Addressing environment ministers from all state governments, the Indian prime minister acknowledged the need for India to follow a sustainable growth strategy.
India,currently the world’s number four polluter, must invest in its own environmentally friendly technologies as a means to fight climate change, said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Tuesday. According to Reuters, the prime minister’s comment can be seen as an attempt to undercut demands by rich nations for India to do more to curb greenhouse gas emissions. The Indian government has resisted committing to emissions targets, saying it will take its own unilateral action to cut pollution. Singh’s statement also signaled that India was willing to invest money in the development of clean technologies in addition to what the country might get from rich countries. "Our growth strategy can be different. It must be different," the prime minister told a national conference on environment and forests in New Delhi, referring to decades of Western industrialization that is blamed for climate change. He said India's energy consumption will rise sharply in the coming decades as it tries to lift its population out of poverty, but stressed a different development path must be taken. "For this we need access to new technologies that are already available with developed countries. We must also make our own investments in new environment-friendly technologies," he said. Addressing environment ministers from all states, Singh acknowledged that the ''multiple environmental crises that confront our country have created an alarming situation'', and he asked state governments to curtail pollution, clean rivers and fight climate change. Describing climate change as a "major global challenge", he said India was conscious of its "responsibility to present and future generations" and would ensure the "ecological sustainabality of its development path
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Lead Poisoning Stokes Tensions in Chinese Town
Farmer Wang Zhifan jabs a stubby finger toward the sprawling smelter blamed for poisoning hundreds of local children with lead. He bares his yellowed teeth and spits hard.
''That thing is like a nuclear bomb for us,'' the 61-year-old says in a voice that seems to carry down the steep slope and into the corn fields that run to the smelter's fence. ''There's just no saving us.''
Local anger boiled over this week with a violent protest at the plant in central Shaanxi province, and tensions remain high in a dispute that demonstrates how environmental degradation caused during the charge for economic growth in China is spawning social unrest.
For decades, many Chinese firms have dumped poisons into rivers and the ground rather than disposing of them safely, counting on the acquiescence of local governments unwilling to damage their economic lifelines.
The resulting problems -- from crop losses to cancer -- have sometimes prompted violence, but they've also brought a rise in public awareness of environmental safety and health. Since the unrest, the government has promised to close down the Dangling Lead and Zinc Smelting Co. plant in Changqing town until it can be made safe.
That offers at least a temporary victory for the villagers, whose outrage came to a head after some 615 of 731 children in two villages near the plant tested positive earlier this month for lead poisoning. Some had lead levels 10 times that which China considers safe.
On Sunday and Monday, angry residents battled police at the smelter's gates, and stoned trucks delivering coal to the plant.
For now, the plant is closed and security is tight. Associated Press reporters who visited the area on Wednesday were tailed by local government officials, and police officers tried to break up interviews and block access to sick children and their parents.
An apology Monday from Dai Zhengshe, the mayor of Baoji city, which oversees Changqing, seems to have done little to cool villagers' anger. Dai made the promise not to reopen the smelter until it met health standards, according to the official Xinhua News Agency, but villagers said they put little faith in his words.
''You really can't trust what the government tells you,'' said He Xiaojun, the father of nine-year-old He Haomin, who suffers from nose bleeds and memory problems -- common symptoms of lead poisoning. ''We want them to move the plant,'' said He, whose village of Madaokou lies a stone's throw away.
Public distrust has been exacerbated over the years by unmet promises and a lack of government transparency.
Villagers living nearby were supposed to have been given new accommodation even before the smelter opened in 2006, but so far just a few dozen have relocated. Authorities promised to shut the plant on Aug. 6, but villagers -- such as Wang, the farmer who likened the plant to a nuclear bomb -- insist production continued for days afterward, with smoke coming from the stacks at night.
Officials say that was only to allow time for furnaces to close down without gas explosions. Plans, meanwhile, call for the relocation of all villagers living within 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) of the smelter ''as soon as possible,'' local government spokesman Wang Minmin told The AP.
Official claims that the plant met national standards for ground and surface water, and soil and waste discharge also prompted derision and disbelief from residents, who question how then their children came to have such high lead levels in their blood.
Ma Jun, founder of the non-governmental Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs in Beijing, says that's likely due to outdated standards that don't take into account the cumulative effect of lead and other heavy metals on people and the environment.
''Therefore, even if a given factory had met all the standards on emissions, there would still likely be damage to human health,'' Ma said.
Lead poisoning can damage the nervous and reproductive systems and cause high blood pressure, anemia and memory loss. It is especially harmful to young children, pregnant women and fetuses, with damage that is usually irreversible, according to the World Health Organization.
On Wednesday at the local Fengxiang County Hospital, about 80 children had been admitted for observation and treatment. They lay on beds, many of them on IV drips, with their parents hovering nearby.
Zha Xiaofang, 41, from Madaokou village, said her 8-year-old daughter has lead levels considered mid- to high-level poisoning. Her daughter has had abdominal pain and memory problems for some time.
''We are anxious because we don't know what will happen next and we don't have any guarantees for the future,'' she said.
Changqing, about 850 miles (1,380 kilometers) west of Beijing, is just one of scores of places in China where pollution and chemical contamination have sparked opposition and protests, embarrassing the ruling Communist Party and its pledges to pursue clean and sustainable development.
In Wenping township in central Hunan province, angry villagers blocked roads on July 30 after the government refused to close down a manganese processing plant. But last Thursday, the local government announced that it was shutting down the factory because it was operating illegally and had discharged lead excessively. As in Changqing, local officials offered free lead testing for all children under the age of 14 within three miles (five kilometers) of the factory.
Plans for chemical plants and garbage incinerators in urban areas have also drawn protests including marches and petitions -- rare in a country where even peaceful dissenters are often punished.
Yet dubious projects continue to receive approval, due in large part to their contribution to local tax bases and employment. According to 2008 media reports, Changqing's Dongling smelter accounted for 17 percent of the county government's revenue and supported more than 2,000 households.
A government stimulus plan is also expediting projects, sometimes shortening their environmental approval times, while a tough government opponent of polluters, vice director of State Environmental Protection Agency, Pan Yue, has recently been sidelined for reasons that are unclear.
Given the lack of trust, greater transparency about major polluting projects was perhaps the only way to head-off future conflicts, said Hu Yuanqiong, a staff attorney with the U.S. Natural Resources Defense Council's China Program.
''The best way to ensure social stability and the sustainability of the economy is to make information open and allow public participation in monitoring emissions and to have a mechanism between the public and the factories to talk things out and resolve disputes,'' Hu said.
''That thing is like a nuclear bomb for us,'' the 61-year-old says in a voice that seems to carry down the steep slope and into the corn fields that run to the smelter's fence. ''There's just no saving us.''
Local anger boiled over this week with a violent protest at the plant in central Shaanxi province, and tensions remain high in a dispute that demonstrates how environmental degradation caused during the charge for economic growth in China is spawning social unrest.
For decades, many Chinese firms have dumped poisons into rivers and the ground rather than disposing of them safely, counting on the acquiescence of local governments unwilling to damage their economic lifelines.
The resulting problems -- from crop losses to cancer -- have sometimes prompted violence, but they've also brought a rise in public awareness of environmental safety and health. Since the unrest, the government has promised to close down the Dangling Lead and Zinc Smelting Co. plant in Changqing town until it can be made safe.
That offers at least a temporary victory for the villagers, whose outrage came to a head after some 615 of 731 children in two villages near the plant tested positive earlier this month for lead poisoning. Some had lead levels 10 times that which China considers safe.
On Sunday and Monday, angry residents battled police at the smelter's gates, and stoned trucks delivering coal to the plant.
For now, the plant is closed and security is tight. Associated Press reporters who visited the area on Wednesday were tailed by local government officials, and police officers tried to break up interviews and block access to sick children and their parents.
An apology Monday from Dai Zhengshe, the mayor of Baoji city, which oversees Changqing, seems to have done little to cool villagers' anger. Dai made the promise not to reopen the smelter until it met health standards, according to the official Xinhua News Agency, but villagers said they put little faith in his words.
''You really can't trust what the government tells you,'' said He Xiaojun, the father of nine-year-old He Haomin, who suffers from nose bleeds and memory problems -- common symptoms of lead poisoning. ''We want them to move the plant,'' said He, whose village of Madaokou lies a stone's throw away.
Public distrust has been exacerbated over the years by unmet promises and a lack of government transparency.
Villagers living nearby were supposed to have been given new accommodation even before the smelter opened in 2006, but so far just a few dozen have relocated. Authorities promised to shut the plant on Aug. 6, but villagers -- such as Wang, the farmer who likened the plant to a nuclear bomb -- insist production continued for days afterward, with smoke coming from the stacks at night.
Officials say that was only to allow time for furnaces to close down without gas explosions. Plans, meanwhile, call for the relocation of all villagers living within 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) of the smelter ''as soon as possible,'' local government spokesman Wang Minmin told The AP.
Official claims that the plant met national standards for ground and surface water, and soil and waste discharge also prompted derision and disbelief from residents, who question how then their children came to have such high lead levels in their blood.
Ma Jun, founder of the non-governmental Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs in Beijing, says that's likely due to outdated standards that don't take into account the cumulative effect of lead and other heavy metals on people and the environment.
''Therefore, even if a given factory had met all the standards on emissions, there would still likely be damage to human health,'' Ma said.
Lead poisoning can damage the nervous and reproductive systems and cause high blood pressure, anemia and memory loss. It is especially harmful to young children, pregnant women and fetuses, with damage that is usually irreversible, according to the World Health Organization.
On Wednesday at the local Fengxiang County Hospital, about 80 children had been admitted for observation and treatment. They lay on beds, many of them on IV drips, with their parents hovering nearby.
Zha Xiaofang, 41, from Madaokou village, said her 8-year-old daughter has lead levels considered mid- to high-level poisoning. Her daughter has had abdominal pain and memory problems for some time.
''We are anxious because we don't know what will happen next and we don't have any guarantees for the future,'' she said.
Changqing, about 850 miles (1,380 kilometers) west of Beijing, is just one of scores of places in China where pollution and chemical contamination have sparked opposition and protests, embarrassing the ruling Communist Party and its pledges to pursue clean and sustainable development.
In Wenping township in central Hunan province, angry villagers blocked roads on July 30 after the government refused to close down a manganese processing plant. But last Thursday, the local government announced that it was shutting down the factory because it was operating illegally and had discharged lead excessively. As in Changqing, local officials offered free lead testing for all children under the age of 14 within three miles (five kilometers) of the factory.
Plans for chemical plants and garbage incinerators in urban areas have also drawn protests including marches and petitions -- rare in a country where even peaceful dissenters are often punished.
Yet dubious projects continue to receive approval, due in large part to their contribution to local tax bases and employment. According to 2008 media reports, Changqing's Dongling smelter accounted for 17 percent of the county government's revenue and supported more than 2,000 households.
