infrastructure

Drilling Rights In The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge | Earth Wise

February 2, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The battle to prevent oil and gas drilling rights from being sold in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska has been going on for 40 years. The Trump administration spent nearly four years pushing to auction off those drilling rights and finally accomplished it in early January.

The ANWR was created in 1960 and is the largest intact wilderness in the U.S., covering nearly 30,000 square miles in Alaska. It is an important breeding habitat for polar bears as well as the home of more than 200 other species including caribou, arctic foxes, golden eagles, and snowy owls. Parts of it are also sacred ground for the indigenous Gwich’in people.

The auction carved out a 5% slice of the refuge for leases and proponents anticipated it would generate billions of dollars in revenues that would offset tax cuts in Alaska.

Of the 22 parcels of land offered, totaling 1.1 million acres, only 12 were bid on at all and the state of Alaska was the sole bidder on 9 of those. In total, the auction raised a paltry $14 million.

Whether the remarkable absence of interest was due to a lack of infrastructure or roads around the region, the decline of fossil fuel investments and use during the pandemic, or the anticipation that any leases would be the subject of endless legal battles by indigenous tribes and environmental activists, the net result was that the auction was basically a flop.

President Biden has stated that he is entirely against Arctic drilling, so the new administration is likely to try to repeal or interfere with any drilling leases or other industrial activity in the ANWR.

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Arctic Oil Drilling Plans Suffer ‘Stunning Setback’ as Almost ‘No One Shows Up’ For the Sale

Photo, posted July 3, 2019, courtesy of Alaska Region U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service via Flickr. Photo Credit: Danielle Brigida/ USFWS

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Renewable Energy And Green Ammonia | Earth Wise

January 20, 2021 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Several different clean technology trends may come together on farms across the country where wind turbines could power devices that produce green ammonia for fertilizer and zero emission fuel.

Distributed wind is a kind of renewable energy that doesn’t get much attention. It refers to turbines that are used to generate electricity for on-site use, as for a factory or a farm. It typically involves smaller turbines than the behemoths that are used in giant wind farms.

Installing a wind turbine or two on a farm could be quite valuable if the electricity generated could be used to make green ammonia. Such an application would eliminate the problem of “stranded wind”, which is when a location has lots of wind but lacks access to the electricity transmission infrastructure.

If farmers could utilize wind energy to produce ammonia, they could make their own fertilizer as well as fuel and get relief from price spikes and uncertainties in the commodities market. Of course, they would also make use of the electricity they generate on site.

Most ammonia is produced using a proven technology called the Haber-Bosch process. Ammonia contains only nitrogen and hydrogen, both of which can be extracted from the air. The trick is how to do it efficiently using renewable electricity. The Department of Energy has a program called the REFUEL Initiative, which aims at deploying renewable energy to produce ammonia. The University of Minnesota, among other places, has multiple programs dedicated to green ammonia technology.

There is encouraging progress being made that may ultimately result in a common sight of wind turbines on farms producing fertilizer, fuel, and electricity.

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The Renewable Energy Cows Come Home, Now With Green Ammonia

Photo, posted July 15, 2009, courtesy of Daniel_Bauer via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The United States And Ticks | Earth Wise

July 21, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Tiny ticks are a big problem. Measuring only three to five millimeters in size, ticks are widely distributed around the world. They are external parasites, feasting on the blood of birds, reptiles, amphibians, and mammals – including humans.

According to estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ticks infect more than 300,000 people with Lyme disease in the United States every year, and the numbers continue to rise. Other common tick-borne diseases include anaplasmosis, babesiosis, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and powassan encephalitis.

But while the prevalence of tick-borne illnesses has steadily increased in the United States over the past two decades, a new study on tick surveillance and control “has revealed an inconsistent and often under-supported patchwork of programs across the country.”

The study, by university researchers at the CDC’s five Vector-Borne Disease Regional Centers of Excellence, is the first-ever examination of tick management programs in the United States. The researchers found clear gaps in our public health infrastructure.

According to the study, which was recently published in the Journal of Medical Entomology, less than 50% of public health and vector-control agencies conduct tick surveillance. Only 25% test ticks for disease-causing germs. And only 12% conduct or support tick-control efforts. Researchers also discovered that the capacity for public tick-control efforts is low, as is the capacity for information and data sharing between agencies on ticks.

