Our World and Everything in It

While American automakers are being pummeled for ignoring the competition, what about the rest of our industries that lag environmentally far behind? I’m reading an article about Cleveland’s race to be the first to set wind turbines in Lake Erie, and that there are no wind turbines off of our shores both in saltwater or fresh. Right now Cleveland has a task force measuring ice thickness and movement relative to turbine towers, a whole new ball game for us.

Even though Europe is still struggling, it seems problems with ice freeze, turbulent waters, and horrendous storms have been dealt with on some 26 wind farms in the ocean’s coastal areas that help meet power demands for 5 countries there. Where did they come from? Overall, we don’t pay a heck of a lot of attention to our competition do we? So who are we to point fingers at our auto industry?

We’re just getting into the swing toward wind and solar power. And even so, with the recent drop in gas prices, many major corporations with millions set aside for environmental projects have shelved them. Here we go again, yoyo’s running up and down the strings manipulated by the fingers of Big Oil.

America just doesn’t get the concept that investing in alternative energy sources is not about the cost and/or availability of oil. It’s about the environment and keeping up with the competition that is simply pulling away from us. To continue to argue about global warming and our part in it while the environment gets decidedly worse is a big part of the problem and the source is Big Oil. The global warming argument has kept people in their Hummers while others screamed for hybrids to the point our auto industry is damned if they do, or damned if they don’t. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone doesn’t complain that with oil prices so low, “Why are American car companies making crappy, little cars?” Remember, “Drill, baby, drill,” was a mantra for our problems during the campaign. The same mindset has thwarted thousands of new jobs a new green industry would offer. But most poignantly, it has caused us to ignore the green competition overseas in many sectors of industry besides the auto companies.

So while Cleveland scrambles to set the first wind turbine tower in windy Lake Erie, with the hopes of having at least 10 by 2011, we’re small potatoes and nowhere near the European forerunners with 26 farms in the ocean. And even though Ohio has some 90 factories involved in the production of wind turbines, and that industry is growing fast, as the article says, “It’s still constrained by a supply chain that can’t meet the demand for wind turbine components,” evidence that green companies still aren’t a big draw here.

Until we divorce ourselves from the notion that there is nothing we can do for the environment, and we simply can’t live without the crude, we’re going to keep coming up short every time the fickle finger of Big Oil pulls it’s strings, whether it’s our own oil or not. And while we’re busy being yo-yos, the competition moves even farther ahead, with greater savings, more sustainable energy and independence, and new jobs emerging with new invention.

http://blog.cleveland.com/business/2008/12/click_here_to_view_the.html

Previewing October 14^th on PBS is a presentation called “Climate Change; Then and Now.” Watch it as it will be replayed on either WGTE or PBS Detroit again. If you want to hear what has happened since the words “global warming” first graced our ears some ten years ago, you might be surprised. The results are in and we definitely have an impact on what’s up with the weather. Read more: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/story/2008/10/heat.html.

I watched another presentation on WGTE’s Frontline last night relative to the oil industry and the environment that’s part of a larger series entitled “Heat.” I swear that it was a compilation of many of the blogs I’ve done over the course of two years from the net wealth of the oil industry down to Detroit automakers. It’s nice to know I’m not totally daft. 

The program began by showing Exxon Mobil’s baby “Hibernia” the largest (by weight) oilrig platform in the world. It’s 16 stories high and 200 miles off the coast of Newfoundland in God forsaken nowhere. Every 5-6 days a tanker leaves with a load worth 500 million dollars. This rig cost Exxon 4 billion dollars!

The storyline then settled in with the statement that no one has resisted change like big oil. The reporter harped about, the ratio of net income for every major U.S. oil company compared to what they invest in alternative technologies. There were quite a few times oil company spokespeople were flustered and could not answer the interviewer. I mean how do you say “we’re greedy?” The coverage then shifted to the Rockefellers, (not so greedy stockholders) demanding in public court that Exxon invest in more alternative energy. Let’s face it, the oil companies are not going to let their bread and butter go without a fight, and do they have the money to fight.

The fight consisted of spin regarding the state of our environment. This spin has made the plight of the environment political rather than scientific, inciting even more divisiveness. The program showed that big oil had a connection to many denial machines like “The Heartland Group, Competitive Enterprises,” and I have to add “Friends of Science,” Senator Inhofe’s favorite. Inhofe was included in last night’s foray of who and what helped stifle the movement toward alternative energy.