A government stimulus plan is also expediting projects, sometimes shortening their environmental approval times, while a tough government opponent of polluters, vice director of State Environmental Protection Agency, Pan Yue, has recently been sidelined for reasons that are unclear.
Given the lack of trust, greater transparency about major polluting projects was perhaps the only way to head-off future conflicts, said Hu Yuanqiong, a staff attorney with the U.S. Natural Resources Defense Council's China Program.
''The best way to ensure social stability and the sustainability of the economy is to make information open and allow public participation in monitoring emissions and to have a mechanism between the public and the factories to talk things out and resolve disputes,'' Hu said.
How the World Bank Let 'Deal Making' Torch the Rainforests
The World Bank ignored its own environmental and social protection standards when it approved nearly $200 million in loan guarantees for palm oil production in Indonesia, a stinging internal audit has found.The report, detailing five years of funding from the International Finance Corp. (IFC), the private-sector arm of the World Bank, lambastes the agency for allowing commercial pressures to influence four separate loans aimed at developing the industry.
"The IFC was aware for more than 20 years that there were significant environmental and social issues and risks inherent in the oil palm sector in Indonesia," auditors wrote. "Despite awareness of the significant issues facing it, IFC did not develop a strategy for engaging in the oil palm sector. In the absence of a tailored strategy, deal making prevailed."
The report (pdf) from the office of the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman comes as Indonesia prepares to enter the carbon markets by protecting its tropical forests. Working in partnership with Australia, the Indonesian government currently is working to design a national carbon accounting system. Australia is building a satellite to monitor deforestation in the Southeast Asian country, according to new U.N. submissions.
Indonesia is home to the world's second-largest reserves of natural forests and peat swamps, which naturally trap carbon dioxide -- the main greenhouse gas that causes climate change. But rampant destruction of the forests to make way for palm oil plantations has caused giant releases of CO2 into the atmosphere, making Indonesia the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases on the planet.
The audit does not address climate change or how lending for palm oil -- an ingredient in foods and a biofuel added to diesel for cars -- fits into the World Bank's new "strategic framework" for development and climate change. It also does not examine any of the specific charges or environmental accusations lodged against the firm to which the World Bank loaned money.
Rather, the report confines itself to whether the IFC abided by its own standards. On that front, the multilateral bank came up short.
IFC saw burning the trees as having 'no impact'
Specifically, auditors said, when loaning to Wilmar International Ltd. and other firms between 2003 and 2008, the IFC did not check out concerns about the companies' supply chain plantations. The Forest Peoples Programme, a U.K.-based nonprofit group that originally brought the complaint, charged that the companies illegally used fire to clear forestland, cleared primary forests, and seized lands belonging to indigenous people without due process.
The IFC, auditors noted, labeled the initial loan as a "category C" -- a listing signifying that a project has little or no adverse environmental or social impacts, and which is typically given to financial intermediaries. But by failing to examine the subsidiaries that source the raw materials, IFC ignored issues like the absence of publicly available environmental impact assessments for the subsidiary companies.
"For each investment, commercial pressures were allowed to prevail," auditors wrote. "Commercial pressures dominated."
In a written response to auditors, the IFC acknowledged shortcomings in the review process. But the lender also defended investment in palm oil production as a way to alleviate poverty in Indonesia.
"IFC believes that production of palm oil, when carried out in an environmentally and socially sustainable fashion, can provide core support for a strong rural economy, providing employment and improved quality of life for millions of the rural poor in tropical areas," it said.
Hunting for a 'sustainable' strategy
The agency vowed to develop a new strategy to guide its future palm oil investments, to be completed in about three months, and to put "renewed emphasis" on assessing a company's supply chain before lending.
Marcus Colchester, director of the Forest Peoples Programme, called that response "inadequate."
In a letter to World Bank President Robert Zoellick and the board, Colchester and leaders of other nonprofit groups called on the World Bank to freeze palm oil lending, charging that IFC suffers a "systemic problem whereby the pressure to lend and to support business interests overcomes prudence, due diligence and concern for social and environmental outcomes."
They noted that the management response included no actions to address the problem of climate change being exacerbated by planting on peatlands and burning forests, and advised no discipline for staff that failed to comply with standards.
Barbara Bramble, a senior program adviser for international affairs at the National Wildlife Federation, said she believes the World Bank should help the Indonesian government at all levels change incentives for palm oil planting and refuse to invest in any company whose primary plantation is primary rainforest.
She, Colchester and even IMF officials widely agreed that there is in Indonesia an abundant amount of already degraded land that could be used for palm oil productuon. The challenge, Bramble said, is shifting national and local laws to encourage more sustainable production.
Meanwhile, the IFC indicated in a statement to E&E that the agency does not plan to give up palm oil investment anytime soon.
"IFC is aware of the environmental and social concerns associated with the palm oil sector in Indonesia. We also believe that the sector has considerable potential for job creation and economic growth," agency officials wrote. "We believe it is imperative to promote sustainable practices in the sector that will benefit the poor and preserve biodiversity."
"The IFC was aware for more than 20 years that there were significant environmental and social issues and risks inherent in the oil palm sector in Indonesia," auditors wrote. "Despite awareness of the significant issues facing it, IFC did not develop a strategy for engaging in the oil palm sector. In the absence of a tailored strategy, deal making prevailed."
The report (pdf) from the office of the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman comes as Indonesia prepares to enter the carbon markets by protecting its tropical forests. Working in partnership with Australia, the Indonesian government currently is working to design a national carbon accounting system. Australia is building a satellite to monitor deforestation in the Southeast Asian country, according to new U.N. submissions.
Indonesia is home to the world's second-largest reserves of natural forests and peat swamps, which naturally trap carbon dioxide -- the main greenhouse gas that causes climate change. But rampant destruction of the forests to make way for palm oil plantations has caused giant releases of CO2 into the atmosphere, making Indonesia the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases on the planet.
The audit does not address climate change or how lending for palm oil -- an ingredient in foods and a biofuel added to diesel for cars -- fits into the World Bank's new "strategic framework" for development and climate change. It also does not examine any of the specific charges or environmental accusations lodged against the firm to which the World Bank loaned money.
Rather, the report confines itself to whether the IFC abided by its own standards. On that front, the multilateral bank came up short.
IFC saw burning the trees as having 'no impact'
Specifically, auditors said, when loaning to Wilmar International Ltd. and other firms between 2003 and 2008, the IFC did not check out concerns about the companies' supply chain plantations. The Forest Peoples Programme, a U.K.-based nonprofit group that originally brought the complaint, charged that the companies illegally used fire to clear forestland, cleared primary forests, and seized lands belonging to indigenous people without due process.
The IFC, auditors noted, labeled the initial loan as a "category C" -- a listing signifying that a project has little or no adverse environmental or social impacts, and which is typically given to financial intermediaries. But by failing to examine the subsidiaries that source the raw materials, IFC ignored issues like the absence of publicly available environmental impact assessments for the subsidiary companies.
"For each investment, commercial pressures were allowed to prevail," auditors wrote. "Commercial pressures dominated."
In a written response to auditors, the IFC acknowledged shortcomings in the review process. But the lender also defended investment in palm oil production as a way to alleviate poverty in Indonesia.
"IFC believes that production of palm oil, when carried out in an environmentally and socially sustainable fashion, can provide core support for a strong rural economy, providing employment and improved quality of life for millions of the rural poor in tropical areas," it said.
Hunting for a 'sustainable' strategy
The agency vowed to develop a new strategy to guide its future palm oil investments, to be completed in about three months, and to put "renewed emphasis" on assessing a company's supply chain before lending.
Marcus Colchester, director of the Forest Peoples Programme, called that response "inadequate."
In a letter to World Bank President Robert Zoellick and the board, Colchester and leaders of other nonprofit groups called on the World Bank to freeze palm oil lending, charging that IFC suffers a "systemic problem whereby the pressure to lend and to support business interests overcomes prudence, due diligence and concern for social and environmental outcomes."
They noted that the management response included no actions to address the problem of climate change being exacerbated by planting on peatlands and burning forests, and advised no discipline for staff that failed to comply with standards.
Barbara Bramble, a senior program adviser for international affairs at the National Wildlife Federation, said she believes the World Bank should help the Indonesian government at all levels change incentives for palm oil planting and refuse to invest in any company whose primary plantation is primary rainforest.
She, Colchester and even IMF officials widely agreed that there is in Indonesia an abundant amount of already degraded land that could be used for palm oil productuon. The challenge, Bramble said, is shifting national and local laws to encourage more sustainable production.
Meanwhile, the IFC indicated in a statement to E&E that the agency does not plan to give up palm oil investment anytime soon.
"IFC is aware of the environmental and social concerns associated with the palm oil sector in Indonesia. We also believe that the sector has considerable potential for job creation and economic growth," agency officials wrote. "We believe it is imperative to promote sustainable practices in the sector that will benefit the poor and preserve biodiversity."
Firm raises eyebrows with suggestion for nuclear powered mines
A mining exploration company figures small nuclear reactors for electric-power generating stations would be ideal for remote operations such as its project in the James Bay region of Quebec.
Western Troy Capital Resources Inc. says a team of advisors is now considering an array of reactor designs suitable for such use and it has initiated contact with the regulatory community.
The venture took root about a year ago when the company was looking at power options for its molybdenum and copper project at MacLeod Lake, CEO Rex Loesby said.
The property is located in boreal wilderness more than 500 kilometres north of Quebec City.
"When we looked at this (option), we said, 'Gee, why aren't people doing this in Canada?' It seems like an obvious thing to do," Loesby recalled.
Remote sites now rely heavily on fossil fuels and generators, he said. Western Troy would replace those power sources with reactors that could generate about five to 20 megawatts of power, Loesby said from his Toronto office.
"These little ones, even if you don't get the economies of scale (gained from building a 1,000 MW nuclear power plant), if something goes wrong, it doesn't wipe out half a city," said Loesby, adding that remote mining sites are not located near cities.
Environmental groups are not so enamoured with the idea.
The idea of nuclear reactors at mine sites "is mad," Jamie Kneen, MiningWatch Canada's communications and outreach co-ordinator, said. "I can't see how it is going to get through the regulatory process."
The notion is "suspect for a number of reasons" including issues surrounding disposal of radioactive waste, said Dale Marshall, climate policy analyst for the David Suzuki Foundation.
"A significant number of mining proponents are saying that climate change is already affecting their operations, specially infrastructure on mines," said Marshall.
"Probably the last thing we want to do is have a whole lot more nuclear reactors being impacted by those climatic events and potentially leading to accidents in those power facilities."
The idea of using nuclear reactors to power the extraction industry is not new, said Paul Stothart, the Mining Association of Canada's vice-president of economic affairs, said in an email.
"For example, there has been considerable discussion in the (Alberta) oilsands where reactors could be used to provide power and heat and hence significantly reduce the amount of fossil fuel used in the . . . production process," he wrote.