The findings highlight the degree to which tick surveillance and control is lagging in the United States. According to the research team, greater support for tick-management programs is critical, and they hope their findings will serve as a baseline from which to measure future improvements.

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Tick surveillance and control lagging in US

Photo, posted May 4, 2009, courtesy of Jerry Kirkhart via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Renewables Could Take Over By 2035 | Earth Wise

July 15, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

A study by UC Berkeley looked at the prospects for renewable energy sources to become the primary source of energy in the United States over the next 15 years. Even though fossil fuels continue to fill that role at present, the plummeting costs of alternative energy sources – primarily solar and wind power – are making them increasingly attractive on the competitive market.

These cost reductions have occurred much faster than what was anticipated even just a few years ago. According to the study, it is technically and economically feasible for renewable sources to provide 90% of our electricity by 2035.

The Berkeley researchers took the available data on renewable energy and created two scenarios for the next 15 years. The first has energy policy remaining as it is now, without ambitious policy changes that encourage the growth of renewable energy. In that scenario, they estimated that 55% of the US energy infrastructure would come from renewables. That amount will not produce the change needed to meet Paris Climate Agreement goals but would simply come about because of the dramatically lower costs for renewable energy.

The second scenario includes state and federal governments leading the way to finance and facilitate the energy reform needed for a greener 2035. It also relies on the large-scale use of grid-scale batteries to store the energy collected from solar and wind installations for when it is needed.

Which scenario is more realistic will depend on several major influential factors, notably the trajectory and consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the results of the November elections. These things will have a huge impact on the future of our energy system.

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Report: By 2035, 90 Percent of the US Could Be Powered by Renewables

Photo, posted May 25, 2019, courtesy of Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

More Dam Failures Likely | Earth Wise

June 24, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Two dams in Central Michigan were breached by rain-swollen floodwaters in May and forced the evacuation of tens of thousands of residents and prompted officials to warn of life-threatening danger from a flooded chemical complex and a toxic waste cleanup site. Engineers say that most dams in the U.S. were designed many decades ago – in some cases, a century ago – and are not suited to a warming world with ever stronger storms.

The dams in Michigan gave way for the same reason behind most dam failures: they were overwhelmed by water, in this case by five inches of rain falling over two days after earlier storms had saturated the ground and swollen rivers.

It can’t be proven whether this specific set of events was triggered by climate change, but global warming is definitely causing some regions to become wetter and is increasing the frequency of extreme storms. And these trends are expected to continue as the world continues to warm.

All of this puts more of the 91,500 dams in the U.S. at greater risk of failing. The American Society of Civil Engineers, in its latest report card on infrastructure issued in 2017, gave the nation’s dams a “D” grade.

Historically, dams have been designed based on past weather history to predict the magnitude of the maximum potential flood that a dam would have to withstand. There was no expectation that future weather patterns might be very different. Infrastructure designers will clearly need to change their practices.

For existing dams, operational changes might be called for, such as reducing water levels in anticipation of more extreme storms. Upgrades might include changing spillway designs to accommodate larger water volumes over a longer time period.

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‘Expect More’: Climate Change Raises Risk of Dam Failures

Photo courtesy of Eye in the Sky/Youtube.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Recycling Coal Plants | Earth Wise

April 27, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Over 300 coal-fired power plants in the US have stopping burning coal over the past decade. Only about 224 plants still produce power by burning coal. As a result, a new sort of recycling industry is taking shape: repurposing of coal plants.

Across the country, utilities are finding ways to redevelop these facilities. Some are industrial in nature and others a far cry from their original purpose.

In January, Beloit College in Wisconsin opened a student union and recreation center in what used to be an Alliant Energy coal-fired power plant. On the southern coast of Massachusetts, a shuttered 1,600 MW coal plant is being demolished to make way for a logistical port and support center for a planned wind farm 35 miles off shore.

In Independence, Missouri, the city is considering competing plans to recycle the Blue Valley Power plant. It may become a 50 MW battery storage facility, or possibly a biofuel plant.

