Bush Administration, specifically aimed to fight acid rain, urban air pollution, and toxic air emissions. It defines major sources of air pollutants “as a stationary source or group of stationary sources that emit or have the potential to emit 10 tons per year or more of a hazardous air pollutant or 25 tons per year or more of a combination of hazardous air pollutants,” and requires technology-based standards. These standards are referred to as “maximum achievable control technology.

President Obama’s Climate Action Plan

On June 25, 2013, President Obama announced a plan through executive orders to reduce carbon emissions. The President created a list of carbon-reduction targets on the path of decreasing U.S. carbon emissions, preparing and adapting for climate change, and leading the global effort to address the issue. On the domestic front, Obama ordered the EPA to finalize its standards for greenhouse emissions from new and old coal-burning power plants. Although, industry heads have threatened suits if old plants are required to limit emissions.

The executive orders also called for strict standards in fuel efficiency for heavy-duty vehicles after 2018 to minimize greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector. In order to prepare for climate change, Obama’s plan involves federal, state, and local governments working together in order to “increase investments in protective infrastructure.” Weather disasters accumulated $100 billion worth of damages in 2012. Internationally, Obama’s plan includes promoting “the development of a global market for natural gas and continued use of nuclear power.” The plan also calls for the Obama Administration to work with U.S. trading partners to discuss negotiations at the World Trade Organization to advocate free trade in environmental goods/services and cleaner energy technologies.

Clean Power Plan

The EPA’s proposed Clean Power Plan, released in June 2014, sets state-by-state carbon emissions rate-reduction targets. The plan calls for a 30 percent reduction of 2005 carbon emission levels by 2030. The plan provides alternative plans called “building blocks” to cut carbon emissions. Some of these building blocks include: renewable energy sources, nuclear power, efficiency improvements at individual fossil fuel plants, shifting generation from coal to natural gas, and greater energy efficiency in buildings and industries. Targets per state range due to individual states’ “mix of electricity-generation resources…technological feasibilities, costs, and emissions reduction potentials of each building block.”

After comments and revisions, the plan is expected to be finalized in August 2015. The EPA anticipates a long run of legal challenges to the Clean Power Plan from coal-producing industry heads. The Obama Administration and EPA saw its first legal win last week on June 9. The suit was brought by some of the nation’s largest coal companies and 14 coal-producing states claiming the plan would jeopardize future construction of coal plants and slow U.S. coal demand. One of the lawyers leading the suit is Lawrence H. Tribe, a Harvard University constitutional law scholar and former law school mentor to President Obama. The courts, for now, have dismissed the case as premature. As Judge Brett Kavanaugh explained in the opinion, “They want us to do something that they candidly acknowledge we have never done before: review the legality of a proposed rule.” Although delayed, opposition will fight another day.

Conclusion

The future holds the final decisions from the courts regarding the Clean Power Plan. Some challenges will more than likely make their way up to the U.S. Supreme Court. It will be a tough battle for the environmental community, but it is one for the health of our Earth and everyone on it. The negative impacts of greenhouse gas emissions, especially Carbon Dioxide, aren’t theories. They are facts and we have to face reality. Although no plan can reverse the damage that has already been done, we can prevent future damage from taking place. It is truly an international issue that needs international cooperation, but it starts domestically, and hopefully the United States will be the leader it needs to be in environmental conservation.

Resources

Primary

EPA: Carbon Dioxide Emissions

EPA: 1990 Clean Air Act Amendment Summary 

EPA: Summary of the Clean Air Act

Additional

CFC: Obama Vows to Finalize Carbon Standards, Other Safeguards in Climate Change Plan

DESMOG: Facts on the Pollution Caused by the U.S. Coal Industry

Duke Energy: How do Power Plants Work?

EPA: Learn About Carbon Pollution From Power Plants

EPA: Our Mission and What We Do

EPA: Overview of Greenhouse Gases

The New York Times: Court Gives Obama a Climate Change Win

Union of Concerned Scientists: The Clean Power Plan

Jessica McLaughlin

Jessica McLaughlin is a graduate of the University of Maryland with a degree in English Literature and Spanish. She works in the publishing industry and recently moved back to the DC area after living in NYC. Contact Jessica at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Power Plants and Carbon Pollution: What Can the EPA Do? appeared first on Law Street.

Imagine the military visiting your hometown for special training exercises. Their activities wipe out your cell signal and keep your car from starting. Their exercises make so much dust and noise, you can’t hear, see, or think straight for days.

That’s okay right?

Probably not. Yet marine mammals have suffered equivalent disruptions to their daily lives during naval exercises for decades. The active sonar used in training exercises interferes with their primary guiding sense of hearing and causes them to flounder during simple tasks like feeding or navigation. As the exercises grow in size and sophistication, so does the extent of the damage they cause. Since marine mammals can’t defend themselves, several environmental organizations stood up to the government agency that’s supposed to defend them. Here’s what happened when environmentalists took on the government to save the whales, dolphins, sea turtles, and other marine animals.

Naval War Games Aren’t Games For Marine Mammals

The Navy strives to “maintain, train, and equip combat-ready Naval forces capable of winning wars, deterring aggression, and maintaining freedom of the seas.” The Navy makes sure it is capable of winning wars through training exercises, often called “war games.” Last year, the Navy planned a series of trainings classified as “military readiness activities” to occur over the next five years in the Hawaii-Southern California Training and Testing (HSTT) study area. A major downside of the trainings? They use active sonar that could potentially kill and injure the marine mammals living in the HSTT region.

Using active sonar just means you’re shooting sounds, called pings, into the water to listen for echoes. Sonar stands for “sound navigation and ranging” because the echoes returned from the pings help people and animals find and navigate around objects in their path. You can’t control the path of a ping; under water they spread out in ripples, touching everything in a given radius. This can get really noisy, really fast, as illustrated by this abstract rendition of sonar below.

If the ping hits a pile of rocks, no harm done. If the ping hits a marine mammal with ultra-sensitive hearing, it can interfere with their basic survival functions.

Marine mammals have evolved with an attuned sense of hearing that enables them to navigate through the murky undersea world, communicate with other animals, and even find food. Hearing is a marine mammal’s primary survival tool. So when military sonar pings rocket through the waves every few seconds, marine mammals can’t perform the most basic functions of life. Ships with sonar cause whales to stop eating and migrating like they should. If the animals get too close, sudden sounds can damage their life-giving hearing permanently and they could be perpetually disoriented forever. For humans, this would be like trying to walk, talk, and drive with continuously fogged-up glasses.

Even the vibrations from the sounds can cause damage under water. You know how the sound of many live drums can make it seem like your whole body is vibrating? Now imagine that times ten. When you hear on land, only your eardrums vibrate. Under water, sound waves rattle and penetrate your entire body. Intense noises–like those used in the naval trainings–can cause deadly hemorrhaging in marine mammals as powerful sounds penetrate their bodies.

This video shows how whales react to the screeching sounds of Navy sonar. They cluster closer to shore, stop diving for food, and change their swimming directions erratically. Some whales even beach themselves in an effort to escape the piercing sounds.

The Navy has been using active sonar in its trainings for years and environmental groups have fought it for almost as long. Past court rulings weighed the need to protect the public over the life of marine mammals. However, the Navy’s latest planned trainings in the HSTT area pushed the marine mammal death toll past levels evaluated in the past. The new exercise plan would include 500,000 hours of sonar, in other words, 500,000 hours of possible damage to marine mammals. According to this Washington Post article, the Navy’s own damage estimate stated 155 animals would die, 2,000 would be permanently injured, and 10 million would have their lives disrupted by the exercises. The Natural Resources Defense Council says this marks an 1,100 perecent increase when compared to other trainings from the past five years.

Armed with new facts and figures, the Natural Resources Defense Council, Cetacean Society International, the Animal Legal Defense Fund, and the Pacific Environment and Resources Center* brought forward a new lawsuit they hoped would succeed where similar efforts had failed in the past. Their case was named Conservation Council for Hawai‘i et al. v. National Marine Fisheries Service et al.

The Case

The plaintiffs didn’t go after the Navy itself, but the regulatory agency that approved the Navy’s training plan, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). Here’s a snippet from their mission page:

Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act, NOAA Fisheries works to recover protected marine species while allowing economic and recreational opportunities.

The Marine Mammal Protection Act prohibits the “take” (defined as “to harass, hunt, capture, or kill, or attempt to harass, hunt, capture, or kill) of marine mammals. When the Navy planned its new training exercises, it had to apply for an exception to this rule through NMFS. Their application outlined the potential death and injury counts, but the NMFS deemed those losses negligible. The attorneys on the case countered that the NMFS evaluation of the marine life damage neglected to grasp and acknowledge the full extent of potential damage caused by the Navy trainings.

The Endangered Species Act (ESA) calls for the government to protect endangered and threatened species. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the “ESA requires federal agencies to ensure that any action they authorize, fund, or carry out, will not likely jeopardize the continued existence of any listed species, or destroy or adversely modify any critical habitat for those species.” Attorneys said the NMFS clearly neglected their duties under the ESA as many of the marine mammals found in the Navy’s massive HSTT study area are endangered.

The Verdict

U.S. District Judge Susan Oki Mollway ruled the NMFS had fallen short of its legal obligations to marine mammals by approving the Navy’s proposed training plan. She called the NMFS decision to refer to marine mammal damages from the naval exercises negligible, “arbitrary and capricious” and in violation of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. She also confirmed NMFS’s violation of the ESA, as eight of the thirty-nine marine mammal species living in the HSTT study area are endangered.

While the ruling affirmed the charges brought against the NMFS, specific remedies won’t be decided for the next few months. The decision marks a battle won, but it’s not quite the end of the war.

A Compromise?

The Natural Resources Defense Council released a statement from case attorney Zak Smith, summarizing what it hopes to get from the case:

The Navy has solutions at its disposal to ensure it limits the harm to these animals during its exercises.  It’s time to stop making excuses and embrace those safety measures.

Environmental groups aren’t asking for a complete cease and desist of all naval trainings involving active sonar. They’re just demanding the military use some of its extensive resources to develop safety measures to mitigate marine mammal damage. One option would be decreasing the test area size. Right now, the HSTT test area covers about 2.7 million square nautical miles, an area about the size of the entire United States. Another option is taking particular care to avoid areas where animals might be mating, giving birth, or feeding.

In the video above, Ken Balcomb from the Center for Whale Research says the Navy just needs to learn when and where to practice. He says just as the government would not test nuclear weapons in a crowded downtown area, they should not test active sonar in oceans teeming with delicate and endangered wildlife. For now, environmental groups remain optimistic that trainings and marine mammals can coexist safely.

Resources

Primary

Federal Register: Takes of Marine Mammals Incidental to Specified Activities; U.S. Navy Training and Testing Activities in the Hawaii-Southern California Training and Testing Study Area

Environmental Protection Agency: Endangered Species Protection Program

Additional

Washington Post: Navy War Games Face Suit Cver Impact on Whales, Dolphins

One Earth: A Silent Victory

Smithsonian Ocean Portal: Keeping An Ear Out For Whale Evolution

Los Angeles Times: Judge Rules Navy Underestimated Threat to Marine Mammals from Sonar

Natural Resources Defense Council: Court Rules Navy War Games Violate Law Protecting Whales and Dolphins

Natural Resources Defense Council: Groups Sue Feds for Putting Whales and Dolphins in Crosshairs throughout Southern California and Hawaiian Waters

Natural Resources Defense Council: Lethal Sounds

Law 360: Navy Loses Training Authorization Over Animal Concerns

Earthjustice: Sonar Complaint

Ashley Bell

Ashley Bell communicates about health and wellness every day as a non-profit Program Manager. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Business and Economics from the College of William and Mary, and loves to investigate what changes in healthy policy and research might mean for the future. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Government vs. Environmentalists: Who is Protecting Marine Wildlife? appeared first on Law Street.

On Saturday May 9^th a transformer fire broke out in New York. While this was a seemingly innocuous event, there was more to the incident than just a fire. It broke out at the site of a nuclear power plant, located only about 35 miles from Manhattan. While the fire never spread to the nuclear power plant itself and there was no immediate threat of a nuclear meltdown, the potential danger was concerning. Yet these risks are just part of the balancing act that is required to harness nuclear power for energy. Read on to learn about the development of nuclear energy, its risks, and its rewards.

History of Nuclear Power

Developing the Technology

The first notions of atoms can be traced all the way back to the ancient Greeks, who philosophized about tiny, unseen elements which combine to form the world around us. But the real work on nuclear energy essentially started in the early years of the 20th century. In the late 1930s, German scientists, following the previous example set by Italian physicist Enrico Fermi, bombarded uranium with neutron, causing it to split. The experiment and subsequent efforts revealed that during the fission process some mass is converted into energy.

In 1942, Fermi took the next step by achieving a self-sustaining chain reaction underneath the University of Chicago’s athletic stadium. This step effectively ushered in the nuclear age. During WWII this field was mainly focused on harnessing the power of the fission reaction into some type of weapon. However, following the war focus returned to producing energy from the reaction, as part of the Atomic Energy Commission created by Congress in 1946. The first reactor to produce electricity was in Idaho on December 20, 1951. The first nuclear powered plant that created power for public use in the United States was in Shippingport, Pennsylvania in 1957.

How do nuclear power plants work?

There are two types of nuclear power plants and they work in separate ways to generate power. In a pressurized water reactor, water is pressurized but not allowed to boil. The water is then streamed though pipes and turned in to steam which powers the generators. In this type of reactor, the water creating the steam and the water in the reactor do not mix.

The other type is known as a boiling water reactor. As the name implies, in this case the water is allowed to boil and turns into steam through fission. The steam, like in the pressurized reactors, turns the generators, which create electricity. In both systems, the water can also be reused once it has been reconverted from steam back into its liquid form.

The Nuclear Power Industry

Following the opening of the plant in Pennsylvania, the industry continued to grow rapidly throughout the 1960s as corporations across the U.S. saw the possibility of a power source that was viewed as a cheaper, safer, and more environmentally friendly than traditional sources, such as coal. However, this trend began to reverse in the 1970s and 80s as the popular opinion of nuclear power became negative and many of the strong selling points of nuclear energy became areas of concern.

Nevertheless, as of January 2015, 31 countries were operating 439 nuclear power plants worldwide, although the number of operating plants can fluctuate slightly based on different definitions of the term “operable.” The United States has the most plants at 99, almost twice as many as the next country France, which has 58. The plants themselves are located predominately in what are commonly considered the more developed countries. One of the major explanations for this phenomenon are the high costs required to build a nuclear power plant. Another major factor in the peaceful use of nuclear power is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT.

Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has been one of bedrocks for peacefully spreading, and at times hampering, the spread of nuclear power worldwide. The first step can probably be traced back to a speech given by President Dwight Eisenhower. This speech, coined the “Atoms for Peace” speech, provided a blueprint for effectively managing nuclear proliferation following WWII. It also paved the way for spreading nuclear technology in a positive way.

While many of the suggested measures from Eisenhower’s speech were not taken, the International Atomic Energy Agency was born out of his ideas. This agency provided the prospect of nuclear knowledge in exchange for agreeing to safeguards and arms limits. While it worked in some cases, it could not halt the military aspect of nuclear research. It did however help give rise to the NPT.

The NPT divided countries into the proverbial nuclear weapon haves and have nots. Its requirements were also essentially the same, in return for allowing inspections countries were giving technical knowhow. While there are many criticisms levied against the NPT, it did work to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, while helping some nations gain nuclear power as an energy source.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Despite all the efforts made to safeguard nuclear energy, there are still many concerns over the safety of nuclear power plants. This danger has manifested itself several times over the course of the nuclear power age, both internationally and abroad.

The worst nuclear power plant disaster in history was in Chernobyl, Ukraine which was then part of the Soviet Union. During the disaster, 50 people were killed at the plant and as many as a million more were exposed to the radiation. The amount of radioactive fallout released into the air, as a result, was 400 times more than what had been released in the bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.

Domestically, the worst nuclear energy disaster was the Three Mile Island incident in 1979. During the crisis on an island in Pennsylvania, a full nuclear meltdown was narrowly avoided and no one was killed. Nonetheless, the stigma created from the ordeal was a key contributing factor to the decline of new nuclear plants in the U.S. during the 1970s and 80s.

The most recent disaster came in 2011 in Fukushima, Japan. During this disaster a massive earthquake, followed by a tsunami, damaged the nuclear reactors in Fukushima. This led to a nuclear meltdown that killed as many as 1000 people trying to evacuate the area.