While it is "conceivable" that small nuclear reactors in remote regions would offer environmental advantages by reducing fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas emissions, "this technology would presumably raise questions regarding community acceptance, site location and permitting, management of waste . . . etc.," Stothart said.
Glenn Harvel, an associate professor of nuclear science at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology, is among the advisors working with Western Troy. While still in its preliminary stage, the project presents "an exciting opportunity for Canada," he said.
There are hurdles to overcome "but it is feasible," he added. A key challenge is "finding the right vendor and then getting everyone in the licensing process to agree that this is a worthwhile thing to do," Harvel said.
While potential vendors — all foreign — have said they could provide a suitable reactor for between $25 million to $75 million, no firm quotes have yet been sought.
Western Troy Capital Resources Inc. says a team of advisors is now considering an array of reactor designs suitable for such use and it has initiated contact with the regulatory community.
The venture took root about a year ago when the company was looking at power options for its molybdenum and copper project at MacLeod Lake, CEO Rex Loesby said.
The property is located in boreal wilderness more than 500 kilometres north of Quebec City.
"When we looked at this (option), we said, 'Gee, why aren't people doing this in Canada?' It seems like an obvious thing to do," Loesby recalled.
Remote sites now rely heavily on fossil fuels and generators, he said. Western Troy would replace those power sources with reactors that could generate about five to 20 megawatts of power, Loesby said from his Toronto office.
"These little ones, even if you don't get the economies of scale (gained from building a 1,000 MW nuclear power plant), if something goes wrong, it doesn't wipe out half a city," said Loesby, adding that remote mining sites are not located near cities.
Environmental groups are not so enamoured with the idea.
The idea of nuclear reactors at mine sites "is mad," Jamie Kneen, MiningWatch Canada's communications and outreach co-ordinator, said. "I can't see how it is going to get through the regulatory process."
The notion is "suspect for a number of reasons" including issues surrounding disposal of radioactive waste, said Dale Marshall, climate policy analyst for the David Suzuki Foundation.
"A significant number of mining proponents are saying that climate change is already affecting their operations, specially infrastructure on mines," said Marshall.
"Probably the last thing we want to do is have a whole lot more nuclear reactors being impacted by those climatic events and potentially leading to accidents in those power facilities."
The idea of using nuclear reactors to power the extraction industry is not new, said Paul Stothart, the Mining Association of Canada's vice-president of economic affairs, said in an email.
"For example, there has been considerable discussion in the (Alberta) oilsands where reactors could be used to provide power and heat and hence significantly reduce the amount of fossil fuel used in the . . . production process," he wrote.
While it is "conceivable" that small nuclear reactors in remote regions would offer environmental advantages by reducing fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas emissions, "this technology would presumably raise questions regarding community acceptance, site location and permitting, management of waste . . . etc.," Stothart said.
Glenn Harvel, an associate professor of nuclear science at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology, is among the advisors working with Western Troy. While still in its preliminary stage, the project presents "an exciting opportunity for Canada," he said.
There are hurdles to overcome "but it is feasible," he added. A key challenge is "finding the right vendor and then getting everyone in the licensing process to agree that this is a worthwhile thing to do," Harvel said.
While potential vendors — all foreign — have said they could provide a suitable reactor for between $25 million to $75 million, no firm quotes have yet been sought.
Oil Industry Backs Protests of Emissions Bill
Hard on the heels of the health care protests, another citizen movement seems to have sprung up, this one to oppose Washington’s attempts to tackle climate change. But behind the scenes, an industry with much at stake — Big Oil — is pulling the strings.Hundreds of people packed a downtown theater here on Tuesday for a lunchtime rally that was as much a celebration of oil’s traditional role in the Texas way of life as it was a political protest against Washington’s energy policies, which many here fear will raise energy prices.
“Something we hold dear is in danger, and that’s our future,” said Bill Bailey, a rodeo announcer and local celebrity, who was the master of ceremonies at the hourlong rally.
The event on Tuesday was organized by a group called Energy Citizens, which is backed by the American Petroleum Institute, the oil industry’s main trade group. Many of the people attending the demonstration were employees of oil companies who work in Houston and were bused from their workplaces.
This was the first of a series of about 20 rallies planned for Southern and oil-producing states to organize resistance to proposed legislation that would set a limit on emissions of heat-trapping gases, requiring many companies to buy emission permits. Participants described the system as an energy tax that would undermine the economy of Houston, the nation’s energy capital.
Mentions of the legislation, which narrowly passed the House in June, drew boos, but most of the rally was festive. A high school marching band played, hot dogs and hamburgers were served, a video featuring the country star Trace Adkins was shown, and hundreds of people wore yellow T-shirts with slogans like “Create American Jobs Don’t Export Them” and “I’ll Pass on $4 Gas.”
The buoyant atmosphere belied the billions of dollars at stake for the petroleum industry. Since the House passed the bill, oil executives have repeatedly complained that their industry would incur sharply higher costs, while federal subsidies would flow to coal-fired utilities and renewable energy programs.
“It’s just a sense of outrage and disappointment with the bill passed by the House,” said James T. Hackett, chief executive of Anadarko Petroleum, who attended the rally. He defended, as an environmental measure, the use of buses financed by oil companies and Energy Citizens to carry employees to the rally. “If we all drove in cars, it wouldn’t look good,” he said.
While polls show that a majority of Americans support efforts to tackle climate change, opposition to the climate bill from energy-intensive industries has become more vigorous in recent weeks. The Senate is expected to consider its own version of the bill at the end of September.
A public relations firm hired by a pro-coal industry group, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, recently sent at least 58 letters opposing new climate laws to members of Congress. An investigation by the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming found that a total of 13 letters sent by the firm, Bonner & Associates, were forgeries. The committee is currently investigating another 45 letters to determine whether they are fakes. The letters purported to be from groups like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and Hispanic organizations.
Bonner & Associates has acknowledged the forgeries, blaming them on a temporary employee who was subsequently fired. The coal coalition has apologized for the fake letters and said it was cooperating with an investigation of the matter by a Congressional committee.
For its part, the oil industry plans to raise the pressure in coming weeks through its public rallies so that it can negotiate more favorable terms in the Senate than it got in the House. The strategy was outlined by the American Petroleum Institute in a memorandum sent to its members, which include Exxon Mobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips. The memorandum, not meant for the public, was obtained by the environmental group Greenpeace last week.
“It’s a clear political hit campaign,” said Kert Davies, the research director at Greenpeace.
In the memorandum, the president and chief executive of the American Petroleum Institute, Jack N. Gerard, said that the aim of the rallies was to send a “loud message” to the Senate. He said the rallies should focus on higher energy costs and jobs. “It’s important that our views be heard,” Mr. Gerard wrote.
Cathy Landry, a spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute, confirmed the contents of the memorandum, but said that the rally was not strictly an institute event and that Energy Citizens included other organizations representing farm and other business interests.
The House bill seeks to reduce greenhouse gases in the United States by 83 percent by 2050 through a mechanism known as cap and trade, which would create carbon permits that could be bought and sold. President Obama initially wanted these permits to be entirely auctioned off, so that all industries would be on the same footing, but the sponsors of the bill agreed to hand out 85 percent of the permits free to ensure passage of the legislation.
The power sector, which accounts for about a third of the nation’s emissions, got 35.5 percent of the free allowances. Petroleum refiners, meanwhile, got 2.25 percent of these allowances, although the transportation sector accounts for about 40 percent of emissions. That means oil companies would have to buy many of their permits on the open market, and they contend that they would have to raise gasoline prices to do so.
But Daniel J. Weiss, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a research and advocacy organization, said that refiners would be allowed to keep the value of the free allowances they received, while public utilities would be required to return the value of their permits to customers.
“There is a myth out there that this is a giveaway to utilities,” Mr. Weiss said. “It’s not true. The oil industry’s goal is to block or weaken efforts to tackle global warming.”
The rallies have opened a rift within the industry. Royal Dutch Shell, an initial supporter of climate legislation, said that it had told the institute that it would not participate in the rallies, although its employees would be free to attend if they wanted to. ConocoPhillips, meanwhile, has opposed the bill since its passage and, in a note on its Web site, encouraged employees to attend the rallies.
Since Mr. Obama’s election, the oil industry has lost some clout in Washington. The rally on Tuesday gave voice to the feeling among employees of oil companies that their industry was being battered.
“I experienced Carter’s war against the industry, and I’m tired of being pushed around,” said David H. Leland, a geological map maker for NFR Energy. “We provide a product for a reasonable price, and we’re going to be punished for doing a damn good job.”
“Something we hold dear is in danger, and that’s our future,” said Bill Bailey, a rodeo announcer and local celebrity, who was the master of ceremonies at the hourlong rally.
The event on Tuesday was organized by a group called Energy Citizens, which is backed by the American Petroleum Institute, the oil industry’s main trade group. Many of the people attending the demonstration were employees of oil companies who work in Houston and were bused from their workplaces.
This was the first of a series of about 20 rallies planned for Southern and oil-producing states to organize resistance to proposed legislation that would set a limit on emissions of heat-trapping gases, requiring many companies to buy emission permits. Participants described the system as an energy tax that would undermine the economy of Houston, the nation’s energy capital.
Mentions of the legislation, which narrowly passed the House in June, drew boos, but most of the rally was festive. A high school marching band played, hot dogs and hamburgers were served, a video featuring the country star Trace Adkins was shown, and hundreds of people wore yellow T-shirts with slogans like “Create American Jobs Don’t Export Them” and “I’ll Pass on $4 Gas.”
The buoyant atmosphere belied the billions of dollars at stake for the petroleum industry. Since the House passed the bill, oil executives have repeatedly complained that their industry would incur sharply higher costs, while federal subsidies would flow to coal-fired utilities and renewable energy programs.
“It’s just a sense of outrage and disappointment with the bill passed by the House,” said James T. Hackett, chief executive of Anadarko Petroleum, who attended the rally. He defended, as an environmental measure, the use of buses financed by oil companies and Energy Citizens to carry employees to the rally. “If we all drove in cars, it wouldn’t look good,” he said.
While polls show that a majority of Americans support efforts to tackle climate change, opposition to the climate bill from energy-intensive industries has become more vigorous in recent weeks. The Senate is expected to consider its own version of the bill at the end of September.
A public relations firm hired by a pro-coal industry group, the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, recently sent at least 58 letters opposing new climate laws to members of Congress. An investigation by the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming found that a total of 13 letters sent by the firm, Bonner & Associates, were forgeries. The committee is currently investigating another 45 letters to determine whether they are fakes. The letters purported to be from groups like the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and Hispanic organizations.
Bonner & Associates has acknowledged the forgeries, blaming them on a temporary employee who was subsequently fired. The coal coalition has apologized for the fake letters and said it was cooperating with an investigation of the matter by a Congressional committee.