Another popular reuse strategy is data centers. Data centers use tremendous amounts of power and therefore can make use of the former coal plants’ capacity to handle large amounts of electricity.

Retired coal-fired plants have built-in infrastructure and components that can be repurposed for new industry. The plants typically have access to rail, ports and waterways, as well as proximity to good highway transportation. The electrical grids to which they are connected can be reused for solar or wind farms at the site.

Given that coal plants are continuing to close, the potential to redevelop them in various ways continues to grow as well. There is a surge in interest in coal plant redevelopment because these facilities are assets of value.

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Coal-fired power plants finding new uses as data centers, clean energy hubs

Photo, posted January 10, 2017, courtesy of Rusty Clark via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Record Low Ice In The Bering Sea | Earth Wise

January 30, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The Bering Sea is the area of the far northern Pacific Ocean that separates Alaska from Russia. Sea ice in the Bering Sea shrank to its lowest levels in recorded history in 2018, an event with profound effects on northwest Alaska residents who depend on marine resources for food, cash, and culture.

The loss of ice is indicative of very rapid change in the entire northern Bering Sea ecosystem with ramifications for everyone in the region. A new peer-reviewed study published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society examined the details and consequences of the drastic changes in the Bering Sea.

The study found that the maximum daily Bering Sea ice was the lowest on record, and the widespread impacts of that fact include unprecedented weather effects, marine wildlife die-offs, and sightings of animals outside of their normal range. Ecological changes included the first documented mass strandings of ice-associated seals, a redistribution of thermally sensitive fish, and a multispecies die-off of seabirds due to starvation.

Persistent and anomalous warm winter weather contributed to poor ice conditions that resulted in a fatal accident on an ice road and retreating and fractured sea ice led to ice-laden flooding that caused power outages and infrastructure damage. In addition, there have been more than 50 reports of unusual events related to weather and marine wildlife.

The record-low sea ice is a consequence of the warming climate resulting in a warmer ocean, later arrival of sea ice, and more frequent storms than in the pre-industrial era. These conditions are continuing to increase in occurrence.

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Record low level of Bering Sea ice causes profound, widespread impacts

Photo, posted April 7, 2014, courtesy of Allen Smith via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Excluding Climate Change From Infrastructure Planning | Earth Wise

January 14, 2020 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

According to a new Trump administration proposal, federal agencies would no longer need to take climate change into account when evaluating infrastructure projects. The proposed changes to the 50-year-old National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) are aimed at speeding up approvals for highway construction, pipelines, oil and gas leases, and other major infrastructure projects.

Under NEPA, federal agencies are required to consider how their proposed actions would affect everything from water quality to wildlife to greenhouse gas emissions. They’re also required to understand how rising seas and other consequences of climate change might affect a given project. These requirements have proven to be an obstacle to projects like the Keystone XL pipeline, for example.

According to reporting in the New York Times, the administration also plans to narrow the range of projects that require environmental review in the first place. That could make it more likely for projects to be approved without having to disclose plans to do things like cut down trees, discharge waste, or increase air pollution.

The administration says that the changes would improve the environmental review and permitting process while ensuring a safe, healthy, and productive environment. Environmentalists say the proposed changes would weaken critical safeguards for air, water, and wildlife.

The proposed changes to NEPA would revise the rules that guide the implementation of the law, as opposed to amending the act itself. Once these proposed changes appear in the federal register, the public will have 60 days to comment on them.

A decision on whether or not to weaken the nation’s benchmark environmental law is expected before November.

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Trump Rule Would Exclude Climate Change in Infrastructure Planning

Photo, posted February 23, 2016, courtesy of Lissy Wild via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Which Cities To Save From The Changing Climate

October 28, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

After several years of brutal flooding and hurricanes in the U.S., a distressing debate is emerging: if there is not enough money available to protect every coastal community from the effects of global warming, how do we decide which ones to save first.

Recent research looked at the costs involved in providing basic storm-surge protection in the form of sea walls for all coastal cities with more than 25,000 residents. That number was $42 billion. Expanding the list to include communities smaller than 25,000 people would increase that cost to more than $400 billion. Realistically, that is just not going to happen.