Not to be left out, there was a segment on American auto companies. I could not believe my ears when a scientist being interviewed reiterated my words about our auto industry: “Where was the foresight?” It continued to show that Clinton funded the American auto industry to develop hybrid cars in 98. The prototypes were shown. The auto companies rolled them out and bingo, Bush got into office. That all stopped. The American car companies made bigger and bigger gas-guzzlers like SUV’s, Hummers, etc.  But Japan kept up with the hybrid idea since that time. Now Japan is 10 years ahead of us.  Japan’s factories are also aiming to cut emissions drastically more than they already have. If only we could work on the dolphin/whale thing…

It was quite a night for me to see the same content of some my past blogs come to life in a presentation. We live chaotic lives at times and so our news becomes disjointed and senseless. We only get bits and pieces. Heat is a long series to catch in its entirety. There are 9 chapters. But you can view them online. It’s nice to see it all strung together and for that effort we can always thank Public TV.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/heat/view/6.html

According to an article on ENS, “The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee held a hearing today to review the Bush administration’s record on public health and environmental matters, but it was conducted in the absence of Ranking Member Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, a Republican and former chair of the committee.”

It figures. Remember Inhofe, the senator waiving his own list of scientists that don’t agree with global warming, many of which belong to the “The Friends of Science Society,” a Canadian group I’ve blogged about before that seem to have ulterior motives:

So Inhofe boycotted this meeting, urged two witnesses not to appear, and the rest of the Republicans on the committee didn’t show either. It’s only a matter of time hopefully that we find out just how much environmental damage the Bush administration did. It affects our health and the future of our children. This is why I cannot understand people’s grasping at straws to avoid admitting and dealing with a rapidly growing global warming problem.

According to the article, the GAO or Govt. Accountability Office has already uncovered the following:

·         EPA political officials worked with the White House and the Pentagon to undermine the process for evaluating toxic chemical risks.

·         EPA has severely weakened its Office of Children’s Health Protection and largely ignored its Children’s Health Advisory Committee.

·         Despite the president’s campaign promise to regulate carbon dioxide emissions, the White House reversed course and rejected actions to control global warming pollution.

·         In one of its first official acts, the Bush EPA announced that it was suspending the newly strengthened standard for arsenic in tap water.

·         The EPA story is the same for soot, smog, and lead standards - all weaker than its own scientists recommended.

·         Over the last seven years, the pace of Superfund cleanups has dropped by about 50 percent compared to the last seven years of the prior administration, from about 80 cleanups per year to 40 or less.

·         EPA has decided that it will not set a health standard for the toxic rocket fuel perchlorate in our drinking water, even though EPA data show that up to 16.6 million people are exposed to unsafe levels.

I don’t know about anyone else, but with or without Inhofe and the Republicans presence on the latest committee, there is enough evidence above to show that more than likely we’ve been lied to about plenty relative to the environment. And the animals that have taken a hit because of Bush’s tampering with the Endangered Species List goes beyond polar bears.

I still have a qualm that when the Bush administration is over we’re going to hear these words regarding the state of our world and everything it it, “It’s much, much worse than we thought.”

Read the article: http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/sep2008/2008-09-24-02.asp.

President Bush lifted the ban on offshore oil drilling Monday, but it means nothing if Congress renews the ban as part of the annual spending bill for the Department of the Interior. Congress has done so since 1981 but it appears that many in congress even the most ardent environmentalists might support drilling where it makes sense. Sense?

How political can you get? Everyone including those in Bush’s administration admitted that drilling for oil will not bring immediate relief at the pump, if at all. Oilmen in this country have stated there isn’t enough to sustain us anyway. It’s been stated over and over that 2012 would be the earliest we will see any relief as far as gas prices in the U.S. from any new drilling.

But people in this country want immediate satisfaction, and become oblivious to facts in the quest for instant gratification. So now even our most enthusiastic defenders of the environment are saying they would consider it, but for what possible reason? It’s not going to bring prices down for four years, one whole presidential term. Ah but it will make our reps look like they are doing something to help a very impatient public. And for that, they just might get re-elected. To hell with the environment in an election year. Now we see true colors come out. This is a pretty late hour to succumb to the Bush oil regime. I thought we had more sense than that. Oh that’s right. Bush/Cheney wouldn’t be in office at all so there wouldn’t be a war in Iraq, our economy wouldn’t be plummeting, and we wouldn’t be trillions in debt if we had any sense.