For its part, the oil industry plans to raise the pressure in coming weeks through its public rallies so that it can negotiate more favorable terms in the Senate than it got in the House. The strategy was outlined by the American Petroleum Institute in a memorandum sent to its members, which include Exxon Mobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips. The memorandum, not meant for the public, was obtained by the environmental group Greenpeace last week.
“It’s a clear political hit campaign,” said Kert Davies, the research director at Greenpeace.
In the memorandum, the president and chief executive of the American Petroleum Institute, Jack N. Gerard, said that the aim of the rallies was to send a “loud message” to the Senate. He said the rallies should focus on higher energy costs and jobs. “It’s important that our views be heard,” Mr. Gerard wrote.
Cathy Landry, a spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute, confirmed the contents of the memorandum, but said that the rally was not strictly an institute event and that Energy Citizens included other organizations representing farm and other business interests.
The House bill seeks to reduce greenhouse gases in the United States by 83 percent by 2050 through a mechanism known as cap and trade, which would create carbon permits that could be bought and sold. President Obama initially wanted these permits to be entirely auctioned off, so that all industries would be on the same footing, but the sponsors of the bill agreed to hand out 85 percent of the permits free to ensure passage of the legislation.
The power sector, which accounts for about a third of the nation’s emissions, got 35.5 percent of the free allowances. Petroleum refiners, meanwhile, got 2.25 percent of these allowances, although the transportation sector accounts for about 40 percent of emissions. That means oil companies would have to buy many of their permits on the open market, and they contend that they would have to raise gasoline prices to do so.
But Daniel J. Weiss, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a research and advocacy organization, said that refiners would be allowed to keep the value of the free allowances they received, while public utilities would be required to return the value of their permits to customers.
“There is a myth out there that this is a giveaway to utilities,” Mr. Weiss said. “It’s not true. The oil industry’s goal is to block or weaken efforts to tackle global warming.”
The rallies have opened a rift within the industry. Royal Dutch Shell, an initial supporter of climate legislation, said that it had told the institute that it would not participate in the rallies, although its employees would be free to attend if they wanted to. ConocoPhillips, meanwhile, has opposed the bill since its passage and, in a note on its Web site, encouraged employees to attend the rallies.
Since Mr. Obama’s election, the oil industry has lost some clout in Washington. The rally on Tuesday gave voice to the feeling among employees of oil companies that their industry was being battered.
“I experienced Carter’s war against the industry, and I’m tired of being pushed around,” said David H. Leland, a geological map maker for NFR Energy. “We provide a product for a reasonable price, and we’re going to be punished for doing a damn good job.”
An Underwater Fight Is Waged for the Health of San Francisco Bay
Chela Zabin will not soon forget when she first glimpsed the golden brown tentacle of the latest alien to settle in the fertile waters of San Francisco Bay.
Heidi Schumann for The New York Times
The broad-leaf kelp is used in miso soup.
“I had that moment of ‘Oh God, this is it, it’s here,’ ” said Dr. Zabin, a biologist with the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. “I was really hoping I was wrong.”
The tentacle in question was that of an Asian kelp, Undaria pinnatifida, a flavorful and healthful ingredient in miso soup and an aggressive, costly intruder in waters from New Zealand to Monterey Bay.
The kelp, known as wakame (pronounced wa-KA-me), is on a list of “100 of the World’s Worst Invasive Alien Species,” compiled by the Invasive Species Specialist Group. Since her discovery in May, Dr. Zabin and colleagues have pulled up nearly 140 pounds of kelp attached to pilings and boats in the San Francisco Marina alone.
Every year the damage wrought by aquatic invaders in the United States and the cost of controlling them is estimated at $9 billion, according to a 2003 study by a Cornell University professor, David Pimentel, whose research is considered the most comprehensive. The bill for controlling two closely-related invasive mussels — the zebra and the quagga — in the Great Lakes alone is $30 million annually, says the United States Federal Aquatic Nuisance Species Task Force.
Many scientists say that San Francisco Bay has more than 250 nonnative species, like European green crab, Asian zooplankton and other creatures and plants that outcompete native species for food, space and sunlight.
“Here you’ve got a veritable smorgasbord of habitats from shallow and muddy to deep water,” said Lars Anderson, a lead scientist with the United States Agriculture Department. The Oakland port ranks as the fourth busiest in the nation, and ships bring in tiny hitchhikers from across the globe to take up residence in the bay.
Most invasive aquatic species arrive stuck to hulls or as stowaways in ballast water. Wakame first arrived at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in 2000, Dr. Zabin and other scientists said. A year later it had moved south into Baja California and north as far as Monterey Bay, where scientists in scuba suits yanked it off boat hulls and marina moorings.
“It’s just like gardening, you can pull out all the weeds you want, but there will always be that little dandelion seed that will sprout and recolonize,” said Steve Lonhart, senior scientist at the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. The kelp, which can grow an inch a day, could spread as far north as Canada before the water becomes too cold to sustain it, Dr. Lonhart said.
Native to the Japan Sea, wakame has now spread to the Mediterranean and elsewhere along European coastlines, and to New Zealand, Australia and Argentina, where the fetid smell of rotting kelp has kept beachgoers from parts of the coast.
Wakame harms native kelp, mucks up marinas and the undersides of boats, and damages mariculture like oyster farming.
Money to help eradicate invasive species is difficult to come by on both state and federal levels, particularly in a state facing an unprecedented financial crisis and cuts to programs. “When there is a big wildfire, no one stops and asks, ‘Who is going to pay for this?’ They just fight the fire,” Dr. Anderson said. “We don’t have that kind of automatic response with invasive species.”
On weekends, Dr. Anderson trolls Tomales Bay, 50 miles north of here, in a sea kayak, looking for wakame’s wide leaves.
John Finger is owner of Hog Island Oyster Farm, which has beds in 160 acres of Tomales Bay. His beds yield 2.5 million oysters per year, worth $6 million, Mr. Finger said. Of wakame’s approach, he said, “It seems inevitable that it will show up here.”
Though wakame has not yet been spotted in the bay, Mr. Finger said he was pre-emptively training his staff on how to identify and remove the kelp. “This is just another sign of how small the world is,” he said.
Back in San Francisco, Dr. Zabin and colleagues from nonprofit groups and state and federal agencies have been pooling resources and volunteers, donning scuba and snorkeling equipment and filling black plastic trash bags with the kelp.
But before trucking it to the landfill, Dr. Zabin plans to ship some to Texas. “I got an e-mail from a guy who wants to use it to make biofuel,” Dr. Zabin said. “Maybe he could just come and vacuum it up.”
Heidi Schumann for The New York Times
The broad-leaf kelp is used in miso soup.
“I had that moment of ‘Oh God, this is it, it’s here,’ ” said Dr. Zabin, a biologist with the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. “I was really hoping I was wrong.”
The tentacle in question was that of an Asian kelp, Undaria pinnatifida, a flavorful and healthful ingredient in miso soup and an aggressive, costly intruder in waters from New Zealand to Monterey Bay.
The kelp, known as wakame (pronounced wa-KA-me), is on a list of “100 of the World’s Worst Invasive Alien Species,” compiled by the Invasive Species Specialist Group. Since her discovery in May, Dr. Zabin and colleagues have pulled up nearly 140 pounds of kelp attached to pilings and boats in the San Francisco Marina alone.
Every year the damage wrought by aquatic invaders in the United States and the cost of controlling them is estimated at $9 billion, according to a 2003 study by a Cornell University professor, David Pimentel, whose research is considered the most comprehensive. The bill for controlling two closely-related invasive mussels — the zebra and the quagga — in the Great Lakes alone is $30 million annually, says the United States Federal Aquatic Nuisance Species Task Force.
Many scientists say that San Francisco Bay has more than 250 nonnative species, like European green crab, Asian zooplankton and other creatures and plants that outcompete native species for food, space and sunlight.
“Here you’ve got a veritable smorgasbord of habitats from shallow and muddy to deep water,” said Lars Anderson, a lead scientist with the United States Agriculture Department. The Oakland port ranks as the fourth busiest in the nation, and ships bring in tiny hitchhikers from across the globe to take up residence in the bay.
Most invasive aquatic species arrive stuck to hulls or as stowaways in ballast water. Wakame first arrived at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach in 2000, Dr. Zabin and other scientists said. A year later it had moved south into Baja California and north as far as Monterey Bay, where scientists in scuba suits yanked it off boat hulls and marina moorings.
“It’s just like gardening, you can pull out all the weeds you want, but there will always be that little dandelion seed that will sprout and recolonize,” said Steve Lonhart, senior scientist at the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. The kelp, which can grow an inch a day, could spread as far north as Canada before the water becomes too cold to sustain it, Dr. Lonhart said.
Native to the Japan Sea, wakame has now spread to the Mediterranean and elsewhere along European coastlines, and to New Zealand, Australia and Argentina, where the fetid smell of rotting kelp has kept beachgoers from parts of the coast.
Wakame harms native kelp, mucks up marinas and the undersides of boats, and damages mariculture like oyster farming.
Money to help eradicate invasive species is difficult to come by on both state and federal levels, particularly in a state facing an unprecedented financial crisis and cuts to programs. “When there is a big wildfire, no one stops and asks, ‘Who is going to pay for this?’ They just fight the fire,” Dr. Anderson said. “We don’t have that kind of automatic response with invasive species.”
On weekends, Dr. Anderson trolls Tomales Bay, 50 miles north of here, in a sea kayak, looking for wakame’s wide leaves.
John Finger is owner of Hog Island Oyster Farm, which has beds in 160 acres of Tomales Bay. His beds yield 2.5 million oysters per year, worth $6 million, Mr. Finger said. Of wakame’s approach, he said, “It seems inevitable that it will show up here.”
Though wakame has not yet been spotted in the bay, Mr. Finger said he was pre-emptively training his staff on how to identify and remove the kelp. “This is just another sign of how small the world is,” he said.
Back in San Francisco, Dr. Zabin and colleagues from nonprofit groups and state and federal agencies have been pooling resources and volunteers, donning scuba and snorkeling equipment and filling black plastic trash bags with the kelp.
But before trucking it to the landfill, Dr. Zabin plans to ship some to Texas. “I got an e-mail from a guy who wants to use it to make biofuel,” Dr. Zabin said. “Maybe he could just come and vacuum it up.”
Climate plan calls for forest expansion
New forests would spread across the American landscape, replacing both pasture and farm fields, under a congressional plan to confront climate change, an Environmental Protection Agency analysis shows.
About 18 million acres of new trees — roughly the size of West Virginia — would be planted by 2020, according to an EPA analysis of a climate bill passed by the House of Representatives in June.
That's because the House bill gives financial incentives to farmers and ranchers to plant trees, which suck in large amounts of the key global-warming gas: carbon dioxide.