This particular study only looked at sea walls and no other methods for minimizing flood risk, such as moving homes and businesses away from the most flood-prone areas. It also didn’t look at additional and costlier actions that will be required even with sea walls, such as revamping sewers, storm water, and drinking water infrastructure.

The facts are that many cities, especially small ones, will not be able to meet the costs facing them. Those that can’t will depend on federal funding. But even optimistically large proposals for federal infrastructure spending are likely to fall far short of the vast need. Ultimately, the money will end up being spent where it can do the most good – even if it means that some places are left out.

But what criteria will be used to direct the money? Economic value? Historic significance? Population? Political influence?

This is a looming and massive issue whose chief obstacle may be that many officials refuse to acknowledge that it is happening. This is the next wave of climate denial – denying the costs that we are all facing.

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With More Storms and Rising Seas, Which U.S. Cities Should Be Saved First?

Photo, posted October 31, 2018, courtesy of Patrick Kinney via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The Cost Of Rising Seas

October 1, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Coastal cities in the United States are grappling with the need for extensive infrastructure projects to protect against rising seas and worsening storms. The cost of these projects will be enormous, and it is unclear how to pay to them.

Boston has many neighborhoods in low-lying areas, and it is estimated that $2.4 billion will be needed to protect the city from flooding. The city abandoned plans to build a harbor barrier that would have cost $6 to $12 billion because it was economically unfeasible.

Charleston, South Caroline needs $2 billion to reduce flooding that occurs regularly during high tides. The Houston, Texas area needs $30 billion to provide protection against a 100-year flood. Hurricane Harvey caused $125 billion in damages in Texas in 2017. New York City is considering a $10 billion storm surge barrier and floodgates to shield parts of the city from rising waters.

Florida faces the greatest exposure to flooding with an estimated $76 billion in costs to address some of its problems.

At the federal level, multiple agencies represent potential funding sources, but none offer the kind of money required to address the need. This places a heavy burden on state and local governments. Various states have passed legislation related to shoreline resiliency and flood abatement, but relatively little funding has been approved. Some bond measures have passed, but the totals are small compared with what is needed.

Educating people about the costs of not doing anything or not doing enough soon enough is essential. As Hurricane Katrina demonstrated, not spending a large amount of money on resilience can result in having to spend a colossal amount of money on recovery.

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Who Will Pay for the Huge Costs of Holding Back Rising Seas?

Photo, posted December 26, 2013, courtesy of Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Meeting Climate Goals With Current Energy Infrastructure

September 2, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The Paris Climate Agreement set forth a goal to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius as well as a more optimistic (and preferable) goal of keeping the temperature rise to less than 1.5 degrees. Reaching either of these goals requires getting to net-zero emissions by the middle of the century.

A new paper, published in Nature, looks at the issue of whether existing power plants and other fossil-fuel-burning equipment (including vehicles) can continue to operate until they age out of functionality, or whether they need to be retired early.

The results of the study are that future emissions from existing facilities would take up the entire carbon budget needed to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius and almost 2/3 of the budget needed to keep warming below 2 degrees over the next 30 years.

So, the good news is that we can still avoid a 2-degree rise without having to shut down all the existing power plants early. But we would definitely have to stop building new things with smokestacks and tailpipes that dump CO₂ into the atmosphere.

That good news is tempered by the fact that the number of fossil fuel-burning power plants and vehicles in the world has increased dramatically over the past decade, spurred by rapid economic and industrial development in China and India. In fact, China is predicted to produce more than 40% of all the carbon emissions over the next 30 years.

The 2-degree climate goal is not at all the most desirable result. The 1.5-degree target would be far better for the climate. But if the world is to achieve it, there will be dramatic changes needed in the existing infrastructure – either shutting it down or retrofitting it to drastically reduce emissions.

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Two-Degree Climate Goal Attainable Without Early Infrastructure Retirement

Photo, posted March 5, 2010, courtesy of Tennessee Valley Authority via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Concerns About Dam Safety

August 22, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The United States has a total of 91,000 dams of various sizes and types. Many of them are aging and sorely in need of repairs. All that maintenance would add up to tens of billions of dollars. Experts are increasingly worried that as extreme precipitation events become increasingly common, dams are increasingly at risk of failure, threatening lives and posing environmental risks.