I wrote a blog, “Polar Bears vs. Big Oil; Guess Who’s Going to Die?” I’m starting to feel like Humans vs. Big Oil…

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/15/opinion/15tue3.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

If you’ve never heard of or viewed the panorama of Utah’s Red Rock Canyon area, do it. It is absolutely beautiful. I saw a travel channel segment on Zion National Park and want to visit there. It looks like a place of God. Our national parks are a real treasure, but the Bush administration doesn’t have much time left, and is trying for land grabs right out of OUR national parks to drill for oil.

If Bush has his way, oil drills will destroy eleven million acres of national park in Utah’s Red Rock Canyon. I’m hearing about these attempted land grabs happening all over the place. What I want to know is what is the sense? We know we’re short of refineries in the U.S. It’s a well known fact every time the U.S. has an oil crisis, large or small, that right away we want to invade new areas and drill for more oil. But it’s of no use unless it’s refined, and we don’t have enough refineries.

And it’s not likely we’ll be seeing brand new refineries in the future because of global warming. And yes even the Bush/Cheney administration admitted quite a while ago in 2002 that humans do indeed cause global warming. The U.S. EPA submitted a 268-page report to the UN back then admitting to and agreeing with scientists that oil refining, fossil fuel power plants, and car emissions are significant causes of global warming.

It’s 2008. What aren’t they getting? I know what the Bush administration is getting–more neglectful of our rights when they simply try to take over public lands for nothing more than filling the pockets of the rich from oil production. Trashing these beautiful areas of our country will not sit well with a court system that has been standing for the environment in a number of cases so far.

According to an Earthjustice report, just recently another federal court judge ruled that: “After years of court battles, Kane County must halt its illegal efforts to create roadways through Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and other wilderness areas,” which is in another area of Utah’s Red Rock Canyon. A U.S. District Judge “ordered the county to take down its signs inviting vehicles into areas closed to protect sensitive streams, wildlife habitat, archeological treasures, and wilderness values.”

This is good news but Dirk Kempthorne, Secy. of Interior, needs to hear from us again, even though he and the Bush administration know that attempts to drill in Utah’s Red Rock Canyon is going to meet with some mighty big resistance since this judge’s ruling.

http://action.wilderness.org/campaign/utahm00/xwnke5k44xx5mjj?

http://www.earthjustice.org/news/press/2008/utah-county-must-stop-illegal-seizure-of-rights-of-way.html

Bush admits humans cause global warming: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2023835.stm

http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/does_the_us_lack_sufficient_oil_refining.html

I was looking over Science Daily’s website and found so many articles about man’s involvement with global warming. It seems humans have affected the environment for thousands of years. The Little Ice Age and Medieval Warming period all the nay sayers like to brandish as proof that global warming happened before and is a natural occurrence just ain’t so.

Man has been affecting the environment for thousands of years. The sad thing is this article is almost 3 years old. Have these findings been censored from the general public because I’ve been arguing with people who have brought up the ice ages and warming periods of the past, while the whole time science has had proof that: “Humans have been tinkering with greenhouse gas levels in Earth’s atmosphere for at least 2,000 years and probably longer, according to a surprising new study of methane trapped in Antarctic ice cores conducted by an international research team.”

Read more about it and browse around because there is a plethora of articles and findings that substantiate we are indeed causing what we call global warming.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/09/050909075709.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1998/10/981002082033.htm

http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2007/0902-our_changing_climate.htm

“We were in fully open ocean, dozens of miles from the ice pack, in a sort of half-fog at what passes for dusk around here, when a 10 foot wide chunk of ice flowed past. It was visible for maybe 15 seconds - the only ice we’d seen for days. On it: a polar bear, just drifting wherever the ocean wanted to take him” http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/feb2008/2008-02-11-01.asp.

I quoted that to say this. As the polar bear waits to get on the Endangered Species List, a decision that comes from the Department of the Interior, the polar bear’s habitat continues to disintegrate. It is practically wide-open seas according to the same article, and “the polar ice cap has reached its lowest extent in recorded history.” The summer Arctic may be ice-free as soon as 2040 and polar bear populations will decrease by two thirds. Out of an estimated 22,000 bears, that means over 14,500 polar bears will die. The one that floated by the Coast Guard Cutter is just one example that they won’t be afforded a quick death.