The forestation effort would be even larger than one carried out by the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression, says the U.S. Forest Service's Ralph Alig. The CCC, which lasted from 1933 to 1942, planted 3 billion trees, says the Civilian Conservation Corps Legacy, an alumni group for workers and family members.
The environmental benefits are clear. More trees would not only lower carbon dioxide levels, but they would improve water quality, because they need lower levels of pesticides and fertilizers, says agricultural economist Bruce McCarl of Texas A&M University, who contributed to the EPA analysis.
FIND MORE STORIES IN: George W. Bush Texas Great Depression Duke University Tom Vilsack United States Forest Service Mike Johanns Civilian Conservation Corps
The plan would, however, be hard on ranchers and farmers and potentially food prices, says American Farm Bureau chief economist Bob Young.
In the Senate, which is likely to consider a similar bill this fall, there are some who worry the loss of farmland would lead to increases in food prices worse than those seen in mid-2007, when costs spiked 7% to 8% above 2006 levels.
If those food prices seemed high, "wait till you start moving agricultural acres into climate-change areas," warns Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., Agriculture secretary for President George W. Bush.
McCarl says food costs would stay roughly the same.
The latest EPA analysis does not say where the farmland would be lost. However, an EPA study done in 2005 that analyzed climate-change policies similar to the House bill found that trees would overgrow farms primarily in three areas:
•Great Lake states: Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
•The Southeast: Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
•The Corn Belt: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Missouri and Ohio.
Forests once grew there, says study author Brian Murray of Duke University, so trees would sprout quickly in those areas if farmers got financial incentives. The House climate bill would allow landowners who reduce carbon dioxide to sell carbon permits to polluters, such as power plants.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack last week hailed the possibility that climate-change action could help forests. "We have our own deforestation problem right here in the U.S. of A," he said. "Just keeping forest as forest is a significant challenge."
Roughly 1 million acres of forests every year were flattened to make way for homes and other development in the 1990s, Alig says. Without a climate bill, a net total 26 million acres of forest will be lost to development by 2050, he says.
About 18 million acres of new trees — roughly the size of West Virginia — would be planted by 2020, according to an EPA analysis of a climate bill passed by the House of Representatives in June.
That's because the House bill gives financial incentives to farmers and ranchers to plant trees, which suck in large amounts of the key global-warming gas: carbon dioxide.
The forestation effort would be even larger than one carried out by the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Great Depression, says the U.S. Forest Service's Ralph Alig. The CCC, which lasted from 1933 to 1942, planted 3 billion trees, says the Civilian Conservation Corps Legacy, an alumni group for workers and family members.
The environmental benefits are clear. More trees would not only lower carbon dioxide levels, but they would improve water quality, because they need lower levels of pesticides and fertilizers, says agricultural economist Bruce McCarl of Texas A&M University, who contributed to the EPA analysis.
FIND MORE STORIES IN: George W. Bush Texas Great Depression Duke University Tom Vilsack United States Forest Service Mike Johanns Civilian Conservation Corps
The plan would, however, be hard on ranchers and farmers and potentially food prices, says American Farm Bureau chief economist Bob Young.
In the Senate, which is likely to consider a similar bill this fall, there are some who worry the loss of farmland would lead to increases in food prices worse than those seen in mid-2007, when costs spiked 7% to 8% above 2006 levels.
If those food prices seemed high, "wait till you start moving agricultural acres into climate-change areas," warns Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., Agriculture secretary for President George W. Bush.
McCarl says food costs would stay roughly the same.
The latest EPA analysis does not say where the farmland would be lost. However, an EPA study done in 2005 that analyzed climate-change policies similar to the House bill found that trees would overgrow farms primarily in three areas:
•Great Lake states: Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
•The Southeast: Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
•The Corn Belt: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Missouri and Ohio.
Forests once grew there, says study author Brian Murray of Duke University, so trees would sprout quickly in those areas if farmers got financial incentives. The House climate bill would allow landowners who reduce carbon dioxide to sell carbon permits to polluters, such as power plants.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack last week hailed the possibility that climate-change action could help forests. "We have our own deforestation problem right here in the U.S. of A," he said. "Just keeping forest as forest is a significant challenge."
Roughly 1 million acres of forests every year were flattened to make way for homes and other development in the 1990s, Alig says. Without a climate bill, a net total 26 million acres of forest will be lost to development by 2050, he says.
India depleting key water source, study finds
Excessive irrigation and the unrelenting thirst of 114 million people are causing groundwater levels in northern India to drop dramatically, a problem that could lead to severe water shortages, according to a study released Wednesday.
Levels have dropped as much as a foot a year between 2002 and 2008, for a total of 26 cubic miles of water that vanished — enough to fill Lake Mead, the largest manmade reservoir in the United States, three times.
The study comes as India's struggles with water have become a major political issue. The problem reaches across the country's vast class divide, touching everyone from residents of elite neighborhoods where the taps regularly go dry to poor farmers in desperate need of irrigation to grow their crops.
Giving free electricity to farmers — who use that electricity to pump more groundwater — has become a common promise by campaigning politicians. That, though, simply makes the problem worse.
"This issue is of grave importance," said K. Sreelakshmi, a natural resource economist at New Delhi's Energy and Resources Institute, TERI. Sreelakshmi, who was not connected to the study, noted that previous research projects had revealed lowering groundwater, though this one used a new approach by relying on satellite data.
"The question is what do we do about the problem," she said. "How do we recharge" India's dropping water table?
NASA-led studyThe study, led by Matthew Rodell of the United States' NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, indicated that groundwater across a swath of India from New Delhi into heavily farmed agricultural belts dropped at an average rate of 1.6 inches per year between August 2002 and October 2008. That decrease in groundwater is more than double the capacity of India's largest reservoir.
"The region has become dependent on irrigation to maximize agricultural productivity," Rodell said in a statement. "If measures are not taken to ensure sustainable groundwater usage,the consequences for the 114 million residents of the region may include a collapse of agricultural output and severe shortages of potable water."
The study noted that the drop in groundwater came in years where there was no shortage of rainfall to cause a natural decline.
Altaf Qadri / AP
Some water wells in northern India, like this one surrounded by bricks near a construction site in Gahroh, have been abandoned after drying out.
The region, though, has seen an enormous increase in water use since the 1960s. Part of that is because of the growing population, though even more resulted from the so-called Green Revolution, which dramatically increased India's agricultural production — in part by exponentially expanding the use of groundwater for irrigation.
"Severe groundwater depletion is occurring as a result of human consumption," the researchers concluded in the study, released online in the journal Nature.
The study was based largely on data provided by GRACE — the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment — a satellite system launched in 2002 by NASA and the German Aerospace Center. GRACE allows scientists to estimate changes in groundwater storage by measuring tiny variations in the Earth's gravitational pull.
Pakistan, Bangladesh cited earlierAnother recent study based on GRACE data, using results from a 1,200-mile swath across eastern Pakistan, northern India and into Bangladesh, showed about 1.9 million cubic feet of groundwater lost per year.
That study, in Geophysical Research Letters, was led by geophysicists Virendra Tiwari of the National Geophysical Research Institute in Hyderabad, India; John Wahr of the University of Colorado, Boulder; and Sean Swenson of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder.
"This is probably the largest rate of groundwater loss in any comparable-sized region on Earth," that study said.
Levels have dropped as much as a foot a year between 2002 and 2008, for a total of 26 cubic miles of water that vanished — enough to fill Lake Mead, the largest manmade reservoir in the United States, three times.
The study comes as India's struggles with water have become a major political issue. The problem reaches across the country's vast class divide, touching everyone from residents of elite neighborhoods where the taps regularly go dry to poor farmers in desperate need of irrigation to grow their crops.
Giving free electricity to farmers — who use that electricity to pump more groundwater — has become a common promise by campaigning politicians. That, though, simply makes the problem worse.
"This issue is of grave importance," said K. Sreelakshmi, a natural resource economist at New Delhi's Energy and Resources Institute, TERI. Sreelakshmi, who was not connected to the study, noted that previous research projects had revealed lowering groundwater, though this one used a new approach by relying on satellite data.
"The question is what do we do about the problem," she said. "How do we recharge" India's dropping water table?
NASA-led studyThe study, led by Matthew Rodell of the United States' NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, indicated that groundwater across a swath of India from New Delhi into heavily farmed agricultural belts dropped at an average rate of 1.6 inches per year between August 2002 and October 2008. That decrease in groundwater is more than double the capacity of India's largest reservoir.
"The region has become dependent on irrigation to maximize agricultural productivity," Rodell said in a statement. "If measures are not taken to ensure sustainable groundwater usage,the consequences for the 114 million residents of the region may include a collapse of agricultural output and severe shortages of potable water."
The study noted that the drop in groundwater came in years where there was no shortage of rainfall to cause a natural decline.
Altaf Qadri / AP
Some water wells in northern India, like this one surrounded by bricks near a construction site in Gahroh, have been abandoned after drying out.
The region, though, has seen an enormous increase in water use since the 1960s. Part of that is because of the growing population, though even more resulted from the so-called Green Revolution, which dramatically increased India's agricultural production — in part by exponentially expanding the use of groundwater for irrigation.
"Severe groundwater depletion is occurring as a result of human consumption," the researchers concluded in the study, released online in the journal Nature.
The study was based largely on data provided by GRACE — the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment — a satellite system launched in 2002 by NASA and the German Aerospace Center. GRACE allows scientists to estimate changes in groundwater storage by measuring tiny variations in the Earth's gravitational pull.
Pakistan, Bangladesh cited earlierAnother recent study based on GRACE data, using results from a 1,200-mile swath across eastern Pakistan, northern India and into Bangladesh, showed about 1.9 million cubic feet of groundwater lost per year.
That study, in Geophysical Research Letters, was led by geophysicists Virendra Tiwari of the National Geophysical Research Institute in Hyderabad, India; John Wahr of the University of Colorado, Boulder; and Sean Swenson of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder.
"This is probably the largest rate of groundwater loss in any comparable-sized region on Earth," that study said.
Deep coral off Southeast could get protection
Deep beneath the crystalline blue surface of the Atlantic Ocean off the southeastern U.S. lies a virtual rain forest of coral reefs so expansive the network is believed to be the world's largest.
A 23,000-square-mile area stretching from North Carolina to Florida is just part of that entire reef tract now being proposed for protection from potential damage by deep-sea commercial fishing and energy exploration.
So far, it's been relatively untouched by man because of its largely unreachable depths, providing scientists a unique opportunity to protect an ecosystem before it's destroyed.
"Most of the time, science is trying to catch up with exploitation," said Steve Ross of the Center for Marine Science at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.
Ross is leading a four-part research cruise that began Aug. 6 aimed at studying these deep sea environments, hoping to find new species of fish, crab and corals that could lead to scientific and medical discoveries.
Environmentalists say crab pots and bottom trawling for shrimp are the most immediate threats.