These are just three examples, but there are more, both in the U.S. and abroad. While nuclear energy has been lauded for its sustainability and limited impact on the environment, the threat of a nuclear meltdown is a major consideration in regards to expanding the technology going forward.

The Future of Nuclear Energy

With last week’s fire at a nuclear facility rekindling fears over the dangers of nuclear technology, what exactly is the future of nuclear energy both domestically and abroad? In answering that, two aspects need to be considered, namely nuclear waste and security.

Waste

Although nuclear energy is often touted as a clean alternative to other energy sources, such as coal and natural gas, it has its own waste issues. In the U.S. alone each year approximately 2000 metric tons of high-level radioactive waste are generated. Troublingly, there is no permanent repository for this nuclear waste so it remains stored on site, potentially vulnerable to attack and leakage.

The waste issue continues further down the supply chain as well. The mining of uranium, which occurs mostly outside of the U.S. and therefore also partly nullifies any argument in relation to energy independence, is a very harrowing experience. A number of chemicals are used to mine Uranium which poison both the surrounding environment and the workers involved in the extraction.

Security

Along with waste is the issue of security. It has already been shown that the security of a nuclear power plant can be jeopardized by human error and natural disasters. However after 9/11 there have been fears of a terrorist attack on a nuclear facility. While the nuclear plants are supposedly protected by measures designed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), there are acknowledged vulnerabilities.

Air and sea attacks could be problematic, as well as multiple coordinated attacks on a facility at once. Spent nuclear rods are particularly vulnerable to attack as they sit outside of controlled nuclear reactors. While the NRC has made strides in some of these categories, especially in regards to potential air strikes, concerns remain that it still falls short in other categories such as potential land and sea assaults. Furthermore, force on force tests–staged attacks on nuclear plants–showed at least 5 percent of plants are still not adequately protected even after changes were made to increase protection following 9/11.

These fears include other worries that stem from the Soviet collapse of the early 90s. These are centered on what are termed as “loose nukes”– unaccounted nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union. Similar concerns may also arise as civil wars continue in countries such as Iraq or Syria who at one time were known to be pursuing nuclear weapons.

Staying the course?

Coupled with waste and security concerns are also cost considerations. Nuclear power plants are very expensive to maintain and suffer a failure rate, in regards to financing, of over 50 percent, meaning tax payers are often required to bail them out. In light of all these considerations and with other truer sustainable energy sources it would seem the days of nuclear energy would be numbered.

This assumption is wrong however, as already 70 new plants are under construction with 400 more proposed worldwide. While many of these will never leave the drawing table, the rise in construction and planning of new nuclear plants points to nuclear power’s proven track record in at least one regard–battling CO2 emissions and producing power on a scale that currently far exceeds any other renewable options.

This option is particularly attractive to countries with state-run governments that can commit to long term investments and are desperate to move beyond major polluters such as coal-power plants, such as China. Meanwhile in Western democracies while some construction is planned, many are working toward phasing out nuclear power altogether. In this regard Germany is leading the pack and has pledged to be completely nuclear free by 2022. The following video explores the future of nuclear power:

Conclusion

Nuclear energy seems to be the ultimate compromise. While it is cleaner than coal or gas plants, it still produces radioactive waste that has no long term storage location and takes thousands of years to decay. Conversely it has a proven track record and while it may cost more to build new nuclear facilities than any other energy source, the energy produced far outpaces many alternatives. Thus, the world with its ever growing energy demands is left to maintain the delicate balance. We are still in the nuclear age, although how long we’ll stay here remains uncertain.

Resources

Primary

Department of Energy: The History of Nuclear Energy

Additional

United States History: International Atomic Energy Agency

Physicians for Social Responsibility: Dirty, Dangerous and Expensive The Truth About Nuclear Power

CNN: After Explosion at Nuclear Plant, Concerns of Environmental Damage

Duke Energy: How Do Nuclear Plants Work?

European Nuclear Society: Nuclear Power Plants Worldwide

Arms Control Association: Arms Control Today

Foreign Policy: Think Again Nuclear Proliferation

CNBC: 11 Nuclear Meltdowns and Disasters

World Nuclear Association: Fukushima Accident

Union of Concerned Scientists: Nuclear Plant Security

BBC News: Nuclear power Energy for the Future or Relic of the Past?

Michael Sliwinski

Michael Sliwinski (@MoneyMike4289) is a 2011 graduate of Ohio University in Athens with a Bachelor’s in History, as well as a 2014 graduate of the University of Georgia with a Master’s in International Policy. In his free time he enjoys writing, reading, and outdoor activites, particularly basketball. Contact Michael at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Nuclear Energy: Worth the Risk? appeared first on Law Street.

Much of the environmental activism combating global warming is based on the rhetoric of personal responsibility and consumerism: if we buy more “green” products, global warming can be stopped. But can we really buy our way out of rapidly rising temperatures and increasing devastation from human-created environmental disasters? Read on to learn about the emphasis on personal responsibility in environmentalism, and the arguments for and against such an approach.

Global Warming: “You” Can Fix It

It is nearly impossible to find articles addressing climate change without finding a list of things that “you” can do to help stop a massive planetary process.

These tips are meant to be empowering and are geared toward combating a frightening sense of apathy about issues of dire importance like global warming. Climate change in particular is something that many people perceive as being in the distant future, and therefore a sense of denial colors so many people’s thinking about climate change.

Lists of “Top 10 Ways to Reduce Your Carbon Dioxide Emissions Footprint” that abound on the internet are meant to help break down global warming into something digestible; something that is not so colossal that you might as well give up before you start trying to do anything about it. People and organizations concerned about climate change want to break it down into little things that “we can all do everyday” to combat it. Talk of “greening your commute,” “greening your home,” and “buying energy efficient products” dominate many discussions about addressing global warming.

However, critics of this approach point out that the desire to do “something” may be just as damaging–if not more so–than recognizing that this is a huge problem with no easy solution. Discussing global warming as though it can be adequately addressed by individuals using fluorescent light bulbs arguably risks minimizing the gravity of the situation.

Greenwashing

Gas, technology, and car companies that make so many daily commutes possible engage in practices that have been accused of creating enormous amounts of pollution and unnecessary toxic waste. Instead of encouraging actions that target these corporate practices at a systemic level, many efforts to “fight” global warming may actually encourage the greenwashing of these massive corporations.

Greenwashing is usefully defined on the Greenwashing Index–an online-based, awareness-driven attempt to “help keep advertising honest”–in the following way:

Everyone’s heard the expression ‘whitewashing’ — it’s defined as ‘a coordinated attempt to hide unpleasant facts, especially in a political context.’ ‘Greenwashing’ is the same premise, but in an environmental context. It’s greenwashing when a company or organization spends more time and money claiming to be ‘green’ through advertising and marketing than actually implementing business practices that minimize environmental impact. It’s whitewashing, but with a green brush. A classic example is an energy company that runs an advertising campaign touting a ‘green’ technology they’re working on — but that ‘green’ technology represents only a sliver of the company’s otherwise not-so-green business, or may be marketed on the heels of an oil spill or plant explosion.

People who criticize corporate greenwashing argue that articles and organizations encouraging people to buy “green” products are actually encouraging people to increase corporate profits by endorsing greenwashing practices. Thus, companies all the way from airlines to those that sell home appliances and personal beauty products engage heavily–and successfully–in greenwashing.

The meat industry often takes the lead in greenwashing. These companies actively distance themselves from the environmental devastation that accompanies factory farming and associated industries, as described by Scientific American here:

Current production levels of meat contribute between 14 and 22 percent of the 36 billion tons of ‘CO2-equivalent’ greenhouse gases the world produces every year. It turns out that producing half a pound of hamburger for someone’s lunch a patty of meat the size of two decks of cards releases as much greenhouse gas into the atmosphere as driving a 3,000-pound car nearly 10 miles.

Meat company Tyson, for example, has advertised itself as animal-friendly, claiming to slaughter its animals in a “humane” manner. But advocates point out that these claims are greenwashed, as the pigs Tyson sells live their lives in cages so small that they cannot move one step back or forward. Critics point out the greenwashed term that Tyson uses for this torturous practice is “individual housing.” This kind of advertising also erases the tremendous environmental destruction that can result from factory farming. When consumers are encouraged to buy “green” and “ethical” meat, they are encouraged not to think about the ways that any form of mass-meat production inherently contributes to  global warming.

Critics of greenwashing would argue that encouraging people concerned about global warming to “fight” it by changing their buying practices often only encourages companies to simply change the ways they advertise themselves: once they market themselves as “greener,” consumers can feel better about buying what are often more expensive “green” products, and help the corporation to turn a profit.

Unequal Burdens of Personal Responsibility

Critiques of the “you can stop global warming” movement are also concerned that harm can occur on an individual, not just corporate, level.

This individualist focus arguably takes attention away from the ways that the environmentally destructive practices that are driving global warming are not the result of individual failings, but rather of massive structures of capitalism. Sustained collective action, rather than individualized consumption choices, are required to combat these larger systems of oppression that fundamentally shape global warming.

When considering the potential impact of “what you can do to reduce global warming” lists, it is important, also, to ask: who is this “you” that these forms of media are talking to? Awareness website Time for Change refers to “a drought in Africa” because of “your increased yearly consumption of fuels,” which makes it clear that the intended “you” is not African, but probably North American. However, even within the presumed North American audience, the burden of personal responsibility arguably falls differently on people of color and people with dis/abilities.

“What you can do to stop global warming” lists that advocate for increased use of public transportation and biking instead of driving seem to work only for those who live in and near cities with accessible and affordable public transit systems. Public transportation systems–even relatively extensive ones like those found in New York City–are often of vastly unequal quality, cost, and distribution.

When cities are designed in ways that lead to modest-income workers of color being driven out of living in city centers where they are often employed and thus must have long commutes to work, these workers are disproportionately impacted by the very climate disasters that are becoming more frequent with global warming. “What you can do” lists encouraging the use of public transportation as a means to fight climate change take for granted the idea that the “you” the list is addressing are people who have cars and who have consistent, reliable access to public transportation–the structure of which is often biased against modest-income neighborhoods of color to begin with.

Bike riding is also often touted as something “you” can do to put a dent in rising carbon dioxide levels. But not everyone can simply hop on a bicycle: the “you” addressed here is clearly not a person with mobility-related dis/abilities who already has inadequate access to public transportation. Additionally, in neighborhoods like those in the South Bronx that the government and corporations target as dumping grounds, it can actually be unhealthy to ride your bicycle–when you exercise in highly polluted areas, you increase the amount of toxins you are inhaling. With asthma rates already devastatingly high in areas like this due to the practices of governments and corporations, encouraging people to ride their bikes as though everyone can is simply misguided. Individualist steps to address climate change can sometimes backfire, and raise other causes for concern.

So…can “you” stop global warming?

Alone? Perhaps not. Changing individual consumer practices shift some of the priorities of corporations, which puts at least the rhetoric of fighting climate change at the fore. However, these shifts don’t necessarily end environmentally destructive corporate practices. Collective action that targets systemic causes of global warming rather than displacing all the responsibility–and therefore, the blame–onto unconcerned individuals might be a common place to start.

 Resources

Huffington Post: 14 U.S. Cities That Could Disappear Over the Next Century, Thanks to Global Warming

About News: Top Ten Things You Can Do to Reduce Global Warming

Guardian: What’s the Carbon Footprint of… a New Car?

Greenwashing Index: About Greenwashing

Business Pundit: The Top 25 Greenwashed Products in America

Scientific American: How Meat Contributes to Global Warming

Animal Legal Defense Fund: Tyson Exposed by Former Suppliers’ Convictions

One Green Planet: Five Ways Factory Farming is Killing the Environment

CounterPunch: Global Warming is Economic Imperialism

Policy Link: For Millions of Low-Income Workers Left Behind by Public Transit Systems, Every Day’s a Snow Day

Daily News: Bronx, Brooklyn Residents Claim City Targeting Their Neighborhoods for Waste Transfer Stations

Jennifer Polish

Jennifer Polish is an English PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC, where she studies non/human animals and the racialization of dis/ability in young adult literature. When she’s not yelling at the computer because Netflix is loading too slowly, she is editing her novel, doing activist-y things, running, or giving the computer a break and yelling at books instead. Contact Jennifer at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Corporate Greenwashing and Global Warming appeared first on Law Street.

Regardless of the political debates about global warming, scientists have long been involved in trying to combat this environmental problem. But what exactly are activist-scientists doing–or not doing–to address global warming?

One facet of combatting global warming is dealing with raised carbon dioxide levels. A lot of talk about carbon dioxide levels focuses on so-called “carbon sinks”–forests that, due to plants’ ability to process carbon dioxide, remove the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere–and their potential to mitigate the effects of global warming. But can forests and artificial means of removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere actually “save us” from global warming?

Capturing Carbon Dioxide

Instead of working to prevent the rising carbon dioxide levels that have been fueling global warming, one of the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) recent projects has been the capturing and storage of excess carbon dioxide. This process involves the harvesting of carbon dioxide from facilities such as electricity power plants that emit a great deal of carbon dioxide. Once the carbon dioxide is harvested directly from these sources, it is channeled–sometimes by pipeline and sometimes by truck–usually underground, where it is re-introduced into the earth in order to produce more oil.

Carbon dioxide capturing and sequestration is often upheld as an easy fix to global warming:

Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) is a technology that can capture up to 90% of the carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions produced from the use of fossil fuels in electricity generation and industrial processes, preventing the carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere.

Carbon dioxide capture can occur through three basic methods. Pre-combustion capture is used in industrial processes like natural gas burning; post-combustion capture is used in the food and beverage industries; and oxyfuel combustion capture is used with water instead of air as a combustion material in industries other than power generation.

Once harvested, the carbon is transported and injected into the earth in liquid form, where it is often channeled into increasing oil production. While sponsors of carbon capture argue that this process is completely safe, there are serious concerns that the injection of such large amounts of liquid into the earth actually increases the likelihood of devastating earthquakes.

Is fueling oil production to fight global warming wise?

Though many support carbon dioxide capture and sequestration, there are serious concerns that this process is used to directly increase, rather than reduce, dependence on non-renewable, highly toxic oil production and use. The carbon dioxide that is harvested from power plants is channeled back into oil production and therefore “helps the United States continue producing record amounts of oil.”

This capture and sequestration method is arguably so popular because it actually creates profits for the massive multinational corporations involved in oil production and related fields. But some scientists are concerned that this process actually further entrenches unsustainable energy practices. David Biello at Scientific American points out:

The process will perpetuate fossil fuel use and may prove a wash as far as keeping global warming pollution out of the atmosphere. Then there are the risks of human-caused earthquakes as a result of pumping high-pressure liquids underground or accidental releases as all that CO2 finds its way back to the atmosphere.

There’s certainly evidence that this corporate-motivated approach to reducing carbon emissions has its drawbacks, especially given the amount of energy that is inefficiently used by the capture and sequestration technology.

 Alternative to Oil: Artificial Photosynthesis

Some scientists are beginning to reevaluate their hesitations about carbon sequestration. Scientists at Berkeley have been working to refine a way that captured carbon can be broken down through artificial photosynthesis instead of being channeled back into oil production.

Dr. Peidong Yang, a chemist at the Berkeley Lab working on artificial photosynthesis–the process that plants use to create food by breaking down carbon dioxide and sunlight into glucose and water—has stated about the research that:

Our system has the potential to fundamentally change the chemical and oil industry in that we can produce chemicals and fuels in a totally renewable way, rather than extracting them from deep below the ground.

Through combining nanowire technology with specific bacterial populations to mimic the photosynthetic processes that leaves undergo naturally, the Berkeley team has created the potential for solar-powered chemistry that non-lethally utilizes sequestered carbon.

The question now is once this new technology is ready for market (it is not quite there yet) will the corporations that profit from the current methods of the re-use of sequestered carbon utilize it?

To the Forests: Natural Photosynthesis and Global Warming

It is important to note, however, that despite the hopefulness with which many are embracing the new developments in artificial photosynthetic capabilities, we seem to be forgetting one crucial thing: Photosynthesis, even on a massive scale such as that accomplished by rainforests, cannot reverse or halt global warming.

Because carbon dioxide is essentially “plant food,” it is easy to focus on an abundance of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere as being good for plant growth. In turn, the more plants there are, the more carbon dioxide will be taken out of the atmosphere. Since extremely excessive carbon dioxide emissions are a principle driver of global warming, plants (particularly strong concentrations of plants, such as rainforests) are often thought to be helpful in reducing carbon emissions and in slowing global warming. Indeed, some scientific studies show that, under certain laboratory greenhouse conditions, increased carbon dioxide levels can contribute to a greater amount of plant growth. This is extremely important because, as Carol Rasmussen, a member of NASA’s Earth Science News Team, reports:

Forests and other land vegetation currently remove up to 30 percent of human carbon dioxide emissions from the atmosphere during photosynthesis. If the rate of absorption were to slow down, the rate of global warming would speed up in return.