In 2017, Oroville Dam in California – the tallest dam in the country – nearly collapsed. That incident forced the evacuation of 190,000 people and cost the state of California $1.1 billion in repairs. California is considered one of the nation’s leading states in dam safety management and yet the partial disintegration of Oroville’s two spillways during a heavy rainstorm was not anticipated.

So far, federal and state dam safety officials have not been able to get disinterested state legislatures and the U.S. Congress to fork up the money needed for repairs to the nation’s aging dam infrastructure.

Th American Society of Civil Engineers gave the nation’s dams a D grade on the latest infrastructure report card. They estimate that the cost of rehabilitating dams whose failure would threaten human life at nearly $45 billion, and the cost of fixing all dams in need of repair at more than $64 billion.

Scientists say the likelihood of dam failures – which not only threaten lives but also release toxic sediments trapped in reservoirs behind many dams – will increase as extreme precipitation events become more frequent in a warming world. Apart from about 1,500 dams owned by federal agencies, regulating dam safety is primarily the responsibility of the states. So far, states have not applied remotely sufficient resources to a growing problem.

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In an Era of Extreme Weather, Concerns Grow Over Dam Safety

Photo, posted August 20, 2014, courtesy of Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Antibiotics In The Environment

June 6, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Antibiotics make their way into the environment in many ways. Sources of antibiotic pollution include the waste from large-scale animal farms and the wastewater from hospitals, municipalities, and antibiotic manufacturing.

A new study has discovered concentrations of antibiotics in some of the world’s rivers exceed safe levels by up to 300 times. In the project, researchers looked for 14 commonly used antibiotics in rivers in 72 countries across six continents. They found antibiotics at 65% of all the sites they examined.

The antibiotic ciproflaxacin was the compound that most frequently exceeded safe levels, surpassing that threshold in 51 places. The antibiotic metronidazole exceeded safe levels by the biggest margin. Concentrations of this antibiotic at one site in Bangladesh was 300 times greater than the safe level. The most prevalent antibiotic was trimethoprim. It was detected at 307 of the 711 sites.

Some of the world’s most iconic rivers were sampled as a part of this study, including the Danube, Mekong, Seine, Thames, Tiber and Tigris.

The project, which was led by the University of York, found that high-risk sites were often located near wastewater treatment systems, waste or sewage dumps, and in some areas of political unrest.

Safe levels for antibiotics, which were recently established by the AMR Industry Alliance, range from 20,000 to 32,000 nanograms per liter depending on the compound.

According to the research team, solutions to the problem of antibiotic contamination should include infrastructure investment, tighter regulation, and the remediation of already contaminated sites.

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Antibiotics found in some of the world’s rivers exceed ‘safe’ levels, global study finds

Photo, posted October 7, 2013, courtesy of Nicola via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Support For A Green New Deal

January 23, 2019 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Shortly after the November election, activists held a sit-in at Nancy Pelosi’s office calling for a Green New Deal – a plan to transform the U.S. energy economy in order to mitigate the effects of climate change as well as address various issues of economic justice. While a number of Congress people have pledged to back the creation of a select committee to develop such a plan, it remains a political football and it remains to be seen whether anything will come of the idea.

There appears to be much less reticence on the part of voters, at least according to a survey conducted by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication at the end of November. The survey gave a brief explanation of the Green New Deal and asked respondents “How much do you support or oppose this idea?”

The result was that 81% of registered voters either “strongly” or “somewhat” supported it. Support was stronger among Democrats at 92%, but a majority of Republicans were also in favor. Some 57% of self-identified conservative Republicans even thought it was a good idea.

The Green New Deal would accelerate the transition from fossil fuels to clean, renewable energy. The goal would be to generate 100% of the nation’s electricity from renewable sources within the next 10 years; upgrade the nation’s energy grid, buildings, and transportation infrastructure; increase energy efficiency; invest in green technology research and development; and provide training for jobs in the new green economy.

Even though most Americans have strong support for the ideas of the Green New Deal, it is quite uncertain whether such an initiative could become a reality, given that very influential special interest groups – notably the fossil fuel industry – will be fighting it tooth and nail.

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