Margot Stiles, a marine scientist for Oceana, an international environmental advocacy group, said other deep water reefs off the U.S. have been severely damaged by trawlers.
"In this case, we have 23,000 square miles of known deep sea corals, and it's not too late to protect them," Stiles said. "This particular reef is to the deep sea what the Great Barrier Reef is for the world."
The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council is pushing the proposal to protect the region, about the size of West Virginia, in depths down to 2,500 feet and below, creating the largest deep water coral protected area off the Atlantic Coast.
Specifics on regulations and restrictions are still being reviewed, but if approved by the U.S. Commerce Department, the plan could take effect by next year.
"As far as we can tell, there's relatively little damage," Ross said. "That's very different from other parts of the world. In Scotland and Ireland ... there's been significant damage mostly from fishing and now those reefs are being protected."
Only seen since 1970sWhile fishermen have for centuries dragged up corals from the deep sea, it wasn't until the early 1900s that scientists discovered these extensive cold-water reefs existed. And it wasn't until the 1970s that researchers were able to use submersibles and cameras to reach the sea floor to document them. It had long been thought coral reefs only formed in shallow, warm waters.
Deep water reefs and pinnacles are much more slow-growing and can take several million years to form. Ross said science is only now beginning to understand these underwater "frontier zones."
Out on the research ship, scientists gather corals, sponges and fish samples by sinking deep to the ocean floor in a four-man submersible about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. The team is comprised of researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Florida Atlantic University, the U.S. Geological Survey and others.
arthowardphotography.com via AP
This squat lobster and scorpionfish were among the marine life found on a recent dive more than 1,000 feet down in the Atlantic.
"We've barely seen the tip of the iceberg in terms of new species out here," Ross said. "We'll find out five or 10 years from now that we made an amazing discovery and we just didn't realize it ... A lot of our pharmaceuticals come from a tropical rainforest environment. The same people are looking for these in the deep sea, and there are expectations that there will be drugs made that could potentially provide cures for some types of cancer.
"There is just a great deal of concern that once these habitats are gone, the potential for realizing those discoveries are eliminated," Ross added.
The deep water reefs also are seen as indicators of the ocean's overall health; because they are so remote, it takes longer for phenomenon like climate change to affect them.
"Science is questions, it's not answers," said Liz Baird of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, cautioning that it may be years before researchers realize the full potential of the reefs.
Little oppositionMost in the fishing industry agree that protecting these reefs is good for business, said Steven Wilson, owner of International Oceanic Enterprises in Alabama. Wilson has been shrimping in the Atlantic for 30 years and has been working with officials preparing the protection plan.
While law enforcement says some fishermen will drop crab pots or drag nets near fragile corals to score big catches, regardless of the damage, Wilson said it's mostly accidental.
"We can't make any money trawling over coral. In fact, we lose money," he said, noting that it destroys the nets.
Woody Moore, a commercial fishermen out of Jacksonville, Fla., has been trawling for shrimp in the Atlantic for three decades and also has been helping develop the deep reef protection proposals.
Moore puts it simply: "We don't want any closures but you gotta give them something or they'll take it all. You gotta play the game
A 23,000-square-mile area stretching from North Carolina to Florida is just part of that entire reef tract now being proposed for protection from potential damage by deep-sea commercial fishing and energy exploration.
So far, it's been relatively untouched by man because of its largely unreachable depths, providing scientists a unique opportunity to protect an ecosystem before it's destroyed.
"Most of the time, science is trying to catch up with exploitation," said Steve Ross of the Center for Marine Science at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.
Ross is leading a four-part research cruise that began Aug. 6 aimed at studying these deep sea environments, hoping to find new species of fish, crab and corals that could lead to scientific and medical discoveries.
Environmentalists say crab pots and bottom trawling for shrimp are the most immediate threats.
Margot Stiles, a marine scientist for Oceana, an international environmental advocacy group, said other deep water reefs off the U.S. have been severely damaged by trawlers.
"In this case, we have 23,000 square miles of known deep sea corals, and it's not too late to protect them," Stiles said. "This particular reef is to the deep sea what the Great Barrier Reef is for the world."
The South Atlantic Fishery Management Council is pushing the proposal to protect the region, about the size of West Virginia, in depths down to 2,500 feet and below, creating the largest deep water coral protected area off the Atlantic Coast.
Specifics on regulations and restrictions are still being reviewed, but if approved by the U.S. Commerce Department, the plan could take effect by next year.
"As far as we can tell, there's relatively little damage," Ross said. "That's very different from other parts of the world. In Scotland and Ireland ... there's been significant damage mostly from fishing and now those reefs are being protected."
Only seen since 1970sWhile fishermen have for centuries dragged up corals from the deep sea, it wasn't until the early 1900s that scientists discovered these extensive cold-water reefs existed. And it wasn't until the 1970s that researchers were able to use submersibles and cameras to reach the sea floor to document them. It had long been thought coral reefs only formed in shallow, warm waters.
Deep water reefs and pinnacles are much more slow-growing and can take several million years to form. Ross said science is only now beginning to understand these underwater "frontier zones."
Out on the research ship, scientists gather corals, sponges and fish samples by sinking deep to the ocean floor in a four-man submersible about the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. The team is comprised of researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Florida Atlantic University, the U.S. Geological Survey and others.
arthowardphotography.com via AP
This squat lobster and scorpionfish were among the marine life found on a recent dive more than 1,000 feet down in the Atlantic.
"We've barely seen the tip of the iceberg in terms of new species out here," Ross said. "We'll find out five or 10 years from now that we made an amazing discovery and we just didn't realize it ... A lot of our pharmaceuticals come from a tropical rainforest environment. The same people are looking for these in the deep sea, and there are expectations that there will be drugs made that could potentially provide cures for some types of cancer.
"There is just a great deal of concern that once these habitats are gone, the potential for realizing those discoveries are eliminated," Ross added.
The deep water reefs also are seen as indicators of the ocean's overall health; because they are so remote, it takes longer for phenomenon like climate change to affect them.
"Science is questions, it's not answers," said Liz Baird of the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, cautioning that it may be years before researchers realize the full potential of the reefs.
Little oppositionMost in the fishing industry agree that protecting these reefs is good for business, said Steven Wilson, owner of International Oceanic Enterprises in Alabama. Wilson has been shrimping in the Atlantic for 30 years and has been working with officials preparing the protection plan.
While law enforcement says some fishermen will drop crab pots or drag nets near fragile corals to score big catches, regardless of the damage, Wilson said it's mostly accidental.
"We can't make any money trawling over coral. In fact, we lose money," he said, noting that it destroys the nets.
Woody Moore, a commercial fishermen out of Jacksonville, Fla., has been trawling for shrimp in the Atlantic for three decades and also has been helping develop the deep reef protection proposals.
Moore puts it simply: "We don't want any closures but you gotta give them something or they'll take it all. You gotta play the game
Are Chinese Citizens Ready for A Green Revolution?
For China, a country with plenty of environmental laws but far too little enforcement, the news was a minor revelation. Two chemical factory officials convicted of releasing carbolic acid into a river - tainting a water source for 200,000 residents of coastal Jiangsu province - were sentenced on Aug. 14 to prison terms of 6 and 11 years. In the past such acts might result in little more than a fine. The state-run Xinhua news service noted it was the first time defendants who "caused environmental pollution were jailed on charges of spreading poison."
But as developments elsewhere in China this week made clear, it is too soon to declare a new era in environmental enforcement. On Aug. 17, hundreds of residents in northwestern Shaanxi province stormed a smelting plant blamed for sickening more than 600 children. The local government was supposed to relocate people living around the Dongling Lead and Zinc Smelting Co. plant by this year, but so far only 156 of 581 families have been moved, Xinhua reported. State media says the mayor of Baoji city vowed Aug. 17 that the plant would be closed and not reopened until it is proven safe, but residents told the South China Morning Post that the plant was continuing to emit pollution even after the official's declaration. (See pictures of Beijing's attempt to clean up its air.)
The scenes of protest in Shaanxi mirror what happened three weeks ago in the central province of Hunan, where up to 1,000 villagers gathered on July 30 to protest the Changsha Xianghe chemical plant. More than 500 people in the area had been sickened, and two residents died of cadmium poisoning, which residents blamed on the factory, according to Xinhua. They had complained about the plant for years, and it, too, been ordered to stop work this spring. But it was not until residents took to the streets that local authorities acted. "It's very easy to understand why these people protest. They need to defend their own interests," says Lin Guanming, a professor in the school of Environmental Sciences and Engineering at Peking University. "When things involve people's interests, health, and their descendants' health, it's not surprising they stand up to defend it."
Environmental demonstrations are not new to China. In 2005, an estimated 50,000 pollution-related protests occurred across the country. But these recent streak of protests stand out as the country is clearly tiring of the ecological burden of its rapid industrial growth. "In recent years, we've seen a drastic increase in environmental protests," says Wang Canfa, professor at the China University of Political Science and Law. "It means that the environmental toll of China's rapid economic development over the years is gradually coming up to the surface." Last fall a survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project found that some 80% of Chinese felt protecting the environment should be a priority. (See pictures of China's infrastructure boom.)
The government has declared some progress in enforcement. In addition to the Jiangsu convictions, prosecutors in central Henan province are pursuing 78 officials for neglecting their environmental responsibilities. Last month for the first time, an environmental group successfully filed a lawsuit against the government, when the All-China Environmental Federation sued a land resources bureau in southwestern Guizhou province for approving a factory beside a scenic lake. And thanks in part to stricter pollution controls set up for last year's summer Olympics, Beijing has enjoyed some of its best air quality in a decade.
For every step the government makes in improving regulations, however, it's faced with a case where enforcement has failed dramatically. Slowing economic growth gives local officials a stronger incentive to flout environmental rules if it means protecting jobs and industry. In Shaanxi, for instance, the Dongling Lead and Zinc Smelting Co. plant contributed one-sixth of of the GDP for Fengxiang county, making it hard for a local official to shutter it amid a downturn.
But as the recent protests and prosecutions indicate, more officials may be forced into upholding environmental laws they'd otherwise ignore. Chinese citizens are ready for an environmental revolution. And as the recent protests have shown, if they can't get satisfaction in the courts, they're willing to pursue it in the streets.
But as developments elsewhere in China this week made clear, it is too soon to declare a new era in environmental enforcement. On Aug. 17, hundreds of residents in northwestern Shaanxi province stormed a smelting plant blamed for sickening more than 600 children. The local government was supposed to relocate people living around the Dongling Lead and Zinc Smelting Co. plant by this year, but so far only 156 of 581 families have been moved, Xinhua reported. State media says the mayor of Baoji city vowed Aug. 17 that the plant would be closed and not reopened until it is proven safe, but residents told the South China Morning Post that the plant was continuing to emit pollution even after the official's declaration. (See pictures of Beijing's attempt to clean up its air.)