Through a natural process referred to as carbon fertilization, plants “eat” the extra carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere by human processes, thus reducing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

Recently, however, the purported impacts of carbon fertilization have been called into question: a recent study found that increased tree growth does not always result from increased carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.

Regardless of whether forest growth is stimulated by increased carbon dioxide, Climate Science Watch encourages us to think beyond the small picture of plants taking already overwhelming amounts of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. There is a bigger picture of the relationship between global warming–which is already occurring–and plant life. A report by Climate Science Watch reminds us that:

Climate [change] impacts like drought, floods, extreme weather, shifting seasons, and increasing ranges of weeds, invasive species, and plant pests will all negatively impact crop yields [and other plant growth].

Additionally, other nutrient restrictions limit the amount of increased natural photosynthesis that can occur in forests. Differentials in rainfall levels and subsequent droughts that are already being caused by global warming negatively impact the amount of plants that can grow and photosynthesize.

Hammering home these cautionary pieces of evidence is the fact that massive forests like the Amazon have been suffering from increased tree mortality–both due to direct human destruction and the indirect impacts of altered conditions from climate change. Therefore, the Amazon rainforest is consuming a billion tons less each year than it has previously. For perspective, each yearly Amazon drop amounts to twice the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by the U.K. per year.

So Should We Take Carbon Dioxide Back Out of the Atmosphere?

Investing hope and massive resources in carbon capture and sequestration, forest-driven photosynthesis, and artificial photosynthesis produces a sense of calm in many that the impacts of global warming can be combated without creating actual changes in the corporate practices that are increasing dangerous carbon dioxide levels. These debates about removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere are important, but they are fundamentally invested in addressing symptoms rather than causes. While these are great scientific achievements, the causes of global warming need to be addressed as well.

Resources

Primary

Environmental Protection Agency: Carbon Dioxide Capture and Sequestration

NASA: NASA Finds Food News about Forests and Carbon Dioxide

Additional

Environment 360: Can Carbon Capture Technology Be Part of the Climate Solution?

Alternet: Corporations Have Big Plans to Profit From Global Warming

Guardian: Chevron Accused of Racism as it Fights Ecuador Pollution Ruling

Guardian: Tropical Rainforests Not Absorbing as Much Carbon as Expected

Guardian: Just 90 Companies Caused Two-Thirds of Man-Made Global Warming Emissions

Science Daily: Major Advance in Artificial Photosynthesis Poses Win/Win For the Environment

Climate Science Watch: The CO2 “Fertilization” Effect Won’t Deter Climate Change

Corp Watch: Climate Change and Environmental Racism

Jennifer Polish

Jennifer Polish is an English PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center in NYC, where she studies non/human animals and the racialization of dis/ability in young adult literature. When she’s not yelling at the computer because Netflix is loading too slowly, she is editing her novel, doing activist-y things, running, or giving the computer a break and yelling at books instead. Contact Jennifer at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Carbon Dioxide Capture: Can it Stop Global Warming? appeared first on Law Street.

California is in the midst of one of the worst droughts we’ve ever seen. The demand for water is exceeding the actual supply of water in the region, leading to big problems. The Southwest region of the United States has always been a dry area, and previously most Southwestern states nursed from the same water supply. Due to a decline in the water supply, those same procedures will not work in 2015 and beyond. Read on to learn about the changing policies for California relating to its water supply, and the potential effects of California’s drought.

Colorado River Sources

In order to understand the water problems occurring in California and the American Southwest as a whole, it’s important to understand the overall state of water in the region. The Colorado River and other water sources in the area play an important role, both historically and today.

According to the Glen Canyon Institute, here’s the background of the area: Seven states in the Colorado Basin signed the Colorado River Compact in 1922. The agreement allocated water rights between New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Arizona, and California.

But now the Colorado River Basin is experiencing a natural disaster and water supply tragedy. That agreement almost 100 years ago was reached based on an overestimation of river flow, and an underestimation of water demand. As a result of the growing demand and unyielding drought, there is a water deficit of almost 1 million acre-feet a year in the Colorado River system.

To provide water for over 40 million people, the Hoover and Glen Canyon dams were built as a part of the Colorado River water management system under the 1922 agreement. This created the Lake Mead and Lake Powell reservoirs. But now, both the Lake Powell and Lake Mead reservoirs are half empty. Environmentalists doubt the reservoirs will ever naturally fill again.

As a result, the conservation and fate of the Colorado River system is directly linked to the environmental health of the Southwest.

How did this problem begin?

During the last century, more than a dozen dams were built which negatively affected the flow of the Colorado River, as a result, “hundreds of miles of canyon and countless archaeological sites have been flooded, and dozens of wildlife species have been endangered.” Glen Canyon Dam is one of the largest contributors to these issues.

The Grand Canyon Protection Act of 1992 was meant to alleviate the negative effects the Glen Canyon Dam had caused; specifically to, “protect, mitigate adverse impacts to, and improve the values for which Grand Canyon National Park and Glen Canyon National Recreation Area were established.” Despite the fact that this act was passed 23 years ago, little implementation or success has been seen.

Lake Mead & Lake Powell

In Lake Mead, water levels have dropped to 1,085 feet above sea level, the lowest in 75 years, and only 10 feet above the level that would trigger cuts in water deliveries by the federal government to Arizona and Nevada.

The purpose of building the dams was to keep the lake reservoirs full. Some strategize to “Fill Lake Mead First” arguing it would benefit the people who depend on Lake Mead in major cities like Los Angeles and Las Vegas. However, this strategy appears to be largely going unnoticed by policymakers.

 California Water Policies

It was only in 2014 that the California government began to recognize the severity of the drought and began to enact serious policy changes. Governor Jerry Brown and California Democratic lawmakers “enlisted business support of a $7.2 billion plan composed mostly of new bonds for water storage and delivery to drought-stricken cities and farms.”

California Governor Jerry Brown signed three bills designed to regulate the pumping of water from underground aquifers. An aquifer is an underground layer of materials such as sand, silt or gravel from which groundwater can pumped up. Habitual digging for water has led to sinking–nearly 30 feet in some areas. Previously, aquifers provided 30-40 percent of California’s water supply. Since the drought, nearly 60 percent of the state’s water comes from underground. Scientists worry that it is possible to completely deplete the underground supply. Currently, there is no method to replace the underground water. In addition, a lack of underground water affects the species of animals who depend upon it. Without a diverse ecosystem underground, the quality of the dirt is also weakened over time.

Governor Brown first politely asked Californians to reduce their water consumption by 20 percent, but instead consumption rose. A water board survey of 267 water providers found consumption in the Bay Area dropped five percent. But in coastal California, consumption rose eight percent, leading to an overall one percent increase of water usage statewide.

As a result, Governor Brown ordered mandatory water use reductions –the first time such an action has been taken in California’s history. An executive order directed the State Water Resources Control Board to enforce a “25 percent reduction on the state’s 400 local water supply agencies, which serve 90 percent of California residents.” However, owners of large farms, who obtain their water from sources outside the local water agencies, will not be subject to the 25 percent mandate.

The agencies are responsible for creating ways to monitor compliance and enforce restrictions to cut back on water use; some hypothesize there should be fines from $500-$1000 per violation. 

The federal government has made a contingency plan as well. According to Nova Publishers, the U.S. Department of Agriculture offers programs to help farmers nationwide “recover financially from a natural disaster, including federal crop insurance, the Noninsured Crop Disaster Assistance Program (NAP), and emergency disaster loans.” These loans are typically less than $100 million per year.

Although state officials do not expect the executive order to result in an increase in farm or food prices; these assumptions can only apply to the immediate future. Long-term effects are still unforeseen.

What are the consequences of California’s water shortage?

Environment

While the entire Southwest region of the United States is facing challenges, California is seeing the most the extreme. Combined with extreme heat, and less circulation, the lack of rainfall has triggered a dangerous increase in wildfires and air pollution across the state. The smog is sticking around due to high-pressure systems, setting California back decades in terms of clean air and creating new health risks.

Jobs

A University of California-Davis research report estimated there would a direct cost to agricultural industry totaling $1.5 billion, a statewide economic cost of $2.2 billion and the loss of 17,100 jobs related to agriculture–rendering a 3.8 percent farm unemployment rate.

Prices

Observers are divided on whether California’s drought will make food prices rice. It seems logical that as farm acres become less useful, food would be more difficult to produce, thus making popular crops like tomatoes, artichokes, and broccoli more expensive.

The most affected crops will most likely be be rice, cotton, hay and corn silage. But crops like avocado, and mangoes which are mostly imported shouldn’t be affected.

Some retailers believe one of California’s signature products, wine, will see price increases in the coming months. The scarcity of water will likely increase prices for wines, especially some of the cheaper ones.

The U.S. is a geographically diverse nation, and does not solely depend on the Southwest for food production. For now, the globalization of food along with the nation’s agriculture industry has helped American consumers mostly escape higher food prices. These two factors continue to work to limit impacts on total food production and costs.

Why doesn’t Silicon Valley help?

What about reverse osmosis? Recycling water? All of those other terms we learned in biology? Technology should be able to solve this problem right? Well some efforts have begun.

California has started the Water Recycling Funding Program (WRFP) to promote the beneficial use of water recycling in order to add to fresh water supplies in California. State funding is going towards water treatment facilities, while most of private and outside funding is going towards the tech community innovations.

Or take Tech startup TerrAvion. According to CNBC it “flies manned aircraft over farmland and gives growers thermal images that can show farmers potential trouble spots when it comes to irrigation” and give tips on how to manage water more effectively.

WaterSmart Software works with water utilities to supply easy-to-understand information to customers on their water use–for example, showing how much water their home may be using compared to another home of the same size.

Conclusion

According to National Geographic, “for many years, California’s powerful agricultural lobby resisted any and all legislative attempts to regulate water restrictions, or groundwater withdrawals.” But, the extent of the current drought, combined with the state’s increasing demand for water has led to new support for change. We are in a new era and California may actually start to look like a desert. Even with the 25 percent reduction push, and the possibility of tech companies saving the day, Californians still must make behavioral changes to reduce water consumption. Even if Californians do make these changes, saving 25 percent of the water supply is not a long-term solution. It’s time for real change in California.

Resources

Popular Mechanics: 6 Radical Solutions for U.S. Southwest Peak Water Problem

National Geographic: Record Drought Reveals Stunning Changes Along Colorado River

Stanford: Causes of California Drought Linked to Climate Change, Stanford scientists Say

National Geographic: Amid Drought, New California Law Will Limit Groundwater Pumping

New York Times: California Imposes First Mandatory Water Restrictions to Deal With Drought

Glen Canyon: Fill Mead First

Arizona Central: States Expected to Reduce Water Taken from Lake Mead

CNBC: Silicon Valley Seeks to Help California

Fortune: The Consequences of California’s Severe Drought

Mercury News: California Drought Conservation Efforts Failing

KTLA: Heat, Drought Causes Significant Increase of Wildfires

LA Times: Heat, Drought Worsen Smog in California, Stalling Decades of Progress

Editor’s Note: This post has been updated to credit select information to The Glen Canyon Institute and National Geographic. 

Jasmine Shelton

Jasmine Shelton is an American University Alumna, Alabamian at heart, and Washington D.C. city girl for now. She loves hiking, second-hand clothes, and flying far away. Contact Jasmine at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post California’s Drought: Costs and Consequences appeared first on Law Street.

The Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act was passed in 2012 in an attempt to save the failing National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) that was deeply in debt and spiraling toward insolvency. As a result, homeowners in flood-prone areas, many of whom had never legally been in a flood zone prior to FEMA’s re-mapping efforts under the act, were required to buy flood insurance at outrageous premiums, with some homeowners seeing a 55 percent increase in their annual premiums. As a result, Congress has stepped in to delay Biggert-Waters’ implementation until these unforeseen side effects can be mitigated, though we have yet to see how this will be done. Read on to learn about the Biggert-Waters Act, flood insurance in the U.S., and what the next steps are.

How does flood insurance work?

While most of us know insurance is often sold by private companies consisting of comedic cavemen and geckos with accents, many types of insurance exist that are sold directly by or backed by the federal government, sometimes in conjunction with private companies. The National Flood Insurance program sells flood insurance, a highly risky type of insurance that most companies normally would not want to sell. It is sold through private insurers who perform the administrative work concerning policy issuance and premium collection, while the federal government collects the final premiums and pays all claims. Homeowners in designated flood zones are required to purchase this insurance, and since its creation in 1968 many policies are partially subsidized by the government to keep premiums reasonable. As of 2011, the program had 5.6 million policies in effect and $1.246 trillion in total insured value. Watch this adorable commercial created by the NFIP (who knew flood insurance could be cute?)

What is the Biggert-Waters Act?

The Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012 was a piece of bipartisan legislation aiming to correct growing problems with the NFIP by bringing premiums in line with the actual risks they represented, and to establish flood zones that coped with the effects of climate change. As government subsidies of flood insurance premiums continued, the amount policyholders were paying into the program became gradually less commensurate with the actual risks being insured. Prior to the passage of Biggert-Waters, many flood insurance policies were subsidized. Despite this, the NFIP had remained stable until Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy struck the Gulf Coast and the Eastern Seaboard, requiring massive claims payments in addition to disaster relief, which severely depleted the resources keeping the NFIP afloat. After Hurricane Sandy, the NFIP needed $28 billion in bailouts, and currently the program is running $24 billion in the red.

Biggert-Waters sought to reform the National Flood Insurance Program in a number of ways. The bill aimed to increase the amount subsidized homeowners pay for their insurance, bringing the premiums paid in line with the actual risks and generating more revenue for the bankrupt NFIP. The NFIP would also no longer be able to provide a free pass for homes built before the NFIP came into effect, which had previously been grandfathered into the program. The program also commenced an extensive re-mapping project to make more homeowners aware of shifting and growing flood zones and to encourage them to purchase flood insurance, instead of remaining unaware until they require federal disaster aid. These mapped flood zones, as they had before Biggert-Waters, impose strict regulations on new home construction that require homes to be built at certain heights or with various loss-prevention methods. All of these reforms were meant to stabilize the NFIP financially and to accurately insure actual flood risks, reducing the strain on federal disaster relief funds.

 Why is there an effort to delay Biggert-Waters?

Some unforeseen side effects of the Biggert-Waters Act have caused many politicians, including Representative Maxine Waters (one of the bill’s authors), to seek a delay in implementation of the bill. She, and others, have done so through the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act of 2014, which amends and delays the effects of Biggert-Waters. As a result of the re-mapping done by FEMA, many homeowners have found themselves in a higher-risk flood zone than they had been previously, which have stricter requirements governing the construction of homes, such as the height to which homes should be raised and the addition of flood vents or break-away walls. If these requirements are not met, a homeowner’s insurance premium can skyrocket.

Such was the case with Richard and Sandra Drake of Union Beach, New Jersey, who saw their annual flood insurance premium jump from $598 in 2013 to $33,000 in 2014 after they were re-mapped into a higher-risk zone. After Hurricane Sandy, the couple rebuilt their home and raised it three feet above the federal requirements for their flood zone. After re-mapping, however, their home was too low for the requirements of their new flood zone, and this was reflected in their annual premium. The new premium threatened to force them to sell and find a new home before Senator Robert Menendez stepped in and worked with FEMA to lower their premium back to pre-mapping rates. New York was forced to set up the Special Initiative for Rebuilding & Resiliency to combat the hikes in rates. Even residents whose homes are built to federal regulations may see premium increases. These rates simply are not feasible for many people who rely on federal flood insurance, which covers regions that range from secondary beach houses to low-income coastal communities.

How is Biggert-Waters being modified?

In 2014 Congress passed the Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act (HFIAA), which repeals and modifies the Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Act. It limits rate increases to 18 percent annually to prevent steep jumps in premiums while mandating increases to subsidized policies, in order to create a more gradual and cushioned path toward the end results sought by Biggert-Waters. It also provides options for homeowners placed into higher-risk flood zones in the new FEMA maps to become eligible for Preferred Risk Policies (PRP), which help lower individual homeowners’ premiums. In addition, it reinstates “grandfathering” in order to help those homeowners who have been re-mapped into higher-risk flood zones.

