Climate change will pose major new hurdles for U.S. naval forces, forcing the military to grapple with an emerging Arctic frontier, increasing demand for humanitarian aid and creating rising seas that could threaten low-lying bases, the National Academy of Sciences said yesterday.
"Even the most moderate current trends in climate, if continued, will present new national security challenges for the the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard," concludes a new academy report. "While the timing, degree and consequence of future climate change impacts remain uncertain, many changes are already underway in regions around the world ... and call for action by U.S. naval leadership in response."
The analysis, conducted at the Navy's request, echoes similar reports authored by the Defense Department, the intelligence community and the Navy's own Task Force Climate Change.
Much of its focus is on the far north, where rising temperatures are decreasing the portion of the oil- and gas- rich Arctic Ocean that is covered by sea ice. By 2030, ice-free periods during late summer could be long enough to create new sea lanes through the polar region, the new report says.
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| In 2009, the submarine USS Annapolis surfaced in the Arctic Ocean so ice experts could examine some of the Navy's old Cold War haunts. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Navy. |
Handling the expected crush of shipping and tourist traffic, along with increased oil and gas exploration and military activity by other nations, will require U.S. naval forces to transform their fleets, from officer training to the mix of ships they employ.
That will be especially challenging because the United States' capacity to operate in the harsh polar environment has degraded since the end of the Cold War, the NAS report says.
A case in point: the United States' aging fleet of of just three icebreakers capable of operating in the Arctic.
One ship, the Polar Star, sits in a Seattle dock in "caretaker" status, undergoing repairs. The Coast Guard hopes to have the vessel back at sea by the end of 2013.
The service plans to decommission another ship that is now operating, the Polar Sea, because needed engine repairs would be cost-prohibitive. Decommissioning the Polar Sea will also free up money needed to finish the Polar Star's repairs.
"As old as they are, and with what it costs to maintain and keep them up, we had to make some difficult choices," said a Coast Guard spokesman, Lt. Paul Rhynard. "With the funding we were given to fix them both, we could only effectively fix one."
The service expects to take the Polar Star out of service at some point before the Polar Sea is seaworthy, leaving only one icebreaker, the Healy, in use. That ship was designed as a scientific research vessel and is less useful for military missions.
The new report also calls for new programs to train Marine Corps units to survive and sustain themselves in the Arctic.
"To my knowledge, we have almost backed out of this cold-weather training," said Frank Bowman, a retired Navy admiral and co-chairman of the committee that wrote the science academy report.
Opening up the Arctic isn't necessarily a recipe for increased conflict, the report says, but the prospect of tapping the region's oil and gas deposits, fisheries and potential new shipping lanes has created a "complex and nuanced" geopolitical situation.
Several Arctic countries are entangled in long-running disputes over their maritime boundaries, including Canada and the United States, Canada and Denmark, and Norway and Russia.
The "most notable" disputes are those involving claims to extend countries' outer continental shelves under the U.N. Law of the Sea Convention, the NAS report says.
The United States is the only major industrialized nation that has not ratified the treaty, which took effect in 1994, despite a broad base of supporters that include the military, mining interests, the oil and gas industry and environmental groups.
Doing so would give the Navy, Marines and Coast Guard "maximum operating flexibility in the Arctic," the science academy says.
"The [treaty] is really important, because that impacts our credibility when we talk to other Arctic nations," said Capt. Tim Gallaudet, deputy director of the Navy's Task Force Climate Change. "They say, 'You say that now, but how can we trust you?'"
But while changing conditions in the Arctic present the most immediate, obvious implications for the U.S. fleet, according to Busalacchi, the new report also outlines emerging issues in other parts of the globe. They include an increased demand for Navy and Marine Corps aid during humanitarian crises, like last year's earthquake in Haiti.
Such missions are likely to emerge as the greatest change to U.S. naval forces' current operations, the science academy says, warning that climate change is likely to cause more frequent or severe droughts, floods, storms and other disasters that could strain military resources and national security missions.
The Navy currently has two hospital ships available, the Comfort and the Mercy. If those ships are retired when the service's budget is tight or if more resources are needed for a large disaster, naval forces should consider leasing out such ships from private companies, the report suggests.
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| The Polar Sea, one of the Coast Guard's tiny, aging fleet of icebreakers, crunches its way through the Beaufort Sea in 2009. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Navy. |
"It's not just a matter of having a large space [for these operations] -- you need a surgical setup, you need a trauma setup, you need beds and you need the proper equipment," Bowman said.
Gallaudet said that leasing ships would make sense, because they are not needed on a consistent basis. He also noted that naval forces could also draw on their aircraft carriers and amphibious ships with large medical facilities to render humanitarian aid.
Another pressing climate change impact confronting the Navy, Marine Corps and Coast Guard is the effect rising seas will have on their low-lying bases and other facilities.
The NAS report says the Navy should expect anywhere from 1.3 to 6.5 feet of sea level rise through the end of the century, with the most likely rise being 2.6 feet.
But those are values for the global average sea level rise, the report notes, cautioning that erosion and subsidence of coastal areas could exacerbate the impact of rising waters in many areas. And even without inundation, a gradual rise in sea level is also likely to increase naval installations' vulnerability to storm surge and increase the height of waves.
Taken together, the laundry list of potential climate impacts on naval operations is daunting, said Jay Gulledge, senior scientist at the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.
"Even though I've been looking at these issues for a few years, this actually drove home to me that the potential for climate change to stress the capability of the naval forces is actually pretty large," he said. "If you think about it, you've got several things going on at the same time, all of which could overtax the Navy's capability."