The scenes of protest in Shaanxi mirror what happened three weeks ago in the central province of Hunan, where up to 1,000 villagers gathered on July 30 to protest the Changsha Xianghe chemical plant. More than 500 people in the area had been sickened, and two residents died of cadmium poisoning, which residents blamed on the factory, according to Xinhua. They had complained about the plant for years, and it, too, been ordered to stop work this spring. But it was not until residents took to the streets that local authorities acted. "It's very easy to understand why these people protest. They need to defend their own interests," says Lin Guanming, a professor in the school of Environmental Sciences and Engineering at Peking University. "When things involve people's interests, health, and their descendants' health, it's not surprising they stand up to defend it."
Environmental demonstrations are not new to China. In 2005, an estimated 50,000 pollution-related protests occurred across the country. But these recent streak of protests stand out as the country is clearly tiring of the ecological burden of its rapid industrial growth. "In recent years, we've seen a drastic increase in environmental protests," says Wang Canfa, professor at the China University of Political Science and Law. "It means that the environmental toll of China's rapid economic development over the years is gradually coming up to the surface." Last fall a survey by the Pew Global Attitudes Project found that some 80% of Chinese felt protecting the environment should be a priority. (See pictures of China's infrastructure boom.)
The government has declared some progress in enforcement. In addition to the Jiangsu convictions, prosecutors in central Henan province are pursuing 78 officials for neglecting their environmental responsibilities. Last month for the first time, an environmental group successfully filed a lawsuit against the government, when the All-China Environmental Federation sued a land resources bureau in southwestern Guizhou province for approving a factory beside a scenic lake. And thanks in part to stricter pollution controls set up for last year's summer Olympics, Beijing has enjoyed some of its best air quality in a decade.
For every step the government makes in improving regulations, however, it's faced with a case where enforcement has failed dramatically. Slowing economic growth gives local officials a stronger incentive to flout environmental rules if it means protecting jobs and industry. In Shaanxi, for instance, the Dongling Lead and Zinc Smelting Co. plant contributed one-sixth of of the GDP for Fengxiang county, making it hard for a local official to shutter it amid a downturn.
But as the recent protests and prosecutions indicate, more officials may be forced into upholding environmental laws they'd otherwise ignore. Chinese citizens are ready for an environmental revolution. And as the recent protests have shown, if they can't get satisfaction in the courts, they're willing to pursue it in the streets.
Storing nuclear waste a $24-billion problem
There are two million high-level radioactive fuel bundles sitting at temporary storage sites in Canada, as the Nuclear Waste Management Organization wrestles with the mandate of finding a community to host a central storage facility for the waste for perhaps tens of thousands of years.
Throw in the fact that the cost of storing this nuclear waste could be up to $24 billion — a figure that will likely rise — and environmental groups are dead set against a central facility, and it shapes up to be a challenge of colossal proportions.
The process of finding a site to bury the high-level spent fuel has dragged on for decades as reactors keep churning out more spent bundles.
In 1998, after almost 10 years of study, a federal environmental assessment rejected the storage option. People involved at the time with the Seaborn Panel, as it was called, were convinced that the science was good but the central storage option did not have public support, as people feared accidents and contamination.
The 1998 decision will end up costing Canadians billions more as the cost of a storage facilty rises, pushed by inflation and unfavourable economic conditions.
The waste storage issue languished and lacked direction until the Nuclear Waste Management Organization was mandated by the federal government in 2002 to find a site and build a permanent, underground storage facility for the waste.
The NWMO, made up of utilities that create and store nuclear spent fuel waste (each bundle is about the size of a fire log, weighs 24 kilograms, and is radioactive and dangerous to people), has been touring the country recently to gauge the response to a central facility in communities where waste is temporarily stored near reactors.
The group is moving ahead again with a target of 2035 for a central site.
In June 2009, the NWMO travelled to New Brunswick, site of the Point Lepreau nuclear generating station, which has been operating a Candu reactor since 1983. Like the nuclear sites in Ontario, Quebec and AECL's nuclear research facility in Manitoba, New Brunswick is storing spent waste (121,000 bundles) in temporary quarters at its site near the Bay of Fundy until a central site is built.
There have been detractors, but people in the province have generally accepted nuclear power and the presence of the plant in Point Lepreau, and there has been serious consideration given to adding an additional reactor.
In what could turn out to be one of the biggest construction projects in Canadian history, the NWMO said the host community for the central storage site will have hundreds of skilled workers on site during the construction phase, and that "wealth creation" in the form of personal income and business profits during the construction phase will be in the billions of dollars.
As well, during the first 30 years of operation, when the spent fuel is being transported for storage, NWMO estimates spending will be in the range of $200 million each year - again benefiting the host community.
But despite those big economic numbers consider the New Brunswick government's reaction when it was suggested by NWMO that any of the four Canadian provinces involved in the nuclear industry could be home to the central storage facility. (The group has yet to even approve the process by which a site is selected for "deep geological repository," as it is called).
"I don't care. I mean I don't care. Have they done research on New Brunswick for nuclear waste? I would suggest they haven't," said the province's Energy Minister Jack Keir.
NWMO clearly has work to do in certain areas.
The money trail
The NWMO estimates it will cost somewhere in the range of $16 billion to $24 billion to site, build and maintain a central storage facility big enough and safe enough to handle the bundles. Some of the money will be used to store bundles at reactor sites before they are moved.
Ontario Power Generation, NB Power Nuclear, Atomic Energy Canada Limited, and Hydro-Quebec have been paying into a trust fund since 2002, building up a nest of $1.5 billion by 2009.
The four nuclear partners are kicking in money to the trust fund each year and will be contributing $163 million in total by 2011. The overall fund is expected to grow to more than $2 billion by 2011, and increase to cover the construction costs of the facility. Given the recession and the financial crisis that began in the fall of 2008, the rate of return on the trust fund will likely have to be adjusted, as many funds lost money or saw a much lower rate of return.
"It's a leap of faith that the [trust] money will be enough," said Julie Michaud, with the New Brunswick Conservation Council.
Mike Buckthought of the Sierra Club Canada said he has no faith in the cost estimates.
"Look at [the nuclear industry's] track record. Whenever we see an estimate for the cost of a plant, the cost is higher. It's the same for this," said Buckthought.
Michael Krizanc, communications manager at NWMO, said the nuclear partners are mandated to cover the construction costs and operation of a central storage facility. He is confident the trust fund will cover costs, and said the federal government will not be on the hook for future money.
What is not known is what the effect on everyday ratepayers would be if the price balloons and the utilities must cover those costs somehow.
Krizanc admitted that his group does not have access to money (and guaranteed money) that was set aside by reactor operators before 2002 for decommissioning and temporary waste management, a figure that reaches into the billions of dollars. Much of the money set aside at that time will likely go to decommissioning plants, a process that is a huge drain on finances.
The nuclear plants operated for decades without paying into a long-term fund.
A spokesman for the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission said his organization did not require the plants to contribute money to a long-term storage plan but did require money for the temporary sites.
The NWMO essentially started fresh in 2002 with regard to finances, despite the fact reactors were creating spent bundles for more than 20 years previously.
A new estimate of the storage costs is expected in the next year, and nobody knows at this point what the tally will be, but given the economic conditions it will be no surprise if it goes beyond $24 billion, a figure that has more than doubled since the early 1990s.
A recap of the Seaborn Panel's report can be found on the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency's website, along with a reference to what the cost of the central site would have been about 10 years ago.
"The cost of a facility based on the concept, estimated by AECL in 1991 dollars, would range from $8.7 billion for five million fuel bundles to $13.3 billion for 10 million bundles, excluding financing costs, taxes, non-routine activities (such as waste retrieval), transportation and any extended monitoring stages," according to the report.
In the United States, the Yucca Mountain central storage project in Nevada was plagued by huge cost overruns, fought by environmentalists and was not welcomed in the end by many residents in Nevada. It was cancelled in February 2009 by President Barack Obama before any fuel was stored, after $9 billion had been spent.
Environmental concerns, social issues
The bundles will have to be stored for perhaps as long as 10,000 years or more as their radioactive nature decreases. The copper and steel containers will be put underground and built to last as long as 100,000 years and withstand pressure from a two kilometre-thick glacier, if an ice age comes in the meantime
The storage site, however, will likely include a design so that future generations can access the spent fuel (which still has some juice, so to speak) and use it if they choose, as Canada's easily accessed uranium reserves could diminish within 100 years. The material could be reprocessed, for example, and used in a special reactor.
After use in a nuclear power plant the bundles contain radioactive material which can emit X-rays and gamma rays as well as high energy alpha particles and beta particles, which can damage human tissue and cause cancer.
There are two ways the material can get into the environment and create havoc - through the air or through the water table.
The New Brunswick Conservation Council worries about the transportation of the waste to a central site and the potential that journey offers for an accident which could possibly contaminate water tables for centuries. The group, which is against nuclear power, said the only alternative to a central storage facility is keeping the waste on site at the various reactors, where it is being stored now.
"It's easy to access, easy to manage, rather than trucking it somewhere in the country. That's a terrible idea," said Michaud.
In this day and age, terrorism is also a concern, and the issue is being considered.
According to the NWMO's website, "the used fuel is shipped in heavy, impact-resistant containers, so it is not easily removed, accessed or damaged. A current typical road transport container weighs about 23 metric tonnes."
"Removal of the container lid requires special tools and lifting equipment. The used fuel is also highly radioactive, and if removed from the transport container, it would present considerable personal hazard to a hijacker."
Armed guards will be a consideration, all of which could be daunting for a community considering whether or not to be a host for the facility.
Jeremy Whitlock, who works for AECL and is a past president of the Canadian Nuclear Society, said there are likely communities that are willing to step up. A community has to be engaged, "trust the science" and be convinced that the economic benefits are worthy.
A community can't be forced to take the facility, he said.
Throw in the fact that the cost of storing this nuclear waste could be up to $24 billion — a figure that will likely rise — and environmental groups are dead set against a central facility, and it shapes up to be a challenge of colossal proportions.
The process of finding a site to bury the high-level spent fuel has dragged on for decades as reactors keep churning out more spent bundles.
In 1998, after almost 10 years of study, a federal environmental assessment rejected the storage option. People involved at the time with the Seaborn Panel, as it was called, were convinced that the science was good but the central storage option did not have public support, as people feared accidents and contamination.
The 1998 decision will end up costing Canadians billions more as the cost of a storage facilty rises, pushed by inflation and unfavourable economic conditions.
The waste storage issue languished and lacked direction until the Nuclear Waste Management Organization was mandated by the federal government in 2002 to find a site and build a permanent, underground storage facility for the waste.
The NWMO, made up of utilities that create and store nuclear spent fuel waste (each bundle is about the size of a fire log, weighs 24 kilograms, and is radioactive and dangerous to people), has been touring the country recently to gauge the response to a central facility in communities where waste is temporarily stored near reactors.
The group is moving ahead again with a target of 2035 for a central site.