In essence, the HFIAA is meant to move toward some of the goals of Biggert-Waters at a more gradual pace, allowing homeowners to grow accustomed to unsubsidized rates instead of being confronted with them all at once; however, many homeowners point out that, while gradually achieved, the future unsubsidized premiums will still be too much to pay in high-risk areas, especially in later years when many homeowners will be living on fixed incomes. While the HFIAA cushions the blow of Biggert-Waters, it does not altogether remedy the controversy.

Who opposes the HFIAA?

Critics of the HFIAA argue that the continued subsidies on homes in high-risk areas leave communities unprepared when the next disastrous flood strikes. By paying unrealistic premiums, critics believe homeowners will be less proactive in elevating their homes, constructing their homes with preventive measures, and working with insurance agents to find a workable financial solution to flood insurance. Many critics also oppose “grandfathering,” in which policies created before the NFIP was implemented in a given community receive lower rates, instead of being prompted to modify their home to be more prepared for potential floods. In response to homeowners who claim that modifying their older homes may not be financially or physically feasible, these critics argue that the effort and resources required to modify a home are negligible in comparison to the effort and resources required to rebuild after a devastating flood. In all, critics are disappointed with a Congress that triumphantly passed bi-partisan legislation aimed at balancing the federal budget, and when citizens began to complain, “bowed to short-term constituent demand.”

Why do we continue to build homes and live in flood-prone areas?

When digesting all of this information one might be prompted to wonder, “Why don’t people simply move away from flood zones? And why are people living there in the first place?” The answer, as is the case with most socio-political questions, is not so simple.

Many homeowners find themselves in flood zones because, historically, cities were often built along rivers or the coast for the accessibility of water transportation. The areas affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy are located near cities–New Orleans and New York, respectively–that rose to prominence due to their accessible harbors, and now these metropolitan areas, suburbs and all, are at the mercy of storm surges and fluctuating rivers and coastlines. In the modern era, prompting entire communities to pack up and move is simply not practical. Many of these communities date back decades and are multi-generational, making it difficult to abandon the area for higher ground. Many new development projects are also taking place in these areas because they are often profitable regions. A beach or a river valley can be an important tourist destination, and so construction in these areas continue despite the risk and the rising cost of flood insurance.

Opponents to flood-zone development are becoming more vocal, however, and are questioning why these areas remain filled with homes. At a certain point, opponents argue, the cost of living in flood zones will become too great and populations will be forced to evacuate. The United States is not the only country struggling with the question over the habitation of flood zones. Severe flooding that affected various parts of the British Isles in February 2014 caused a storm of political bickering and thorough media coverage. Many sources condemned coastal townships and politicians alike for lack of preparedness and for the approval of new development projects in flood zones. Thirteen percent of all new development projects in the United Kingdom in February 2014 were on flood plains, despite well known flooding in those areas. Similar to the U.S., the British government partnered with the Association of British Insurers to create a not-for-profit company to keep flood insurance available and affordable for the U.K.’s citizens. While the dispute over flood-plain communities has existed and will exist for some time, the impending insolvency of the National Flood Insurance Program demands immediate action.

Resources

Primary

House of Representatives: Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Reform Act of 2012

House of Representatives: Homeowner Flood Insurance Affordability Act of 2014

Additional

USA Today: Flood Insurance Bill Clears Congress

Think Progress: How the New Flood Insurance Reforms Make Costly Future Climate Disasters More Likely

Times Picayune: How Controversial Biggert-Waters Flood Insurance Bill Became Law

NJ.com: Union Beach Couple Gets $33K Flood Insurance Bill After Raising Their Home Above New Federal Standards

Insurance Journal: Rep. Waters, Author of Flood Reform Act, Calls for Delay in Implementation

PropertyCasualty360: House, Senate Reject Efforts to Delay NFIP Rate Increases

Union of Concerned Scientists: The Biggert-Waters Act: Fix it, Don’t Abandon it

The New York Times: Outrage as Homeowners Prepare for Substantially Higher Flood Insurance Rates

The New York Times: Homes in Flood Zone Double in New FEMA Map

Independent: Why Do We Insist on Building on Floodplains?

Architects Journal: Flood Debate: Should We Build on Floodplains?

BBC: Why Do People Buy Houses in Places Prone to Flooding?

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post American Flood Insurance: The Biggert-Waters Act and Beyond appeared first on Law Street.

Since November 2014 when Republicans won control of the Senate and maintained control of the House, there have been promises that many hot topics will get attention. One of the first on the list was the issue of the Keystone XL Pipeline. While the political status of the bill is still up in the air, read on to learn about what the Keystone XL Pipeline is, and the political arguments for and against it.

What is the Keystone XL Pipeline?

The Keystone XL Pipeline is a pipeline transport that is to start in the town of Hardisty in Eastern Alberta, Canada and extend southeast to Steele City, Nebraska. The goal of the pipeline is to help transport crude oil from Canada to the Gulf Coast in Texas, and to help move oil from the Bakkan region in North Dakota and Montana to places where it can be used.

The pipeline would actually be an extension to the current Keystone pipeline that already runs from Hardisty to the town of Patoka, Illinois. That’s the reason that it’s called “XL”–it’s an extension to the current operation. When running at full capacity, the Keystone XL will be able to handle up to 830,000 barrels of crude oil per day. The video below explains the purpose of the Keystone XL Pipeline.

In order for the Keystone XL Pipeline to become a reality, Trans Canada has to receive approval from the President due to the fact that the project crosses into the United States from Canada. But since the Constitution states that the President cannot make the laws, and that Congress has to create a law or bill for the pipeline to be built, the issue has been languishing in Congress.

What is the Keystone XL Pipeline’s current status?

The authority to build the Keystone XL pipeline is currently the focus of two versions of a bill in the House and the Senate. The two versions need to become one bill, which will force members from both houses of Congress to work together. The biggest difference between the two bills are the amendments that have been tacked on, particularly on the Senate side. For example, the Senate, which passed its version of the bill on January 29, 2015, added on amendments that protect landowners from the use of eminent demand. The House version of the bill passed on January 9, 2015.

What is the next step for the Keystone XL Pipeline bill?

The House has said it will pass the Senate version soon, so the bill will go to President Obama’s desk for his signature; however, the White House has stated that Obama will veto the Keystone XL Pipeline Bill if it comes to his desk. If this happens, the bill will go back to Congress where a two-thirds majority will be needed to override the president;s veto. If that majority is reached, the pipeline will become a reality. If majority is not reached, the bill will go back to Congress where they will have to hammer out something else.

What are the arguments in favor of passing the Keystone XL Pipeline?

The Economic Argument

Some proponents who would like to see the Keystone XL Pipeline become reality argue that it will create jobs for Americans. The American Petroleum Institute stated that 42,000 American jobs are at stake. While exactly how many jobs would be gained through the construction, maintenance, and operation of the pipelines is difficult to estimate, it’s certain that manpower would be needed for each of these steps. The United States Chamber of Commerce stated that on its Keystone XL Pipeline Lost Opportunity Tour it encountered numerous business owners, civic leaders, and citizens who will benefit from construction of the pipeline, as the jobs it creates will stimulate other parts of the economy.

The Safety Argument

Trans-Canada, the company that will be building the pipeline, emphasizes the safety benefits. It points to the existing Keystone Pipeline that has safely transported more than 700 million barrels of the same oil to U.S. refineries since 2010 as proof of its commitment to safety and the amount of oil that it has successfully moved already. It argues that a pipeline is the safest way to move oil and natural gas. According to a recent Frasier study, there are fewer accidents with pipeline transport than with trains or trucks. Furthermore it points out that five studies and 20,000 pages of scientific review have led the U.S. State Department to conclude that the project can be built and operated with minimal environmental impact.

Energy Independence

One political concern that has deepened in recent years is the worry that the United States relies too much on outside producers for oil, gas, and other forms of energy. While the amount of oil that we import from OPEC countries has gone down over the years, we still do import significant amounts of oil from the Middle East. While the new pipeline means that we will still be importing oil, it will be from Canada, our consistent ally. Those who emphasize the need for energy independence point out that this development would allow the U.S. to separate its economic relationships from its political relationships in world affairs.

Image courtesy of Tar Sands Blockade via Flickr

What are the arguments against the Keystone XL Pipeline passing?

The Environmental Argument

Those who oppose the Keystone XL Pipeline include environmental groups, such as the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, and The National Resources Defense Council. In fact, the National Resources Defense council stated that “this pipeline will lock the United States into a dependence on hard-to-extract oil and generate a massive expansion of the destructive tar sands oil operations in Canada.” Environmentalists worry that “in addition to the damage that would be caused by the increased tar sands extraction, the pipeline threatens to pollute freshwater supplies in America’s agricultural heartland and increase emissions in already-polluted communities of the Gulf Coast.”

Further arguments against the pipeline come from a group of Nobel Peace Prize Laureates including former president Jimmy Carter and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who state that the tar sands are “among the world’s most polluting oil” and their growth in Northern Alberta has high costs for the climate. They also stress that the Keystone XL pipeline is the “linchpin for tar sands expansion and the increased pollution that will follow.” The result of the increase in pollution will trigger “more climate upheaval with impacts felt around the world.”

Former Vice President Al Gore stated in his blog that the tar sands are the “dirtiest source of liquid fuel on the planet” and this pipeline would be an “enormous mistake.” Those who agree with Gore believe that the “answer to our climate, energy, and economic challenges does not lie in burning more dirty fossil fuels” but in more “rapid development of renewable energy and energy-efficient technologies.”

The Dependency Argument

Senator Bernie Sanders, an Independent Senator from Vermont, made the case back in 2014 that the Keystone XL Pipeline would move America in the wrong direction as instead of making us greener, it would make America more dependent on nonrenewable resources. Proponents of the dependency argument point out that even though we may become less dependent on foreign producers of oil, we would become more dependent on crude oil and natural gas as energy forms. Instead of exploring other energy options, such as solar or wind power, we would continue to rely on nonrenewable resources. Those who are worried about this dependency argue that we could create jobs and energy by focusing on these alternate types of energy.

The Health Argument

Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) explained this school of thought well in a recent speech in the Senate. She reminded everyone that the oil being transported would be tar sand oil, not the conventional crude that we are used to hearing about on the news. Tar sand oil contains 11 times more sulfur and nickel, six times more nitrogen, and five times more lead. Sulfur dioxide can penetrate deeply into sensitive parts of the lungs and cause respiratory diseases such as Emphysema and Bronchitis, while an influx of nitrogen dioxide can increase symptoms in people with Asthma. According to this argument, these problems will increase in areas affected by the pipeline.

Conclusion

The Keystone XL Pipeline is a massive pipe that will run from Canada to Nebraska and link up with other pipelines to get oil down to refineries in Texas. Bills have passed the House and Senate; however, the bills will need to be made into one large bill that will pass Congress jointly in order to be sent to President Obama’s desk.This process has been made difficult by the storm of criticism that has come from both sides of the argument on whether or not a pipeline should cross the American heartland.

Resources

Primary

Senate: Keystone Pipeline XL Bill

House of Representatives: Keystone Pipeline XL Bill

Additional 

TransCanada: About the Project

American Petroleum Institute: API Applauds Swift Senate Action on Keystone XL

Institute for 21st Century Energy: U.S. Chamber Statement on Congressional Action to Approve Keystone XL Pipeline

John Hoeven: Statement on Keystone XL

Think Progress: Find Out How Your Senator Voted on the Keystone XL Pipeline 

John Manchin: Statement on Keystone XL

Al Gore: The Dirtiest Fuel on the Planet

Nobel Women’s Initiative: Nobel Laureates Urge Obama to Deny Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline

Editor’s Note: This post has been updated to credit certain information to Al Gore’s blog. 

Chris Schultz

Chris Schultz is a Midwestern country boy who is a graduate of Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa and holds a bachelors degree in History. He is interested in learning about the various ocean liners that have sailed the world’s waters along with a variety of other topics. Contact Chris at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Keystone XL Pipeline: Economic Breakthrough or Environmental Disaster? appeared first on Law Street.

While debate still surrounds issues involving climate change, scientists have agreed that global carbon emissions must begin to be reduced by the year 2020 in order to avoid the worst effects of climate change. Unsurprisingly, however, this agreement has spawned new debates concerning what to do about it. One solution that has gained political momentum in the past decade is a process commonly referred to as “Cap and Trade”.

What is Cap and Trade?

Cap and Trade, as one might surmise from its name, is a two-step system that attempts to definitively lower carbon emissions and provide an incentive for carbon-reducing technological innovations. In step one, a governing body (be it state, regional, federal, or global) sets a maximum limit of carbon emissions for all participating entities that is a certain degree lower than current emissions. Each year this cap will be gradually reduced until the coalition meets its reduction goal in x amount of years. Simple enough.

Step two involves quantifying the carbon emissions allowable under the cap into carbon credits or permits. Each permit would represent a definable amount, such as one ton of carbon emitted. These credits would then be distributed amongst polluting entities such as factories, refineries, companies, and others, forcing these entities to pollute no more than the amount of carbon credits they possess. If a company comes in under their pollution amount, they can sell their excess credits to carbon brokers or to other companies for a profit. In this way, the trade system incentivizes technological innovations that reduce carbon emissions and the companies that invest in them. In turn, companies that are in danger of exceeding their given amount or are in the process of implementing long-term carbon reduction plans, the results of which would not be seen for a number of years, will purchase carbon credits so as not to exceed their limit. The ability to purchase credits off the carbon market allows for flexibility in the way polluting entities choose to reduce their emissions. Overall, there are only as many credits as the cap allows, and as the cap is incrementally reduced each year, companies will gradually receive less credits, ensuring carbon emissions are reduced annually until a specific goal is reached.

What are some examples of Cap and Trade programs?

Cap and Trade systems exist at different levels of government and have been created for pollutants other than carbon. The 1990 amendment to the Clean Air Act, which created a permits program for sulfur pollution in an attempt to improve air quality, is seen as one of the earliest of these programs and is often hailed by advocates as a successful Cap and Trade program. However, carbon is the principal greenhouse gas affecting climate change, and proponents of Cap and Trade claim that this program can be adapted for carbon as well as a number of other pollutants.

The 1997 Kyoto Protocol, an international treaty to reduce greenhouse gases, implemented the Cap and Trade system as part of its global approach to emissions reductions. The trading program is operated by the United Nations and binds 37 industrialized countries to global emissions reductions, using several carbon emission trading schemes to accomplish the task. The global carbon market is unfortunately, to a degree, at the mercy of global politicians as they attempt to negotiate a post-Kyoto program, with the first commitment period having ended in 2012. Also at the international level, the European Trading System is a carbon Cap and Trade system created in 2005 and run by the European Union. This trading program is factory-based and distributes its emissions credits to individual companies, factories, power plants, etc. Because of this, the European Trading System is the largest Cap and Trade system in the world, incorporating more than 11,000 individual entities in 31 countries.

At the state and national levels, New South Wales and New Zealand have Cap and Trade emissions reduction systems, created in 2003 and 2009, respectively. Additionally, China plans to establish a nation-wide Cap and Trade system in 2016 in response to social unrest over increasing pollution levels in Chinese cities.

In North America, a number of American states and Canadian provinces in the American Northeast participate in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, an organization aiming to reduce carbon emissions by 10 percent by 2020 from the 2009 levels. Pennsylvania, New Brunswick, Ontario, and Quebec act as observers to the coalition, and while New Jersey was a founding member, Governor Chris Christie withdrew the state from the program in 2012. California also implemented an economy-wide Cap and Trade system in 2013 that seeks to reduce emissions by 16 percent between 2013 and 2020.

What are the advantages of a Carbon Trading program?

Advocates of Cap and Trade list a number of advantages this system has over rival emissions-reduction solutions, such as a flat carbon tax. Cap and Trade creates an assured and definite outcome, provides flexibility for the participating entities in their emission reduction methods, incentivizes technological innovation, and represents a global solution.

A flat carbon tax does not necessarily guarantee reduced emissions; it merely makes carbon more expensive in the hope of deterring polluters. Cap and Trade ensures a definite outcome through the cap on total emissions of the participating entities. As the cap is gradually lowered each year, the total emissions within that program decreases, regardless of the number of carbon permits any particular entity owns.

The gradual decrease in the emissions cap and the ability to purchase carbon credit creates the flexibility inherent in this system and the incentive for technological progress. Instead of making carbon significantly more expensive overnight, the cap is reduced in increments while the polluting parties learn to adjust to the new restrictions. It provides companies, factories, and countries time to research, develop, and implement a plan for carbon emissions reduction and provides them with more breathing room in terms of how they want to address their concerns. Some entities might want to implement long-term plans which may have large effects but the results will not be seen for a number of years, while others may want to experiment with new, emerging technology. If the plan does not work the first time around, they can purchase more carbon credits for that particular segment of the process and try something else. Entities that have more successful pollution reduction methods, however, will spend less time and less money, prompting industry and economy-wide investment in clean technology.