Many animals are at the mercy of the Department of the Interior lately, the wolves, and now the polar bears. The polar bear’s biggest and most volatile habitat is in the Chukchi Sea. Despite an outcry from native Eskimos, environmental groups, animal welfare organizations, a lawsuit, and citizens from around the world, the Chukchi Oil leases are going through as per the Dept. of the Interior. Royal Dutch Shell, and Conoco Phillips, you know the oil company that is supposedly investing in a green future like BP, plan to bid on the leases.
 
According to a Wall Street Journal Article Conoco Phillips said that “listing the polar bear as threatened ‘is not warranted’ based on the bears’ current population numbers. Listing them as threatened ‘will have an adverse impact on the oil and gas industry and people that live in the Arctic.’ Well I feel real sorry for the oil and gas industry, don’t you? Exxon Mobil netted $75000 per minute in 2006 and we should feel for the oil and gas industry and the heck with the polar bears? We’ll be on that soon-to-be extinct list too if ignoring ethics in favor of money, money, money keeps up.
 
The idea here is prevention. There are 22,000 bears, the Arctic is already open water so bear numbers will soon be declining rapidly without frozen land to walk and hunt. The Dept. of the Interior should put the bear on the list immediately to stop a catastrophic loss of most of that population, but waits instead using the bear’s current numbers to validate the delay. Meanwhile, the Dept. of Interior rushes to OK the auction of some 30 million acres in one the most pristine parts of the sea, a major polar bear habitat, for oil drilling?

I’m sorry but in a business situation the Department of the Interior’s single authority in both the protection of a clearly endangered species of animal like the polar bear and the very lucrative sale of the polar bear’s habitat for the purpose of drilling for oil presents a conflict of interest. And the delay in adding the polar bear to the Endangered List is an obvious morally unethical decision by a dubious Secy. of Interior, Dirk Kempthorne.

For Kempthorne, Conoco Phillips, and anyone else like President Bush that doesn’t appear to understand the English language, the word endangered means: exposed to danger, in peril. ENDANGERED DOES NOT MEAN ALREADY DEAD! The polar bear is in danger, and definitely in peril with a ruthless administration like this one.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120208255421639257.html?mod=googlenews_wsj.
http://world-wire.com/news/0802060002.html

(more…)

I can’t believe it. The Bush administration hasn’t exited yet and things are changing for the environmental good already. According the Environmental News Service today, Feb. 8th, 2008, the U. S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia “vacated two rules issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that failed to set strict limits on mercury emissions from power plants.” Vacated, I can’t believe it. That means “No Way!”

· The EPA’s cap and trade program was thrown out the window by the court.
· Then the court told the EPA how they “erred by taking power plants off the list of hazardous pollution sources when it issued its Clean Air Mercury Rule” that advocated the cap and trade program.
· The article went on to say, “the EPA now has two years to develop mercury emissions standards for existing power plants.”

The Clean Air Mercury Rule was an attempt by the EPA to limit the amount of mercury discharged by industry. There were two caps. The first was to be 38 tons of emissions reduced by first getting rid of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide called “co-benefits” by the rule. The rule suggests mercury reductions are achieved by doing this. But mercury is a chemical element. It is what it is. It is not sulfur and nitrogen. They are what they are. Granted they’re bad for the respiratory system, but what about the mercury? The court obviously got tired of this nonsense too and told the EPA to get on the ball. There was also an obvious problem with this little statement in the Clean Air Mercury Rule: “”…and because recent information demonstrates that it is not appropriate or necessary to regulate coal and oil-fired utility units under section 112 of the Clean Air Act.” What?

I griped about all of this in another blog when DTE (Detroit area energy provider) announced they were installing scrubbers for sulfur and nitrogen on their Monroe coalburner. Whoopty Doo. Scrubbers do nothing about the mercury, but today the courts sure did. I also predicted that  utility companies would continue too long on their same course and then whine about the cost to reverse things and comply with new clean air policy. How soon before we hear the sob stories?  So predictable. When companies have a big lobby, they throw all foresight to the wind.  They don’t need to stay on the ball. They pay to change the play instead.  And the taxpayer bears the brunt. Read about that again: http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/?m=200701.