In June 2009, the NWMO travelled to New Brunswick, site of the Point Lepreau nuclear generating station, which has been operating a Candu reactor since 1983. Like the nuclear sites in Ontario, Quebec and AECL's nuclear research facility in Manitoba, New Brunswick is storing spent waste (121,000 bundles) in temporary quarters at its site near the Bay of Fundy until a central site is built.
There have been detractors, but people in the province have generally accepted nuclear power and the presence of the plant in Point Lepreau, and there has been serious consideration given to adding an additional reactor.
In what could turn out to be one of the biggest construction projects in Canadian history, the NWMO said the host community for the central storage site will have hundreds of skilled workers on site during the construction phase, and that "wealth creation" in the form of personal income and business profits during the construction phase will be in the billions of dollars.
As well, during the first 30 years of operation, when the spent fuel is being transported for storage, NWMO estimates spending will be in the range of $200 million each year - again benefiting the host community.
But despite those big economic numbers consider the New Brunswick government's reaction when it was suggested by NWMO that any of the four Canadian provinces involved in the nuclear industry could be home to the central storage facility. (The group has yet to even approve the process by which a site is selected for "deep geological repository," as it is called).
"I don't care. I mean I don't care. Have they done research on New Brunswick for nuclear waste? I would suggest they haven't," said the province's Energy Minister Jack Keir.
NWMO clearly has work to do in certain areas.
The money trail
The NWMO estimates it will cost somewhere in the range of $16 billion to $24 billion to site, build and maintain a central storage facility big enough and safe enough to handle the bundles. Some of the money will be used to store bundles at reactor sites before they are moved.
Ontario Power Generation, NB Power Nuclear, Atomic Energy Canada Limited, and Hydro-Quebec have been paying into a trust fund since 2002, building up a nest of $1.5 billion by 2009.
The four nuclear partners are kicking in money to the trust fund each year and will be contributing $163 million in total by 2011. The overall fund is expected to grow to more than $2 billion by 2011, and increase to cover the construction costs of the facility. Given the recession and the financial crisis that began in the fall of 2008, the rate of return on the trust fund will likely have to be adjusted, as many funds lost money or saw a much lower rate of return.
"It's a leap of faith that the [trust] money will be enough," said Julie Michaud, with the New Brunswick Conservation Council.
Mike Buckthought of the Sierra Club Canada said he has no faith in the cost estimates.
"Look at [the nuclear industry's] track record. Whenever we see an estimate for the cost of a plant, the cost is higher. It's the same for this," said Buckthought.
Michael Krizanc, communications manager at NWMO, said the nuclear partners are mandated to cover the construction costs and operation of a central storage facility. He is confident the trust fund will cover costs, and said the federal government will not be on the hook for future money.
What is not known is what the effect on everyday ratepayers would be if the price balloons and the utilities must cover those costs somehow.
Krizanc admitted that his group does not have access to money (and guaranteed money) that was set aside by reactor operators before 2002 for decommissioning and temporary waste management, a figure that reaches into the billions of dollars. Much of the money set aside at that time will likely go to decommissioning plants, a process that is a huge drain on finances.
The nuclear plants operated for decades without paying into a long-term fund.
A spokesman for the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission said his organization did not require the plants to contribute money to a long-term storage plan but did require money for the temporary sites.
The NWMO essentially started fresh in 2002 with regard to finances, despite the fact reactors were creating spent bundles for more than 20 years previously.
A new estimate of the storage costs is expected in the next year, and nobody knows at this point what the tally will be, but given the economic conditions it will be no surprise if it goes beyond $24 billion, a figure that has more than doubled since the early 1990s.
A recap of the Seaborn Panel's report can be found on the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency's website, along with a reference to what the cost of the central site would have been about 10 years ago.
"The cost of a facility based on the concept, estimated by AECL in 1991 dollars, would range from $8.7 billion for five million fuel bundles to $13.3 billion for 10 million bundles, excluding financing costs, taxes, non-routine activities (such as waste retrieval), transportation and any extended monitoring stages," according to the report.
In the United States, the Yucca Mountain central storage project in Nevada was plagued by huge cost overruns, fought by environmentalists and was not welcomed in the end by many residents in Nevada. It was cancelled in February 2009 by President Barack Obama before any fuel was stored, after $9 billion had been spent.
Environmental concerns, social issues
The bundles will have to be stored for perhaps as long as 10,000 years or more as their radioactive nature decreases. The copper and steel containers will be put underground and built to last as long as 100,000 years and withstand pressure from a two kilometre-thick glacier, if an ice age comes in the meantime
The storage site, however, will likely include a design so that future generations can access the spent fuel (which still has some juice, so to speak) and use it if they choose, as Canada's easily accessed uranium reserves could diminish within 100 years. The material could be reprocessed, for example, and used in a special reactor.
After use in a nuclear power plant the bundles contain radioactive material which can emit X-rays and gamma rays as well as high energy alpha particles and beta particles, which can damage human tissue and cause cancer.
There are two ways the material can get into the environment and create havoc - through the air or through the water table.
The New Brunswick Conservation Council worries about the transportation of the waste to a central site and the potential that journey offers for an accident which could possibly contaminate water tables for centuries. The group, which is against nuclear power, said the only alternative to a central storage facility is keeping the waste on site at the various reactors, where it is being stored now.
"It's easy to access, easy to manage, rather than trucking it somewhere in the country. That's a terrible idea," said Michaud.
In this day and age, terrorism is also a concern, and the issue is being considered.
According to the NWMO's website, "the used fuel is shipped in heavy, impact-resistant containers, so it is not easily removed, accessed or damaged. A current typical road transport container weighs about 23 metric tonnes."
"Removal of the container lid requires special tools and lifting equipment. The used fuel is also highly radioactive, and if removed from the transport container, it would present considerable personal hazard to a hijacker."
Armed guards will be a consideration, all of which could be daunting for a community considering whether or not to be a host for the facility.
Jeremy Whitlock, who works for AECL and is a past president of the Canadian Nuclear Society, said there are likely communities that are willing to step up. A community has to be engaged, "trust the science" and be convinced that the economic benefits are worthy.
A community can't be forced to take the facility, he said.
Clean energy safer for workers
To keep the gears of America's economy turning, energy workers need to drill deep into the Earth for explosive gas and flammable oil, a dangerous occupation.
New research finds that switching to a renewable energy system based on sun and wind would provide safer working conditions and prevent more than 130 job-related deaths in the United States each year by significantly reducing the need for mining. The study is published Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
In the paper, Peter Layde, a professor in the department of population health and co-director of the Injury Research Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin, and Steven Sumner of the Medical Center at Duke University, compare the occupational hazards energy workers are exposed to in fossil fuel with that of renewable energy production. Three renewable energy sources with potential for growth - solar, wind and biomass - were included in the study.
"Focusing on the entire lifecycle is important when estimating occupational hazard, including construction and maintenance of all infrastructure needed," Layde said.
Wind and solar energy compared favorably with fossil fuels in every aspect from production to distribution, but the researchers note that better data is needed to make more precise comparisons. Renewables are safer than fossil fuels because mining isn't involved. Mining is the second-most dangerous industry in the U.S., resulting in 27.5 deaths per 100,000 workers, compared with an average of 3.4 deaths for all industries.
The most common biomass fuel, ethanol, did not compare as favorably.
Farming adds risks
Cultivation of corn explicitly for ethanol production is what makes it so hazardous for workers. Farming is the only occupation rated more dangerous than mining, with 28.7 deaths per 100,000 workers annually.
Use of petroleum-based fertilizers is another hidden occupational injury cost in generating ethanol. To make biomass energy safer for workers, they need to be generated from byproducts of farming, such as corn husks and wood chips, that do not increase farming.
According to Nick Wilson, a public health physician at the University of Otago in Wellington, New Zealand, ethanol's total carbon footprint and large subsidies compare unfavorably with solar and wind energy production. Worker safety is yet another disadvantage of ethanol production.
"The world is looking to the U.S. for its tradition of innovation to help with the global transition to renewable energy," said Wilson, "but the use of corn crops to make the biofuel ethanol is an unsustainable mistake that the U.S. needs to rectify."
Safer working conditions for U.S. energy workers adds another variable to the energy cost equation.
"This commentary addresses an aspect of energy costs that has not been addressed before," said Vasilis Fthenakis, senior research engineer and scientist at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York.
Unlike many other benefits of renewable energies, safer working conditions will immediately result in reduced workplace injuries and fatalities, reducing costs to society.
"Transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources is inevitable," Layde said. "That it creates safer working conditions for workers is a reason for doing so sooner than later."
New research finds that switching to a renewable energy system based on sun and wind would provide safer working conditions and prevent more than 130 job-related deaths in the United States each year by significantly reducing the need for mining. The study is published Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
In the paper, Peter Layde, a professor in the department of population health and co-director of the Injury Research Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin, and Steven Sumner of the Medical Center at Duke University, compare the occupational hazards energy workers are exposed to in fossil fuel with that of renewable energy production. Three renewable energy sources with potential for growth - solar, wind and biomass - were included in the study.
"Focusing on the entire lifecycle is important when estimating occupational hazard, including construction and maintenance of all infrastructure needed," Layde said.
Wind and solar energy compared favorably with fossil fuels in every aspect from production to distribution, but the researchers note that better data is needed to make more precise comparisons. Renewables are safer than fossil fuels because mining isn't involved. Mining is the second-most dangerous industry in the U.S., resulting in 27.5 deaths per 100,000 workers, compared with an average of 3.4 deaths for all industries.
The most common biomass fuel, ethanol, did not compare as favorably.
Farming adds risks
Cultivation of corn explicitly for ethanol production is what makes it so hazardous for workers. Farming is the only occupation rated more dangerous than mining, with 28.7 deaths per 100,000 workers annually.
Use of petroleum-based fertilizers is another hidden occupational injury cost in generating ethanol. To make biomass energy safer for workers, they need to be generated from byproducts of farming, such as corn husks and wood chips, that do not increase farming.
According to Nick Wilson, a public health physician at the University of Otago in Wellington, New Zealand, ethanol's total carbon footprint and large subsidies compare unfavorably with solar and wind energy production. Worker safety is yet another disadvantage of ethanol production.
"The world is looking to the U.S. for its tradition of innovation to help with the global transition to renewable energy," said Wilson, "but the use of corn crops to make the biofuel ethanol is an unsustainable mistake that the U.S. needs to rectify."
Safer working conditions for U.S. energy workers adds another variable to the energy cost equation.
"This commentary addresses an aspect of energy costs that has not been addressed before," said Vasilis Fthenakis, senior research engineer and scientist at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York.
Unlike many other benefits of renewable energies, safer working conditions will immediately result in reduced workplace injuries and fatalities, reducing costs to society.
"Transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources is inevitable," Layde said. "That it creates safer working conditions for workers is a reason for doing so sooner than later."
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