Lastly, Cap and Trade represents a global solution to a global problem. Because the trading aspect of the system requires a coalition of entities working in tandem and agreeing to common pollution reduction goals, the carbon market makes an international, far-reaching solution possible. The Kyoto Protocol and the European Trading System are examples of this kind of cooperative effort. A carbon tax, unless agreed upon in the United Nations (an unlikely event), can only feasibly be employed on a national level. However, pollution is a global problem, and a reduction in pollution in one country will not reduce the pollution in others.

What are the disadvantages of a Cap and Trade system?

Despite the goals it sets out to accomplish, there is significant opposition to Cap and Trade as a pollution reduction mechanism. Opponents often favor alternate solutions such as a flat carbon tax or increased public investment in emerging green technologies. Many groups find fault with Cap and Trade because they feel it will create problems with the price of carbon within the artificial carbon market, making it difficult to sustain and even more difficult to produce actual beneficial effects for the economy. James Hansen, in his New York Times Op-ed article “Cap and Fade”, argues that if all or even a large majority of participating bodies were to reduce their carbon emissions in a given year, the market would be over-saturated with carbon permits. The price of carbon would plummet and the artificial Cap and Trade market would collapse. At that point, the individual bodies will see little incentive in continued participation in the program, and Cap and Trade will have ultimately done little to reduce pollution.

Opponents also malign the various “offsets,” or alternatives to carbon reduction that are included within Cap and Trade programs. These offsets raise the overall cap for such measures as the avoidance of deforestation in Brazil or planting trees in a former industrialized area. Opponents point out that reduced pollution in one area should not allow increased pollution in another area. These offsets end up producing no net decrease in overall pollution, hindering the main purpose for which Cap and Trade systems are created.

Another issue critics have with Cap and Trade is that unless it is implemented on a global scale, with as many countries participating as possible, much of the world will continue polluting unabated. If Norway enters into a global program or creates a domestic cap and trade carbon market, that’s great, good for Norway. However, this does not compel another country, say India, to join as well. Climate change does not discriminate where its effects will be felt, and the climate over Norway will be affected the same as the climate over India, regardless of who is participating in a cap and trade program. Therefore, if not all major polluters join the cause, what incentive does that give to the countries or entities that are willing?

Critics also point to the problems experienced in the European Trading System’s carbon market in recent years as a sign that large-scale carbon trading is not a sustainable or effective solution. In early 2013 carbon prices within the European market fell considerably, so low that it threatened to destabilize the market altogether, and forced the European Union to delay credits distribution and take other measures to drag prices back up to a reasonable level. While many advocates argue that a carbon market would regulate itself, many look at the example of the ETS and remain skeptical.

Many are also afraid that Cap and Trade lends itself to corruption and big-business manipulation. Already in the carbon trading programs that currently exist, carbon brokers have materialized to service the buying and selling of carbon permits, in an attempt to get in on a piece of the Cap and Trade pie. Because Cap and Trade relies on the price of carbon and the machinations of a free market, opponents worry that a program will become another appendage of Wall St. without producing real environmental benefits.

Conclusion

Due to economic downturn in 2008 and the increased costs to consumers as a result of a carbon cap, the drive to implement a national carbon trading scheme in the United States has slowed considerably. However, Cap and Trade programs continue to appear in various shapes and sizes, and as the debate surrounding its effectiveness continues, we will wait and see how successful the current programs in effect prove to be.

Resources

Primary 

United Nations: Kyoto Protocol

European Commission: EU Emissions Trading System

Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative: Model Rule

California Environmental Protection Agency: Cap and Trade Program

Additional 

Forbes: Four Reasons California Cap and Trade Had an Extraordinary First Year

Clean Technica: Five Good Things Cap and Trade Has Done for You

Environmental Leader: Why Cap and Trade is Good for Environmental Marketing

Environment 360: The Flawed Logic of the Cap and Trade Debate

The New York Times: Cap and Fade

Chron: Risks of Cap and Trade

Grist: Beyond Baby Steps: Analyzing the Cap and Trade Flop

Washington Post: The Folly of Unilateral Cap and Trade

Council on Foreign Relations: The Debate Over Greenhouse Gas Cap and Trade

Environmental Defense Fund: How Cap and Trade Works

Center for Climate and Energy Solutions: What Is Cap and Trade?

Ecosystem Market Place: Washington State to Pursue Cap and Trade Program

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Cap and Trade: The Solution to Climate Change? appeared first on Law Street.

Daylight Saving Time. It’s become a ubiquitous practice twice a year. Whether it’s fall back, or spring forward, we all dutifully reset our clocks twice a year. Obviously, Daylights Saving Time (DST) is an old practice designed to keep our schedules pinned to the most daylight hours possible. However, with the advent of modern technology that lets us keep our lights on way later than the sun and rise whenever we want, it’s easy to wonder why DST has remained such a staunch tradition. Read on to learn about the history of DST, the argument to keep it around, and the views of those who think its an outdated practice.

The History of Daylight Saving Time

According to Daylight Saving Time (DST) history, Benjamin Franklin was the first to suggest the idea in 1784. However, modern DST was not proposed until 1895 and finally gained attention in 1905, after William Willet presented the idea in the House of Commons in the UK. The idea was eventually implemented and adopted in 1916 post World War I. The main concept behind adopting DST was to replace artificial lighting with daylight and was mainly done to save fuel for the war. In the past, DST has been known to cause widespread confusion in the transportation and broadcasting industries in the United States. Congress finally stepped in and implemented the Uniform Time Act of 1966, which stated that DST begins last Sunday of April and end last Sunday of October.

DST now is implemented in over seventy countries worldwide and affects over a billion people each year. Most countries have their own set DST start and end dates. The current DST schedule in the United States began in 2007 and follows the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which extended the period by a month. Today, most of the US observes DST except for Hawaii and most of Arizona, and US insular areas of Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, American Samoa and Guam.

What’s the argument for getting rid of DST?

DST has been part of a number of recent debates on energy savings; most scientists/researchers have found that the advent of technology has voided the initial energy saving function of DST. Although some money may by saved by not having to pay for lighting during the times when DST means we’re awake for more of the day, we lose that money in other ways. For example, research conducted in Indiana shows that the energy saving effects of DST were made negligible by the fact that people had to use air conditioning more in early evenings in the summer before things had cooled down. DST also costs airlines money, because we’re not properly synced up with Europe, to the tune of about $147 million a year in travel disruptions. Although there could be some money saved by DST, for the most part it’s not enough to make the system worth it.

Academicians argue that the increasing production of electricity, groundbreaking technology with the ability to create the intensity of daylight and the ability to work remotely defeats the purpose behind Daylight Saving. Furthermore, the National Geographic created a piece in which the concept of DST was discussed in much depth. The report says, that Tufts University professor Michael Downing and author of Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time said, “the whole proposition that you can gain or lose an hour is at best, theoretical”.

In the United States, reports related to effects of DST have suggested a rather antagonistic situation. According to a study conducted by Chmura Economics and Analytics, the sudden forward bump has cost the U.S. economy a total of $433,982,548. The research conducted by the above institute has shown that most of this cost is attributed to the decrease in overall human productivity. It claims that DST disrupts the biological clock and causes an increase in road accidents, heart attacks, workplace related injuries, especially in mining and construction business. The change twice a year does throw off our circadian rhythms, and especially affects those who have any sort of sleep disorder.

What’s the argument for keeping DST?

However, DST still remains a much-debated topic around the world. Russia abolished DST in 2011, but the inhabitants of the nation greatly dislike dark mornings. This issue has been so widely discussed, that a coalition in the nation’s Duma has proposed legislation to reestablish the practice by the end of this year. Japan, on the other hand, has not observed DST in over 60 years and few politicians strongly feel that returning to this practice can solve the nations post-Fukushima energy crisis. Brazil also holds conflicting views about this practice. The major cities of Brasilia, Sao Paulo and Rio De Janerio observe DST and have claimed to save over 200 USD in a year.

Special interests also weigh in. The retail industry, for example, is a big fan of DST. When it’s light out longer, people are more willing to go out shopping in the early evening. Similarly, TV networks have mixed feelings on DST, because when it’s lighter out longer people are less likely to surf TV channels.

Conclusion

DST’s original purpose made a lot of sense. But at this point, there’s a lot of evidence to suggest that it may no longer be worth the hassle. Our improved technological capabilities make it less essential that we organize our days around sunlight. Arguments against DST include that it doesn’t really save money, and creates more problems than good by disrupting schedules. Those who support DST like the convenience that it creates. Overall, whether or not DST survives will probably end up being a matter of convenience.

Resources

Primary 

U.S. Congress: Energy Policy Act 2005

Additional

Time and Date: History of Daylight Saving Time

Capturing the Daylight Dividend Program: The Benefits of Daylight Through Windows

Business Day: Daylight Saving May be Key to Security of Power Supply

Smart Planet: U.S. Economy Lost $433,982,548 Because of Daylight Saving Time

National Geographic: Time to Move On? The Case Against Daylight Savings

Current Biology: The Human Circadian Clock’s Seasonal Adjustment is Disrupted by Daylight Saving Time

American Economic Review: Losing Sleep at the Market: The Daylight Saving Anomaly

WorldTimeZone.com: World DST Timezones

Debate.org: Does Daylight Savings Time Have Any Purposeful Advantage in Today’s Business or Cultural World?

TimeandDate.com: The Pros and Cons of Daylight Saving Time

ABC: Body’s Clock Never Adjusts to Daylight Saving Time

Tanzoom Ahmed

Tanzoom Ahmed is a graduate of George Mason University with a Master of Public Policy. Contact Tanzoom at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Daylight Saving Time: Have We Outgrown the Need? appeared first on Law Street.

Fracking. The word is thrown around in newspapers, in political debates, in discussions about the future of our global climate change problem. But what does it actually mean? What effect does it have on our environment and economy? Is it even legal? Read on to learn about fracking, the legal framework in place to permit it, and the arguments about the practice.

What is fracking?

Fracking–more scientifically referred to as hydraulic fracking–is the injection of fluids, including water and toxic chemicals into oil and gas wells at high pressure in order to extract the gas and oil. The fluids are projected at the earth with such strong force that it creates cracks from which the gas or oil can freely flow. It mirrors the hydraulic fractures can happen in the earth naturally.

What’s the law on fracking?

The Energy Policy Act of 2005, passed by Congress on July 29, 2005 and signed into law by President George W. Bush on August 8, 2005, is “an act to ensure jobs for our future with secure, affordable, and reliable energy.” It provides incentives for diversifying sources of energy production. This includes ensuring increased use of biofuel with gasoline, requiring the Department of Energy (DOE) to study and report on already existent natural gases, and providing tax breaks and guaranteed loans for making energy conservation improvements to homes.

While fracking was not protected under the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the Halliburton Loophole is the nickname for the ability to frack under the Act. Under President Bush and Vice President Cheney, the EPA created an exemption in order to allow hydraulic fracturing (fracking) to be legal.

The exemption is on page 102, Section 322 in the EPA.

SEC. 322. HYDRAULIC FRACTURING.
Paragraph (1) of section 1421(d) of the Safe Drinking Water Act (42 U.S.C. 300h(d)) is amended to read as follows:
‘‘(1) UNDERGROUND INJECTION.—The term ‘underground injection’—
‘‘(A) means the subsurface emplacement of fluids by well injection; and
‘‘(B) EXCLUDES—
‘‘(i) the underground injection of natural gas for purposes of storage; and
‘‘(ii) the underground injection of fluids or propping agents (other than diesel fuels) pursuant to hydraulic fracturing operations related to oil, gas, or geothermal production activities.’’

There are no regulations that require documenting the chemicals used during fracking, or their possible health or environmental effects. As a result, multiple states, the most recent being California, have passed laws to create fracking regulations. In 2011, Texas became the first state requiring companies to disclose the chemicals being used.

What’s the argument against current regulations on fracking?

Many argue that these state regulations still lack crucial information that all residents should know about. Additionally, certain state regulations and laws have trade secrets that keep important information about different chemicals from the public. The Clean Water Act found 32 million gallons of diesel fuel illegally injected into the earth during fracking.  Evidence indicates that over six hundred different chemicals are used to frack. The popular HBO documentary Gasland 2 shows footage of Dimock, Pennsylvania where faucet water could be lit on fire because of contamination due to fracking. Many argue that the government should restrict the use of at least certain chemicals used in the process, or at the very least, require companies to state what materials they are using.

What’s the argument in favor of current regulations on fracking?

Fracking supporters argue that it is economically beneficial to the country. The IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates reported that fracking “supported 2.1 million jobs, added almost $75 billion in federal and state revenue, contributed $283 billion to the gross domestic product, and lifted household income by more than $1,200.” Fracking has promised us affordable and clean natural gas to help combat the foreign fuels we have now. Approximately 20 to 30 billion barrels of natural gas and oil have been recovered due to fracking. Currently, there is no other technology that retrieves natural gas and oil in places from places that fracking can reach.

Conclusion

Fracking has entered the national discourse as a possibly effective way to get some non-renewable resources that are available but difficult to reach. The regulations over whether or not we can use fracking to reach oil and gas resources have evolved over time, but they have done very little to stem the greater debate about the environmental and economical impacts of the process.

Resources

Primary

U.S. Congress: The Energy Policy Act of 2005

Additional

FracFocus: Chemical Disclosure Registry

Clean Water Action: Fracking Laws and Loopholes

Independent Voter Network: Middle Ground is Possible for Debate on Fracking in America

State Impact: Pennsylvania’s Disclosure Rules: What the Frack’s in the Ground

Slate: Who’s Fracking in Your Backyard?

EnergyFromShale.org: Pioneering America’s Energy Future

Real Clear Politics: The Breathtaking Benefits of Fracking

Reason.com: The Promised Land of Fracking

American Enterprise Institute: Benefits of Hydraulic Fracking

Elsevier: Fracking–The Pros and Cons 

Economist: Fracking

Inhabitat: The Costs and Benefits of Fracking

Huffington Post: Fracking Pros and Cons–Weighing in on Hydraulic Fracturing

Environmental Protection Agency: EPA Announces Final Study Plan to Asses Hydraulic Fracturing

—

Nicole Counts is a freelance writer, activist, and lover of books. She is graduate of Temple University with a BA in English and she lives in New York City. Contact Nicole at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

Featured image courtesy of [greensefa via Flickr]

Law Street Media Staff

Law Street Media Staff posts are written by the team at Fastcase and Law Street Media

The post Fracking and the Environment appeared first on Law Street.

The world has a complicated relationship with non-renewable resources. Large chunks of these resources are controlled by just a few countries. The United States has long worried about its ability to help our allies obtain these resources. One proposed way has been to pass the Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act. Read on to learn about the underlying energy crisis, and the arguments for and against this legislation.

Background of the Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act

As the Ukrainian crisis continues to wage on, the question of oil dependence has emerged as a relevant and pressing issue that could impact geopolitical events. Currently, Russia provides one third of Western Europe’s natural gas, and an even higher percentage of Eastern Europe’s, leaving countries such as Ukraine locked under the power of Russian oil prices. As oil and gas prices rise as a result of political tensions in the region, these countries will look to import their natural gas from other sources, hoping that wider options in the market will drive prices down for their manufacturing and private sectors.

Meanwhile, the United States currently has large reserves of natural gas that amount to more than enough for domestic consumption for the foreseeable future. The natural assumption here would be to export US natural gas to these countries seeking independence from Russian energy. However, in order to export natural gas, it must be processed and liquefied at cryogenic temperatures, creating a liquid that can be shipped. The application process for creating export facilities that create Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), which must pass through both the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), is convoluted and delayed; only seven applications have been approved since 2011, with 24 applications still pending.

The Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act, approved by the House Energy and Commerce Committee and through the House in full, would remove these restrictions by federal agencies and expedite the process for approving applications for the construction of LNG export facilities. However, fierce opposition has risen against this bill. Opponents argue that the bill will inadvertently raise domestic oil and gas prices while providing funding to energy production methods that wreak havoc on natural environments.

What’s the argument for the legislation?