This ruling comes on the heals of the June 2007 edict by the Court of Appeals that vacated the EPA’s Incinerator Rule. The court blasted the EPA for violating the Clean Air Act for relaxing limits on emissions of smog-forming compounds from large power plants, factories, and other industrial sources,” according to Chemical and Engineering News. Smog and smoke have always been pretty self explanatory to me. If you can see it in the air, it’s substantial, and you probably shouldn’t be breathing it. As a result of the court’s ruling, chemical plants, refineries, and other industrial facilities that burn the waste they generate in on-site incinerators must comply with the law’s most stringent rules governing hazardous air pollutants. So what about Holcim Cement?

As I sit in a county with the nation’s second largest coalburner that sits on Lake Erie, and a Holcim cement plant that’s big on incinerating and has racked up big fines for doing it, it’s going to be real interesting how the court’s rulings play out.

The announcement of the court ruling today: http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/feb2008/2008-02-08-01.asp.
The June, 2007 ruling about incinerators: http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/85/i25/8525news7.html.
The EPA’s Clean Air Mercury Rule that is defunct as of today: http://www.epa.gov/camr/basic.htm.
A disturbing report about mercury hot spots: http://www.mindfully.org/Air/2004/Fort-Wayne-Indiana-Mercury11jan04.htm.
 

The tornadoes disaster that struck the south Tuesday was different. We’ve seen interviews of people after a tornado struck their home, or threw them around. They’ve always been curiously stoic, that they are alive and that’s all that matter. The reporter ends by saying something like “looking at the debris and destruction, it’s amazing no one was killed.” Not so this time.

People were visibly shaken, edgy, overwhelmed. There didn’t seem to be any warning.  An aerial view of a touchdown on Union University campus shows signs of the whirring motion that hit like a blender. The middle of the campus is gone, while the outward spirals of wind blew apart the dorms that were clustered around it. One student got sucked out of a hallway while holding onto a heavy gumball machine. He didn’t have enough time to run inside far enough. Part of the building collapsed on him but he made it. Up to 60 other people didn’t.

The death toll keeps climbing as people look through the debris. I’m tornado phobic. Not so much of the actual funnel but because caught off guard, these storms are deadly. And the chances of being caught off-guard are greater than you think. I found a good website, WeatherEye, that based its info on results of Project Vortex, the world’s largest storm-chasing project. What better info than people that sit in those weird mobile units gathering data at the edge of a huge twister.

It’s always been believed that a tornado takes 20-30 minutes to form, and we have detectors everywhere. Try 5 to 10 minutes, and tornadoes many times come from small weather patterns that develop between weather stations. So what happened Tuesday is something like this. You’re sitting there in Tennessee in February. There are storm predictions. The storm starts.  And out of nowhere drops a funnel cloud. You’re not prepared at all, just hanging onto your breeches. It lasts a few minutes, but your life is changed forever—no mementos, no trophies, no pictures, nothing to wear, no paperwork, no purse, no pets…absolutely stripped.  The teeth of some of the people interviewed were still chattering. I don’t ever want to be surprised like that, not living in a frame house with a 4 ft. crawlspace, along with 2 cats and a parrot. All I visualize is the entire contents of our pole barn whisking around and mowing my house to shreds, while I’m trapped below listening to it.

I’ve got good reason to be afraid. Our weather is getting more and more erratic, and it’s those warm days that don’t want to budge when the cold moves in that cause the problems.  After this week’s tornado fest, everyone should be a little more respectful. You would think by now we would have better predictions.

According to WeatherEye, NASA launched an OTD or Optical Transient Detector satellite in 1995 that was able to view lightening strikes even in the daylight. That satellite passed over a storm and picked up 200 lightening flashes while our sensors on the ground picked up only 9. It also detected plenty of cloud-to-cloud strikes. While they seemed to reach their peak, a tornado touched down. There seems to be a correlation between cloud to cloud lightening activity and the materialization of a tornado. This satellite picked up as much as 20 times more cloud-to-cloud activity than detected on the ground.

That was back in 95, why are we still being surprised by tornadoes like those on Tuesday? It’s 2008. We have a state of the art satellite that can help predict bad weather patterns before they strike, far better than any other before. It’s sitting in a warehouse somewhere. President Bush didn’t allow money for it. He wants to pursue the space station project. The shelved satellite was to replace one that is soon to be obsolete and out of service. In view of the bad weather that we are experiencing, and it’s only going to get worse, I think it would be prudent to urge whoever is the next president to get it launched, and quickly.

http://www.blogsmonroe.com/world/?p=186

http://weathereye.kgan.com/expert/tornadoes/predict.html.

http://weathereye.kgan.com/expert/tornadoes/predict2.html.