The goal of the act is clear: provide Ukraine with American natural gas, thus breaking their dependence on Russia for energy and balancing the scale of global power in region. Until former satellite nations are able to break their dependence on Russian energy, many argue, Russia will be able to economically, and therefore politically, control these countries. The U.S. State Department recently announced, “The United States is taking immediate steps to assist Ukraine, including the provision of emergency finance and technical assistance in the areas of energy security, energy efficiency, and energy sector reform.” This, in short, is an announcement that US natural gas reserves will be shipped to Ukraine in order to regulate the balance of power that has tipped in that region.

Exporting US natural gas to these areas would, advocates argue, create a number of benefits for the United States and its citizens, in addition to benefits for Ukraine. The act would make the US the world’s top producer of natural gas, thus reinstating America’s dominance in energy production and improving its trade deficit. Shipping natural gas overseas requires the construction and operation of natural gas liquefaction installations, which could create roughly 450,000 jobs by 2025. The main impediment to the export of natural gas, which the bill addresses, is the application process for constructing these new facilities. Both the DOE and FERC have to sign off on any natural gas liquefaction projects, where environmental factors, the LNG buyers’ Free Trade Agreement status, public interest, and a number of other factors must be taken into account. During the FERC phase of the approval, over 20 government agencies become involved in the review process, creating a bottleneck effect in the long line of applications. Advocates argue that this act, designed to expedite this review process and enable LNG buyers to begin exporting American natural gas, will strengthen both America’s economy and the economy of nations such as Ukraine that are heavily dependent on Russian energy.

What’s the argument against the legislation?

Opponents, however, argue that the infrastructure required to ship gas to Ukraine has not yet been built, making it years before any gas would actually reach Ukraine (which, coincidentally, does not have any LNG import facilities, as it gets almost all of its natural gas via pipeline from Russia). Approving applications now to construct LNG export facilities, opponents state, is a long-term solution to an immediate problem. Many believe that exporting natural gas reserves would also negatively impact the US economy in a number of ways, creating more economic problems than the current geopolitical situation is worth. Some experts believe exporting America’s natural gas reserves will increase domestic gas prices, which have been kept low, internationally speaking, by its abundant reserves. Exporting natural gas and creating scarcity would drive up domestic oil and gas prices, hurting commercial interests and everyday consumers. This would also stifle what many refer to as the “American manufacturing renaissance” that has been occurring as a direct result of these gas reserves.

The great quantity of easily accessible natural gas has drawn energy-intensive companies to the U.S. to invest in manufacturing facilities across the country. Recently 97 energy-intensive chemical manufacturing companies invested roughly $72 billion in the U.S., spurring job growth and economic strength. Opponents argue that it is this type of economic growth that America must seek, instead of distant, fleeting profits from the sale of our natural gas. Were America’s natural gas to be exported, rising energy prices and a growing scarcity of domestic energy would smother the manufacturing renaissance and would place economic growth in the unstable hands of the oil and gas industry, instead of the diversified and profitable chemical manufacturing industry.

Lastly, opponents have been joined by environmental advocates who have voiced their concern over the environmental impacts of increased drilling and exportation of American natural gas. If the demand for natural gas export increases, opponents argue, then the demand for natural gas would also increase, which would lead to expanded drilling projects using controversial methods such as fracking to extract more natural gas. The construction of LNG export facilities and expanded drilling projects would also place more wildlife areas at risk that environmentalists have struggled to protect. The pressure for more natural gas recovery would also lead to increased carbon emissions and higher risks of spills and accidents that could dramatically damage an ecological area. Instead, many economic experts argue that the US should export drilling technology and raw materials to countries such as Ukraine to enable them to produce their own natural gas and free themselves from the bonds of Russian energy. In this way, the US could immediately profit from international trade and provide economic aid to its ally, the Ukraine.

Conclusion

The Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act passed the House this summer, and now is waiting in the Senate. While the bill is subject to much debate, it does begin to deal with the question of how nonrenewable resources are transferred internationally, and the political implications that accompany such transfers.

Resources

Primary

U.S. House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee: Domestic Prosperity and Global Freedom Act

Additional

Fuel Fix: U.S. LNG Exports Could Ensure European Energy Security

Energy Collective: Exporting U.S. LNG to Prized Non-FTA Countries: Bottlenecks in the Approval Process

Oregon Catalyst: Walden Presses Obama to Stop Natural Gas Export Delays

Roll Call: LNG Exports: An Opportunity For America

Deseret News: Liquid Natural Gas Exports Threaten U.S. Jobs

The New York Times: Foreseeable Trouble in Exporting Natural Gas

Sierra Club: Stop LNG Exports

Reuters: The Case Against Natural Gas Exports

Greeley Tribune: Colorado’s Delegation Pushes to Fast-Track LNG Exports to Non Free-Trade Countries

Lexology: Congress Turns Its Attention to LNG Exports

The New York Times: U.S. Hopes Boom in Natural Gas Can Curb Putin

Hill: DOE Approves Natural Gas Export Terminal

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Politicization of Natural Gas Exports appeared first on Law Street.

Logging was once a major industry in the western United States and often supported entire towns in rural areas. In the 1970s and 80s, under pressure from environmental groups, the federal government dramatically reduced timber harvesting inside federally protected land, reducing logging activity by up to 80 percent in some areas. Since the rampant wildfires that have swept through western states such as California, Nevada, and Oregon over the past few summers, many have called for increased logging inside national parks and forests in order to thin forests and decrease the number of destructive wildfires each year. Read on to learn about the logging industry, and the arguments for and against allowing continued logging in national parks and forests.

What has the government been doing about logging on federal land?

The House of Representatives passed the “Restoring Healthy Forests for Healthy Communities Act” (HR 1526), a bill that would require a minimum quota of timber to be harvested from federal lands each year for the creation of lumber or bio-mass energy, while removing environmental and federal restrictions to timber recovery projects in order to expedite this process. While the bill passed the Republican-controlled House with a 244-173 vote, political experts predict the bill has little chance of passing the Democrat-held Senate, especially after the Obama administration has promised to veto the bill if it reaches the President’s desk. The debate will most likely be ongoing until some sort of legislation can be agreed upon.

What’s the argument for logging in forests?

Logging supporters argue that forests have become too dense and overcrowded, and that forest thinning could help reduce the risk of forest fires while stimulating the economy. In the summer of 2013, a fire in the Yosemite Rim incinerated 400 square miles of forest while endangering nearby communities, and numerous similar fires have prompted affected residents to look for ways to reduce the threat of wildfire.

Forest fires not only threaten the trees in a particular area, but the wildlife as well. Some experts have indicated that fires such as these are increasing in frequency due to the increased density of national forests, caused by the reduction of logging in these areas in the 70s and 80s. Californians have a vested interest in the health of their national forests, as in addition to the yearly threat of wildfires, roughly 75 percent of California’s drinking water comes from forest watersheds. Many believe forest thinning through logging can improve the health of national forests and protect local wildlife.

Increased logging activity means more revenue for rural counties, where logging mills are often located, and more jobs in these areas. Many rural communities have experienced economic decline since environmental concerns decreased logging on federally protected lands. The authors of HR 1526framed the bill as a measure to both decrease the risk of wildfires and stimulate the job market in economically stagnant communities.

What is the argument against logging in forests?

Opponents of HR 1526, including Senate Democrats and the White House, are apprehensive about the bill’s measures to decrease regulations on logging, while pointing out that the economic stimulation of logging would counteract the outdoor recreation industries that have flourished in these same regions. An integral part of the bill is a measure to decrease public input, environmental analysis, and federal regulation of timber harvesting projects, which opponents say decreases control over the timber industry and would lead to a resumption of rampant deforestation experienced in the early-to-mid twentieth century. While the logging industry could create more jobs and provide economic stimulation to rural counties, logging would damage the outdoor recreation industry that has flourished in communities adjacent to national parks and forest. Therefore, HR 1526 would essentially destroy one newly established industry in the hope of reinstating what many consider an antiquated industry.

Many opponents also point out that in past TSPIRS reports (Timber Sale Information Reporting System), the US Forest Service repeatedly reported significant losses in its timber sales. Although the Forest Service has not released one of these reports since 1997, opponents of logging in national parks do not expect the logging industry to be much more profitable for the US Forest Service now than it was then.

Many scientists point out that forest wildfires are a natural part of the life of any forest, and that while in the short term these wildfires destroy trees, wildlife, and their habitats, in the long run wildfires help create enriched soil, greater biodiversity, and the greater overall health of a forest. While it is important to protect communities at risk of wildfire destruction, forest thinning would actually do little to improve the health of American forests.

Conclusion

Logging is both a way to provide energy and keep forest populations under control, but when done in excess it can be harmful. The political debate about logging has been contentious, but with the constant changes brought by the environment, the political landscape, and logging companies, but it is a hot topic to keep an eye on.

Resources

Primary 

U.S. Congress: Restoring Healthy Forests for Healthy Communities Act

Additional

Billings Gazette: Barrasso Sponsors Bill to Increase Logging in National Forests

CBS Sacramento: Rim Fire Prompts Calls for Opening National Forests to Logging

San Francisco Gate: Pro and Con on the Healthy Forest Initiative

Jefferson Public Radio: Groups Aim to Boost Logging, Restoration in Olympic National Forest

A New Century of Forest Planning: Planning in HR 1526

Earth First: Greenwashing Senators Call for Increased Logging in National Forests

Kentucky Heartwood: The Economics of Logging Our National Forests

AmericanForests.org: Burning Hot: The Evolution of Eastern and Western Fires

All Gov California: House GOP OK’s a Lot More Logging in California National Forests

Los Angeles Times: House OK’s More Logging in National Forests, Including in California

AmericanForests.org: HR 1526: Limiting Judicial Review of Forest Management

Jurist: U.S. House Approves Bill to Increase Logging in National Forests

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Logging in National Parks and Forests: A Contentious Debate appeared first on Law Street.

Wood is the oldest and most reliable source of heat known to man. Twelve million Americans still use wood stoves to heat their homes. Wood is less expensive than natural gas or electric, and is readily available in rural areas that may not have reliable gas or electric lines. However, there have been some concerns about the environmental inefficiency of wood burning as well as its health effects. Read on to learn about the arguments for and against regulating woodburning stoves.

What are the concerns about wood burning stoves?

The pollution caused by burning wood has been linked to asthma, damaged lungs, and early deaths in areas where woodburning is common. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced its desire to institute regulations that would ban all woodburning stoves that release more than 12 micrograms of particular matter per cubic meter, a requirement that 80 percent of stoves currently in use would not meet. This regulation would cause all new wood stoves to burn 80 percent cleaner than stoves manufactured under the existing 1988 regulations. While the EPA regulation promises to cut down on air pollutants and would not affect wood stoves already in use, the proposed ban has been met with opposition by those who believe it will have adverse effects on the wood-stove industry and prohibit many buyers from purchasing. Opponents also dispute the actual impact this ban would have, arguing that the areas with the most air pollution are the areas that contain the least amount of wood stoves in use.

What are the arguments in favor of regulating wood burning stoves?

Supporters of the EPA’s proposal argue that while current wood stove owners will not be affected, future wood stoves will reduce harmful emissions by 80 percent, cutting down on air pollution and saving Americans money on health care. The particles released by burning wood have been linked to lung damage, asthma, shorter life expectancy, and climate change. The EPA estimates that these regulations will provide Americans with $1.8-$2.4 billion in annual health savings, and will reduce carbon dioxide, methane, and black carbon emissions as well.

While eco-friendly wood stoves are more costly to make and purchase, the EPA and its supporters argue that individuals will see returns in the long run in reduced healthcare costs and improved overall health. Some states have already needed to decree woodburning bans for short periods of time. In December 2013, Utah banned wood burning in five counties when weather conditions and increased wood burning led to dangerous levels of particular matter in the air around these areas. Similar actions have been taken in parts of Alaska. Advocates of the EPA’s ban see these events as signals that stronger federal action needs to be taken to ensure wood-stove pollution does not produce lasting damage. Supporters also emphasize that the proposed regulations would only come into effect in 2015, and that they would not affect wood stoves already in use.

What are the arguments against regulating woodburning stoves?

Opponents argue that these regulations will destroy the wood-stove industry, costing many Americans jobs and financial stability. The regulations will make the production of wood stoves more expensive, and with the majority of wood-stove buyers being rural, low-income families, this ban on cheaper, less-environmentally friendly stoves could cause a reduction in stove sales and cause many wood-stove manufacturers to go out of business.

Although the ban will only affect newly manufactured stoves, citizens will be prevented from selling their old, inefficient stoves, making them incapable of trading their old stoves for a new one. Many opponents also see these regulations as an example of what they call the EPA’s “Sue and Settle” policy. Opponents accuse the EPA of working in tandem with large environmental groups and state agencies in a process whereby the group will sue the EPA for not going far enough in its restrictions and regulations, and instead of going to court the EPA will settle out of court by offering to impose what some believe are pre-determined regulations on manufacturing, allowing both the EPA and environmental groups to get what they want through the façade of a lawsuit. Shortly after the wood-stove ban was proposed, Connecticut, Maryland, New York, Massachusetts, Vermont, Oregon, and Rhode Island filed a lawsuit against the EPA claiming it did not do enough to reduce air pollution and demanded that the EPA add woodburning water heaters to the list of regulated woodburning appliances. Opponents of the regulations have cried foul and accuse the EPA of using a corrupt scheme to impose regulations that will force wood stove manufacturers out of business and will make it more difficult for rural families to heat their homes.

Conclusion

Woodburning stoves are a simple way that people can provide energy — particularly heat — for their homes. But they’re not always the most efficient or environmentally friendly way to do so. The potential health concerns have also led to worries. As a result, the EPA has taken action to try to change the ways in which woodburning stoves are regulated. There are many proponents of the stoves, as well as those who want to see them done away with, but change and regulation will be slow to develop.

Resources

Primary 

Environmental Protection Agency: Source Performance Standards for Residential Wood Heaters

Additional

Climate Progress: No, President Obama is Not Trying to Make Your Wood-Burning Stove Illegal

Fox News: EPA Proposes Restrictions for New Wood Stoves

Washington Post: EPA Moves to Regulate New Wood Stoves

NewsMiner.com: Feds Announce Plans for Stricter Wood Stove Regulations

Climate Progress: EPA Unveils Long-Awaited Regulations to Make New Wood Heaters Burn 80 Percent Cleaner

Clovis News Journal: People Justified to Get Heated on Stove Rules

Forbes: EPA’s Wood-Burning Stove Ban Has Chilling Consequences For Many Rural People

New American: EPA Wants to Snuff Out Wood and Pellet Stoves

Inquisitr: EPA Wood Stove Bans Include 80 Percent of Burners Now on the Market

Independent Sentinel: EPA Bans Most Wood Burning Stoves in a Corrupt Scheme, Fireplaces Next

Troy Record: EPA Wood Stove Ban is Heating Debate

Newsmax: EPA Wood-Stove Proposal Prompts Rural Backlash

Rural Blog: EPA Proposes Regulations Limiting Particle Pollution From New Wood-Fired Stoves and Furnaces

National Conference of State Legislatures: Regulating Fireplaces and Wood-Burning Stoves

Gazettenet.com: U.S. EPA Issues Tougher Regulations For Residential Wood-Burning Devices

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Heat is On: The Debate Over Woodburning Stoves appeared first on Law Street.

As a world, we’re constantly on the lookout for new ways to obtain our non-renewable resources. Some of the new areas that have been discussed as possible drilling areas include the Arctic and Antarctic. Read on to learn about what drilling in those regions would mean, and the arguments for and the against expanding drilling to the Arctic and Antarctic.

Why would we want to drill in the Arctic and Antarctic?

The Earth’s poles, comprised of the Arctic at its northern pole and the Antarctic in the south, are held in a precarious geopolitical and environmental situation as melting ice at the fringes of the poles reveals reservoirs of valuable resources that are easier to extract than ever before. In September 2012, it was found that arctic ice levels were at their lowest on record, dating back to 1979. Aside from a myriad of environmental effects, these lower ice levels have also revealed the treasures they have held for millions of years: vital natural resources, and plenty of them.

Some have estimated that the Arctic holds roughly 30 percent of the world’s undiscovered natural gas and 15 percent of its oil, while others have quantified the amount at around 40 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil and 200 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. In addition to natural gas and oil, the Arctic and Antarctic contain large deposits of coal, lead, iron, chromium, copper, gold, nickel, platinum, uranium, and silver, which become increasingly valuable in an industrialized world. Figures such as these have many eager to begin extracting these materials for market, but they are held in restraint by grave environmental concerns over the economic and environmental future of the Arctic and Antarctic, and by international organizations that attempt to balance these concerns with the global need for fuel.

The Arctic is governed by the Arctic Council, a collection of eight countries whose international borders lie directly within the Arctic Circle. The Antarctic, on the other hand, has no territorial claims and is therefore governed by an international council of countries that conduct scientific experiments on the continent and who have a vested interests in its security and/or resources. As these resources grow steadily within our grasp during a time of economic stagnation, these groups must decide whether to make the Arctic and Antarctic off limits to resource exploration and exploitation, or to begin devising plans for environmentally sound exploitation of these regions.

Resource extraction in the Arctic has occurred since the 1970s, with both the US and Russia successfully drilling for oil north of the Arctic Circle. Since then, technological innovation has made oil drilling more profitable and environmentally sound than it has been in the past, which has advocates calling for an expansion of drilling projects currently occurring in the Arctic. Resource extraction, many argue, is currently ideal due a number of factors.

1. The melting pack ice surrounding both the Arctic and Antarctic is gradually melting, making it easier to reach natural resources with less environmental impact.
2. While the Arctic has territorial claims on its southern fringes, the majority of the Arctic and the entirety of the Antarctic have no political ownership and have no indigenous populations to stand in the way of these natural resources. Extraction would not displace or steal land away from any native population, and no one country or group of countries can monopolize the reserves of carbon-based and mineral resources there, making the polar regions a vital economic opportunity for all nations. Drilling has been taking place in Russia, Norway, and parts of Greenland and Canada with few negative environmental repercussions while providing these countries with vital natural resources, and advocates argue that as technology progresses, the positive potential for resource exploitation in the Arctic only increases. Oil drilling efforts have, in fact, brought economic prosperity to several northern towns and cities that would otherwise have been remote, forgotten villages on the political as well as geographical fringes of their respective countries. During the current economic recession, advocates argue, an influx of natural resources and raw materials would help to kick start manufacturing and consumption that would benefit the economy on a global scale.
3. As climate change progresses, it will be come even easier and more cost effective to access these areas to drill.

What’s the argument against drilling in the Arctic and the Antarctic?

Opponents, led by environmental groups, argue that resource extraction in the Arctic and Antarctic will only exacerbate the current rate of global warming, strengthen our addiction to fossil fuels, and risk destroying one of the last untouched wildernesses on Earth. While melting pack ice on the fringes of the Arctic and Antarctic helps to uncover these stored resources, opponents of oil drilling and resource extraction point out that the reason why the pack ice is melting in the first place is because of global warming due to irreversible exploitation of resources and the burning of fossil fuels.

The “opportunity” that tantalizes advocates of exploitation, opponents argue, is merely an unfortunate side effect of that same opportunity. Achim Steiner, the United Nations Environmental Program’s Executive Director, said, “What we are seeing is that the melting of the ice is prompting a rush for exactly the fossil fuel resources that caused the melt in the first place.” The polar caps of the Earth are, in fact, a vast wilderness teeming with biodiversity and an area yet to be fully understood by scientists and naturalists. Because of its remote location and harsh environment, it has remained largely unchanged throughout the course of human industrialization. As technological innovation provides greater access to these regions and makes the exploitation of its resources easier, environmentalists are worried that the relentless search for energy will permanently ruin one of the last pristine wild areas on the planet.

Allowing resources such as oil, natural gas, and minerals to be extracted from the Arctic and Antarctic increases the risk of oil spills, Arctic pollution, and the destruction of natural habitats. While the Arctic and Antarctic may contain vast reservoirs of fossil fuels and natural resources and the combination of current technology and melting pack ice is making these resources easier to reach, many are fighting to keep the Arctic and the Antarctic the way they are: untouched by man.

Case Study: The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) was established in 1960 for the purpose of preserving a 19.6 million acre area of wilderness and the accompanying wildlife in northeastern Alaska bordering northern coastline. ANWR, operated by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, is home to a variety of ecosystems as well as a variety of wildlife such as caribou, polar bears, grizzly bears, and muskoxen. The rest of Alaska’s northern coast, including Prudhoe Bay and much of the North Slope, have been opened to oil exploration and drilling, has delivered billions of barrels of oil to American markets since the 1970s. Since its formation there has been debate on whether to allow oil exploration and drilling to take place in ANWR. It is well known that Alaska sits on large oil reserves.

Advocates claim that oil drilling in ANWR would benefit the American economy with minimal environmental impact. Through land leasing, bids, and taxation the oil in Alaska’s wilderness is estimated to add billions of dollars in revenue to state and federal treasuries. The oil found here would be an alternative to costly imported oil, and the extraction of oil in ANWR is also estimated to create 250-735 thousand new jobs, further stimulating the economy. Advocates of drilling also argue that the environmental impact of oil exploration and drilling would be minimal, citing advanced drilling technology and the fact that only eight percent of the wildlife refuge would be used for exploration and drilling. Additionally, supporters cite polls that show a majority of Alaskan citizens favor drilling for oil in the refuge. Proponents of oil drilling say that the economic benefits would far outweigh the minimal environmental impact in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Opponents argue that the proposed economic benefits of oil drilling in the Arctic are minimal, and that the drilling severely harms local ecosystems and species. Given that oil prices are based upon world supply and are largely dictated by OPEC, drilling at ANWR would have little impact on oil prices for everyday consumers. This oil reserve would only account for one to four percent of daily consumption in the U.S., and if approved the oil would not reach markets for another ten years due to the exploration, construction, and production involved in creating a new oil field. Opponents cite a report written by the Environmental Information Agency claiming that at peak production in 2030 ANWR oil would only reduce foreign oil imports by three percent. Opponents of drilling also questions oil companies’ desire to find oil in ANWR when it was reported in 2010 by the Bureau of Land Management that oil companies were developing less than 30 percent of the federal land they had already leased or owned for the purpose of oil drilling. Citing these figures, opponents argue that access to oil inside ANWR would have little economic benefit to the United States.

Opponents also dispute the drilling advocates’ claim that the environmental impact of drilling would be much greater than proponents estimate. They disagree on the claim that exploration and drilling would use only eight percent of ANWR land. The oil in this area is scattered in several small pockets instead of one large reservoir, requiring much more land to explore and access these oil reserves. These lands would include birthing areas, migratory routes, and natural habitats of numerous wild species and a variety of ecosystems. Many opponents accept that advanced technology reduces the risk of oil spills and other disasters, but they argue that even the presence of heavy machinery and human interference will have adverse effects on these ecosystems and on the flora and fauna that live there. Environmentalists are also worried that allowing oil drilling in ANWR would open the floodgates to more corporate control over federally protected wildlife areas, thus nullifying the point of creating national parks and wildlife refuges in the first place.

Conclusion

It’s clear that there’s pressure to find new and reliable sources of natural gas and oil, but many opponents pose the important question: at what cost? There are both incentives and huge downsides to drilling the Arctic and Antarctic poles. As the options for where to get non-renewable resources continue to narrow, it’s an important debate to keep an eye on.

 Resources

Primary 

Secretariat of the Antarctic Treaty: The Antarctic Treaty

Additional

Moscow Times: Russia Pushes For Further Arctic Exploitation

CNN: It’s Time to Develop Our Arctic Resources

Earth Sky: Robert Blaauw on Oil Exploration and Development in the Arctic

Arctic: Towards An Agenda For Arctic Sustainable Development

Minnesota Daily: ANWR Drilling Benefits Americans

Committee on Natural Resources: ANWR: Producing American Energy and Creating American Jobs

CNSnews.com: ANWR Drilling Would Ease Energy Crisis, Create Economic Boon, Supporters Say

Cool Antarctica: Human Impacts on Antarctica and Threats to the Environment– Mining and Oil

Climate Science Watch: U.S. Arctic Strategy Aims to Exploit Oil and Gas For ‘National Security’

Reuters: Arctic Needs Protection From Resource Rush as Ice Melts

Grid Arendal: The Arctic–A New Victim of Global Development?

National Wildlife Refuge Association: Protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Record: Oil is the New Gold in Arctic ‘Cold Rush’

Globe and Mail: The North’s Resource Boom: Is it Prosperity or Exploitation?

SciDev: Developing Nations Seek a Share of Antarctica’s Spoils

CBN News: The ANWR Debate: To Drill or Not to Drill

National Geographic: Arctic Oil Drilling Debate Escalates

Heritage Foundation: Opening ANWR: Long Overdue

Alaska Dispatch News: Drilling ANWR is Not the Answer to U.S. Energy Challenges

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Debating Resource Exploitation in the Arctic and Antarctic appeared first on Law Street.

Earlier this year, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released new guidelines for what gasoline can contain. The motive behind the new regulations was to create gasoline that minimizes the effects on the environment, improve public health, and mitigates the effects of climate change. One big change was that the EPA announced its desire to minimize the amount of sulfur in gasoline. Read on to learn about the effects of sulfur in gasoline, the debate, and the end results.

Why do we care about sulfur in our gasoline?

Sulfur is a smog-forming pollutant that has been linked to respiratory diseases and air pollution. The new regulations would require refiners to reduce the amount of sulfur in gasoline by 60 percent by 2017, from 30 parts per million to 10 parts per million. President Obama asked the EPA for cleaner gasoline standards in 2010, and since then the EPA has worked with scientists and automakers to develop these new regulations. However, the regulations would require oil refiners to install expensive new equipment in their refineries and would force auto manufacturers to install new pollution-control in car engines. While some argue that these new regulations will improve health at a minimal cost, oil refiners argue that the costs are unnecessarily expensive to their industry, thus hurting consumers, taking away jobs, and negatively impacting the economy as a whole.

What are the arguments for these new guidelines?

Advocates argue that the additional costs of the EPA regulations would pay for themselves by the year 2030 through decreased costs in health care. The EPA estimates that the reduction in sulfur emissions would save Americans between $5.7 and $19 billion by the year 2030 and would reduce the amount of sick days taken at school and work. The EPA also estimated that Americans could see the prevention of 770-2,000 premature deaths, 2,200 hospital admissions, 1,900 asthma attacks, and 30,000 reported cases of respiratory problems in children living near highways or urban centers. All of these health benefits, the EPA claims, would come at an increase of just 2/3 of a cent per gallon and the addition of just $75 to the sticker price of a new car.

Representative John Dingell (D-MI) explained the benefit behind the new law, stating,

We do have a serious problem with too much sulfur in gasoline. It screws up the mufflers, it screws up the catalytic converters, and it screws up a lot of other things, too.

Other advocates point to the emission standards of the European Union, Japan, and South Korea, which are far ahead of those in the United States, to argue that these regulations would bring the US up to speed with other developed countries. Lastly, some in the auto industry have argued that these sulfur emission standards would be beneficial to auto makers in enabling them to meet newer, stricter federal environmental regulations, which would more than make up for the additional cost of rigging their cars to emit less sulfur.

What are the arguments against the new guidelines?

Opponents argue that the EPA regulations would have minimal environmental impact while putting greater strain on the economy and ultimately hurting consumers. Since 2000, oil refiners have already been required to reduce the sulfur levels in gasoline by 90 percent; the new regulations would mandate the removal of the last 10 percent, which according to experts is much more difficult and costly to remove than the initial 90 percent. This process would cost the oil industry roughly $10 billion and would increase the cost of gas by nine cents per gallon. This increased cost would force the oil companies to cut employment and raise prices, which in the end hurts the average consumer. Additionally, opponents argue that these increased costs are unnecessary because they will have little impact on climate change and global warming. While sulfur emissions contribute to smog and some air pollution, there has been no link found between sulfur emissions and the factors that contribute to climate change, leading opponents to argue that the environmental impact of these regulations is just not worth the economic stress forced upon consumers and job seekers.

The American Petroleum Institute (API) disagreed with the new guidelines, complaining especially about the little time that producers will have to comply with the guidelines. The API’s Bob Greco claimed that the rules don’t allow enough flexibility for producers to switch over in both a timely and safe manner. Patrick Kelly, an API Senior Policy advisor, also said:

API opposes this discretionary rulemaking as we have serious doubts as to the Agency’s justification for it. We have been insisting that EPA demonstrate a scientific justification for two and a half years. API commissioned research on the costs and benefits associated with further reductions in gasoline sulfur. We found some clear conclusions: The proposed standard will yield little immediate or longer term air quality benefits. And, reducing average sulfur from 30 parts per million to 10 parts per million will impose enormous costs. Further reducing gasoline sulfur is not necessary for meeting more stringent vehicle emissions standards, and automakers are unlikely to introduce vehicle emission technology that is enabled by the lower sulfur fuel.

Conclusion

The implementation by the EPA of new guidelines regarding sulfur in gasoline made news this spring. As the guidelines continue to be phased into place, there is still disagreement about the viability and fairness of the rules, and whether or not they will have a concrete effect on our environment, health, and economy remains to be seen.

Resources

Climate Progress: A Comprehensive Guide to the EPA’s New Pollution-Reducing Gasoline Rules

Huffington Post: Sulfur, Sulfur, Toil and Trouble

TIME: EPA’s New Emission Rules Could Increase Gas Prices, Save Lives

Earth Day Network: EPA Finalizes Tier 3 Gasoline Standards

Environmental Protection: API Opposes EPA’s Tier 3 Rule

Bloomberg: Refiners Rebuff EPA Concessions In Rule to Cut Sulfur

Machinery Lubrication: New EPA Gasoline Regulations Costly, Counterproductive

Bloomberg: EPA Said Poised to Issue Lower Sulfur Limits On Fuel

The New York Times: EPA Set to Reveal Tough New Sulfur Emissions Rule

Utah Political Capitol: Tier 3 Gasoline: Air-Pollution Slayer or Tail Pipe Dream?

Convenience Store and Fuel News: EPA Finalizes Tier 3 Emission & Fuel Standards

Union of Concerned Scientists: The EPA’s Tier 3 Standards

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post EPA Rules Aim to Phase Out Sulfur in Gas: What Does it Mean For Your Wallet? appeared first on Law Street.

In a world where the price of gas is costly for both our wallets and the environment, environmentally friendly cars are becoming increasingly popular. In fact, the United States government is encouraging the purchase and use of environmentally friendly cars by offering tax credits. Read on to learn about the environmental car trend, tax credits offered, and their effects.

 What are environmentally friendly cars?

Environmentally friendly cars, sometimes referred to as “green” cars, are essentially cars that minimize their harmful effects on the environment. They can include, but are not limited to:

• Hybrid cars: While these cars can take many forms, this category of eco-friendly cars include any type of car that uses multiple energy sources to power a vehicle. The most common type is a hybrid-electric vehicle.
• Bio-diesel cars: These cars are powered by diesel, or a mix of diesel and vegetable oil.
• Ethanol-powered cars: This category of eco-friendly cars use ethanol created from a material such as corn, barley, or wheat.
• Electric cars: These cars run on electricity and are plugged in to gain enough charge to function.
• Hydrogen-powered cars: These vehicles use hydrogen for power, in the form of fuel cells. Many versions of hydrogen cars are still in the development processes.

Eco-friendly vehicles make up a relatively small number of the vehicles sold in the United States, but the market is growing. JD Power and Associates has estimated that by 2015 eco-friendly cars that contain some sort of hybrid component could make up as much as 10 percent of the vehicle market share.

What tax credits can you obtain for using an environmentally friendly car?

The Energy Policy Act of 2005 established a series of tax incentives, namely credits, for individuals purchasing or leasing eco-friendly vehicles such as electric cars, hybrids, and alternative-fuel vehicles. This bill was expanded upon by the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. Because of the added cost of their fuel-efficient technologies as well as their lack of presence in the current auto market, eco-friendly cars are significantly more expensive than similar cars with engines run on gasoline. These federal tax incentives were aimed at increasing the sales of these “green” cars to make them a larger part of the transportation vehicle market and thus reduce harmful carbon emissions in the United States into the environment.

Currently, individuals purchasing electric cars and plug-in hybrids can qualify for a tax credit of up to $7,500 dollars, which in some cases can significantly reduce the cost of these cars. These incentives are designed to gradually phase out for a given manufacturer after that company has sold more than 60,000 electric cars. Individual states also have their own incentives for purchasing “green” cars. Since their introduction into the car market, there has been debate as to whether these incentives are effective reaching their goals or whether they should even be offered in the first place.

What is the argument for creating these tax credits?

Supporters of these incentives argue that tax credits will increase sales of this type of car and help establish eco-friendly car brands such as Tesla or the Nissan Leaf as economically viable options for consumers. When the federal and state tax incentives are combined with the increased fuel economy, they often become just as cheap, if not cheaper, than standard gasoline-combustion cars. Leases are popular for these relatively-new cars, and in many states such as Washington and Georgia, where state tax incentives for eco-friendly cars are high, individuals are able to lease these cars nearly for free.

Supporters assert that these tax incentives allow fledgling hybrid manufacturers to gain an economic foothold and to become serious competitors in the auto market. Through increased sales due to federal tax incentives, Nissan was able to open lithium ion battery factories in Tennessee to cut down on cars being shipped from Japan, allowing them to drop the price of the Nissan Leaf by $6,400. Price reductions such as this will lead to increased sales and company growth, allowing hybrid manufacturers to gain a larger share of the profit from auto sales. Altogether, as hybrid manufacturers grow and as more people purchase and lease hybrid and electric cars, US emissions will be dramatically reduced.

What is the argument against creating the tax credits?

Opponents of these tax incentives argue that the tax credits do not make these environmentally-friendly cars more cost effective; they do not help reduce emissions; and they only make “green” cars more affordable to already-wealthy individuals while requiring taxpayers and the federal government to foot the bill.

The federal government imposes standards on the average fuel economy of all vehicles each company sells, and mandates that a company cannot exceed this limit. By selling more hybrid cars, car companies are in fact able to sell more low-fuel economy cars while still adhering to these federal standards, thus negating the tax incentives’ effect on improving the environment. And while tax incentives in some states may make eco-friendly cars cheaper to lease, some studies indicate that even with the tax incentives cars such as the Chevy Volt could still take up to 27 years to pay off.

The Congressional Budget Office stated in a 2012 report that it would require tax incentives of about $12,000 — $4,500 higher than current incentives — to have a serious impact upon the price of hybrid and electric cars. According to these reports, hybrid and electric cars still are not affordable to the average consumer. Opponents then argue that the tax incentives only serve to make these eco-friendly cars more affordable for affluent families who can already afford them. Meanwhile, the federal government and taxpayers are forced to cover the money lost by these incentives. The Congressional Budget Office report estimated these incentives would cost the federal government roughly $7.5 billion through 2019.

There’s also some concern about whether or not hybrids are actually good for the environment, as depicted in the infographic below.

Conclusion

Environmentally friendly cars are certainly here to stay, and while their market share increases the government has been happy to encourage it. However, as they become more prevalent among the average driver, the government may not have the resources to continue with the tax credits. For now, it’s a innovative program that could be a good choice for those in the market for a new car.

Resources

Primary

State of Utah: Clean Fuel Vehicle Tax Credit

U.S. Congress: Energy Policy Act of 2005

Additional

Wall Street Journal: To Spark Buyers for Electric Cars, Drop the Price to Nearly $0

Street: Why Electric Cars Are Selling in California: They’re Free

Palisades Hudson Financial Group: Atlanta Turns Over a New Leaf

Seattle Times: Seen a Tesla Today? Electric Cars Turn Up Fastest in Washington State

The New York Times: Payoff For Efficient Cars Takes Years

Fortune: Electric Vehicles Still Struggling to be Cost-Competitive

American Enterprise Institute: Subsidy-Powered Vehicles

Forbes: If Tesla Would Stop Selling Cars, We’d All Save Some Money

Congressional Budget Office: Effects of Federal Tax Credits for the Purchase of Electric Vehicles

Bankrate.com: Tax Breaks For Gas Savers

Green Car Reports: Will Georgia Kill Its $5,000 Tax Credit For Electric-Car Purchases

San Francisco Gate: Car Fuel Efficiency Tax Breaks

Internal Revenue Service: Going Green May Reduce Your Taxes

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post The Tax Credit Battle Over Environmentally Friendly Cars appeared first on Law Street.

The global community is quickly working its way through the natural resources available to us. As we seek new ways to access oil and gas, one of the newest possible frontiers is the American Atlantic Coast. The U.S. has toyed with using a supposedly minimally invasive tactic to test for oil and gas deep in the Atlantic Ocean called airgun testing. Read on to find out what airgun testing is, what affect it has on the environment, and what its prospects are moving forward.

What is Airgun Testing?

Airgun testing is essentially a way to test for oil and gas reserves. The seismic airguns attach onto ships, and then blast loud, strong bursts of air onto the ocean floor. How the air responds can tell the airgun operator whether or not there may be oil or gas reserves below the surface. Watch the video below for a simple, technical explanation of how airgun testing works.

The History of Airgun Testing in the United States

On February 27, an Environmental Impact Statement was released by the Interior Department that allows the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to begin issuing permits for seismic testing off the Atlantic Coast for oil and gas exploration. Although the ocean floor was tested for oil reserves in the 1970s and 80s, many experts feel those reports used outdated technology and gave an inaccurate representation of the oil and gas deposits in the Atlantic.

Some experts say that oil reserves could be found off the Atlantic coast that would be similar to those known to be in the Gulf of Mexico and could dramatically boost the American economy. Environmental groups, however, strongly oppose oil exploration using this method, as it is known to kill small fish and eggs in close vicinity to the air blasts. The long-term effects on the behavior of larger aquatic animals such as dolphins and whales is unknown. The proposed area for seismic exploration spans several miles off the coast and stretches from Delaware to Florida, and though the area in question is banned from any oil exploration activity until 2017, the next president could overturn that rule.

What are the arguments in favor of airgun testing?

Advocates of oil exploration off the Atlantic Coast using airgun seismic testing argue that the permits issued by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) place restrictions that will make airgun testing safe for marine wildlife. The Environmental Impact Statement recommends three restrictions to ensure that these tests are conducted in a safe, environmentally conscious manner:

1. Prohibit survey activity on the migratory routes of the endangered Right Whale. A path roughly 20 miles wide would be created in the middle of the proposed area in which exploration could not be conducted from November through April — the whale migration season — creating a safe corridor for the whales.
2. Prohibit more than one survey from being conducted at any given time.
3. Prior to any survey activity, exploration vehicles would be required to use passive acoustic monitoring systems to identify wildlife in the exploration area; if any wildlife are found that would be affected by the airgun, the survey area for that day would be shifted to a different location.

Advocates feel that these provisions, written into any permits issued by the BOEM, would safeguard against potential negative effects of airgun testing.

Advocates also point to the economic benefits of updated oil exploration off the Atlantic Coast. Some experts claim that the Atlantic coast could hold the equivalent of seven years of oil generated in the Gulf of Mexico, enough to boost the American economy and strengthen the United States’ energy security. The American Petroleum Institute has estimated that the oil to be found there could generate nearly 280,000 jobs, $195 billion in private revenue, and $51 billion in government revenue.These estimates, of course, are dependent upon the discovery of more oil than the current 3.3 billion barrels estimated to be there. Additionally, supporters argue that airgun testing can also be used for tasks such as discovering sand deposits for beach recovery and as scouting for possible locations of off-shore wind turbines.

What are the Arguments Against Airgun Testing?

Opponents argue that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has been too hasty in its approval for permits without proper studies of the long-term effects of airgun testing on marine wildlife. It is known that the high pressure airgun blasts can injure or kill small fish and their eggs, but little is known about the long-term effects on marine animals such as behavioral disruption, migration, and mating patterns. The area up for seismic testing puts 34 species of whales and dolphins and several species of turtles at risk. Because sound travels faster in water, aquatic wildlife miles away from the seismic testing could be affected, although the effects of airgun testing are still being studied. Environmental group Oceana argues that the November through April ban on seismic testing will not save the whales and that the BOEM did little to use current acoustic data on whale activity or search for alternatives methods to airgun testing.

Airgun testing in the Atlantic has also sparked backlash because it could potentially harm tourism and fishing industries in coastal areas, in addition to the negative effects of offshore oil production that are sure to result from oil exploration. Opponents point to the results of airgun testing off the coast of Southwestern Africa, which severely disrupted tuna migration patterns, and thus damaged the tuna industry that normally thrives in that area.

Some experts argue that while 280,000 jobs in oil exploration and production could be created, some 730,000 jobs in the fishing and tourism industries would be lost if oil exploration were to disrupt aquatic wildlife. Additionally, opponents argue that oil exploration will inevitably progress to oil production, which could have disastrous effects upon the Atlantic coast. The effects are still felt today of the 2006 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the Exxon-Valdez oil spill near Alaska in 1989. The same type of oil spill could potentially occur off the Atlantic coast if drilling were permitted there, which runs the risk of affecting a greater population than either of the previous spills. Oil drilling itself could pose a myriad of negative effects upon marine wildlife, and airgun testing could be blamed for paving the way to large-scale offshore oil drilling near the Atlantic coast.

 Resources

Primary

Bureau of Ocean Energy Management: Atlantic Geological and Geophysical Activities Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement

Additional

Bloomberg: Review Clears Path For Seismic Tests of U.S. Atlantic Oil

International Business Times: Obama Administration Releases Environmental Study to Set Rules For Oil and Gas Exploration in Atlantic Ocean

Examiner: Use of Air Guns Being Considered For U.S. Oil and Gas Exploration

Greenville Online: Rules Set For Oil Testing in Atlantic Ocean

Star News Online: McCrory Adds Voice to Coastal Governors Who Want Offshore Drilling

Climate Progress: ‘Airgun’ Drilling in the Atlantic Wouldn’t Find Much Oil, But Could Harm Wildlife

National Geographic: Atlantic Seismic Tests For Oil: Marine Animals At Risk?

EcoWatch: U.S. to Allow Seismic Airgun Testing For Offshore Drilling Exploration, Will Threaten Marine Life

Oceana: Seismic Airguns: An Ocean Threat

The New York Times: U.S. Moves Toward Atlantic Oil Exploration, Stirring Debate Over Sea Life

McClatchy DC: Interior Department Favors Controversial Seismic Tests For Atlantic Ocean Oil

Tech Times: Atlantic Oil Drilling Using Seismic Airgun May Wipe Out Endangered Right Whales

Washington Post: U.S. Rules Would Allow ‘Seismic Air Guns’ in Search For Offshore Oil, Gas

TIME: To Drill or Not to Drill: The Debate Over Offshore Testing and Drilling in the Atlantic

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Airgun Testing For Oil Reserves is a Controversial Environmental Issue appeared first on Law Street.

On December 18, 2013, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus unveiled a discussion draft for an energy tax reform plan intended to make progress in the federal government’s current system of corporate tax incentives for the production of clean energy. The old system was criticized as being too complicated and too decentralized. Read on to learn about Baucus’ energy plan, the arguments in favor of it, and the arguments against it.

What was Baucus’ plan?

There are forty separate tax incentives offered to corporations for a variety of forms of energy including fossil fuels, wind, solar, and nuclear power; however, many of these are short-term incentives set to expire every two years or so until they are re-authorized by Congress, often leaving companies unsure of which tax incentives would still be in effect in the future. These incentives are also often specific in a way that does not provide for new and emerging technologies that may contribute to reducing emissions.

Senator Baucus’ plan aims to make energy tax incentives “more predictable, rational, and tech-neutral” by consolidating some of these incentives and eliminating others to form two broader and simpler tax incentives, one focused on clean production of electricity and one focused on clean production of transportation fuel. These incentives are granted after a particular plant is using a method that produces emissions intensity 25 percent cleaner than average energy production methods (“emissions intensity” is measured as the amount of emissions released per amount of energy produced, and is used to compare the environmental effect of different methods of energy production).

Baucus’ plan also calls for using the federal money saved through this tax reform to lower the corporate tax rate, which currently stands at 35 percent. Baucus, however, was confirmed in January as the next US Ambassador to China, and though leadership of the Senate Finance Commission will transfer to Senator Ron Wyden, who has worked closely with Baucus on this reform plan, many expect the plan to become stalled as its leader moves overseas. Despite this uncertain future, Baucus’ reform plan is seen as an indicator of impending reform to the current energy tax system in the United States.

What is the argument for Baucus’ plan?

Supporters of the reform say Baucus’ plan is an effective way to simplify the tax incentive structure while supporting clean energy. Companies would not have to waiting on their toes to see whether the particular incentives that apply to them would be renewed, and knowing that these incentives will have more longevity would promote more investment into clean energy production technology projects in the future. Most importantly, this reform plan is tech-neutral, meaning that it does not favor certain technologies over others and in fact does not specify any technologies in its incentives.

Supporters argue that this aspect of the plan will benefit newer and cleaner technologies that may not necessarily fit into the rigid outlines of our current tax incentives, thus paving the way for further innovation and investment into energy-producing technology. Additionally, many of the incentives that are to be eliminated and not included in the broader transportation fuel incentive are tax breaks that benefit Big Oil, a move hailed by many supporters who do not see the point of offering tax breaks to companies in an industry that has shown record profits year after year [cite]. Lastly, with the federal revenue gained from simplifying the tax incentive structure and removing breaks for big oil companies, Senator Baucus’ plan intends to lower corporate tax rates, which supporters hope will provide impetus for further economic growth.

What is the argument against Baucus’ plan?

Others are strongly opposed to this reform plan due to its emphasis only on energy producers (companies that use coal, fossil fuels, wind, solar and other methods to produce energy) and not energy users (all other private citizens and companies that use electricity, gasoline, etc.), and because the emissions reduction quotas of the incentives are, as one critic put it, “unambitious”, and would have little effect on improving the environment.

The two main tax incentives of Baucus’ plan target producers of electricity and transportation fuel, with no mention of companies that use energy in a cleaner way. This means that companies that make their buildings more energy efficient, companies that manufacture environmentally-friendly appliances and cars, and the individuals who use these greener manufactured goods would no longer receive the tax incentives they currently receive. Many opponents see this as being counter-productive in the struggle to promote cleaner energy technologies.

And while this plan does target energy production, many opponents point out that this plan would actually reduce incentives provided to areas such as solar and wind power. Whereas currently producers of solar power receive an investment tax credit of 30 percent, under this new plan they would only be entitled to either a production tax credit of $0.023 per kilowatt or an investment tax credit of 20 percent. Therefore, despite favoring carbon-free methods of energy production, many opponents feel this plan will do little to help area such as solar, wind, and other green energy production.

There has also been a backlash from the oil and natural gas industry, as well as from areas such as Montana and North Dakota who have a fledgling oil industry, arguing that by favoring carbon-free technologies the plan would be stifling job opportunities and economic growth brought about by the oil industry. Lastly, some opponents of the plan argue that the reduction quotas are too low. One critic points out that a 25% reduction in emissions “intensity”, which is the wording used in the discussion draft, is vastly different from a concrete measurement of emissions, and depending upon economic growth and the relative amount of energy these companies are producing, companies could meet this quota without any serious reduction in emissions. On a broader scale, some oppose tax incentives for alternative energy production altogether, arguing that global warming is, as indicated by its name, a global phenomenon, and that any reduction in emissions in the US is offset by emissions due to economic growth in developing countries, where environmental legislation is often more lax.

Conclusion

It’s clear that something needs to be done to fix the very confusing and red-tape-littered energy tax process. While there are certainly tangible benefits to Baucus’ plan, opponents worry that it would do more harm than good.

Resources

Primary

U.S. Senate Committee on Finance: Baucus Unveils Proposal For Energy Tax Reform

U.S. Senate Committee on Finance: Energy Tax Reform Discussion Draft

Additional

American Progress: Baucus Tax Reform Cuts $46 Billion in Oil Breaks

Domestic Fuel: Senator Max Baucus Unveils Energy Tax Reform

EE News: Baucus Proposal Replaces Dozens of Energy Breaks with Credits for ‘Clean’ Fuel, Electricity

BioMass Magazine: Sen. Baucus Releases Proposal To Overhaul Energy Tax Incentives

BillingsGazette: Baucus’ Tax Reform Must Be Fair To Energy Industry

ThinkProgress: Max Baucus’ Renewable Energy Tax Break Reform: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Daily Caller: Analysis: Baucus Energy Tax Plan Comes With Dubious Benefits

Breaking Energy: Are Subsidies the Answer to Energy Sector Tax Reform?

Solar Industry: Baucus Energy Tax Reform Plan Reduces Solar Investment Credit

Washington Post: The Way Congress Funds Clean Energy Is A Mess. Max Baucus Thinks There’s A Better Idea

Politico: Baucus Proposes To Overhaul for Clean-Energy Tax Breaks

Lexology: US Teax Reform Update: Senate Finance Chairman Baucus Issues Energy Tax Reform Proposal

Hill: Baucus Proposes Dumping Energy Breaks

Tax Reform Law: Baucus Proposes Major Overhaul To Energy Incentives

Joseph Palmisano

Joseph Palmisano is a graduate of The College of New Jersey with a degree in History and Education. He has a background in historical preservation, public education, freelance writing, and business. While currently employed as an insurance underwriter, he maintains an interest in environmental and educational reform. Contact Joseph at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Max Baucus’ Tax Plan: Could it Work? appeared first on Law Street.