House-approved legislation that would fund the federal government through September would have a "devastating" effect on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the agency's chief said yesterday.
"The cuts are of a nature that there would be significant hits throughout NOAA's programs," agency Administrator Jane Lubchenco told the House Science, Space and Technology Committee.
Consequences of the cuts could include less accurate long-term and severe weather forecasts and longer response times for marine search-and-rescue operations, she said.
The House-approved spending measure, H.R. 1, would chop $454.3 million from NOAA's operations, research and facilities account. That would slash the agency's total budget to $4.3 billion, down from approximately $4.7 billion in 2010 -- and well below the White House's proposed 2012 budget of $5.5 billion.
The Senate voted down the appropriations bill this week and also nixed a competing plan, leaving no clear path ahead to resolve a weeks-long budget impasse between the two chambers.
Meanwhile, Science Committee Chairman Ralph Hall (R-Texas) made it clear yesterday that he has little sympathy for NOAA's budget woes.
The White House's fiscal 2012 budget request for NOAA "contains few surprises, but several concerns," he said. Among them: NOAA's proposed "Climate Service."
The agency announced its plans to create the climate service last spring, arguing that the new office would create a central federal source of information on everything from projections of sea level rise to maps of the nation's best sites for wind and solar power -- information designed to help governments and businesses adapt to climate change.
The climate service is at the heart of President Obama's 2012 budget request for NOAA, which calls for a sweeping reorganization of NOAA's climate portfolio.
But that hasn't swayed Hall, who authored an amendment to H.R. 1 that would bar NOAA from spending money during the current fiscal year to implement its climate service plans.
"This committee has not yet had the opportunity to fully examine the implications of transitioning fundamental climate research into an operational office," Hall said yesterday. "Until and unless Congress reviews and approves this proposal, I expect NOAA to continue to operate as it did prior to the February 2010 announcement."
Meanwhile, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) derided the climate service plan as "trendy" and "froufrou."
In response to questions from Hall, Lubchenco said that NOAA began planning the climate service during the George W. Bush administration and "planning continues," but the agency has not started operating a climate service.
Facing a panel stacked with Republicans who are skeptical of mainstream scientific views of climate change, the NOAA chief emphasized she saw a growing demand for the information that a climate service would provide.
"We are getting inundated with requests for information that is months to years to decades out -- not centuries," Lubchenco said. "People want to plan. Water managers or city managers or farmers are trying to evaluate what they should do to plan for the next year."
Science panel Republicans also took aim at NOAA's plans for its collection of weather and climate satellites.
The White House's fiscal 2012 budget request seeks $2 billion for NOAA's environmental satellite division. Just over $1 billion of that would be set aside for the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS), a weather and environmental satellite program formed out of the scraps of a defunct joint effort between NOAA and the Air Force.
According to NOAA, JPSS will provide 98 percent of the raw data for the agency's weather model and is crucial to the agency's hurricane forecasts, climate predictions and ability to assist with search-and-rescue operations. But the satellite program's progress has been threatened by the series of continuing budget resolutions that have kept the federal government's lights on since October.
NOAA needs -- but has not received -- $910 million for JPSS during the current fiscal year, Lubchenco told lawmakers.
She said: "I fully appreciate what a large number that is, but the consequences of not having it are very severe. For every dollar we do not spend this year on this program, it will cost us three to five dollars in the future to build this program back up."
Operating under temporary spending measures for the last five months has already delayed JPSS by at least a year, Lubchenco said.
"What that means is that down the road, we will inevitably have a gap where we will not have the ability to do severe storm warnings as we do them today," she added. "It is highly likely we will have a gap. The longer we wait, the longer that gap gets."
Hall questioned why NOAA was spending money to developing JASON-3, a joint mission with the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites to monitor sea level rise, while its JPSS coffers were running dry.
"You know that you can't have both," Hall told Lubchenco. "Don't you need to prioritize in this economy? I think weather is, by any reasonable person, more important than sea-level change. We can't have everything we want."
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House Republicans took a hammer to U.S. EPA's climate regulations yesterday, moving legislation that would prevent the Obama administration from slashing carbon emissions through smokestack limits or issuing future tailpipe standards.
The Energy and Power Subcommittee pushed through legislation sponsored by Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) that would permanently block EPA from considering greenhouse gases in current and future regulations on large stationary sources and also stop the agency from crafting further greenhouse gas standards for vehicles.
But its future remains a row of question marks, starting with the bill's political viability in the Senate and signs that it will attract a veto from President Obama. The White House has indicated that any provision stripping EPA of its ability to regulate greenhouse gases would not make it past the president's desk.
Several Senate Democrats were quick to issue statements yesterday decrying the vote by the House energy panel. New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D) called yesterday's vote a "huge step backwards" that would "tear down critical environmental protections and put big polluters above human health." California Sen. Barbara Boxer (D) said, "I will do everything in my power to stop attacks on the Clean Air Act that threaten the health of our families."
But yesterday, House Democrats did not offer any amendments that would seek to blunt the bill. Instead, Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey (D) told ClimateWire that the hearing was merely the "preview of coming attractions" before the bill goes before the full committee. Democratic Reps. Bobby Rush (Ill.) and Henry Waxman (Calif.) both indicated that amendments would be offered to the legislation when it goes to full committee.
Observers of the committee, however, suggest that any amendments seeking to significantly limit the bill would not be able to overcome opposition.
Earlier this week, Waxman said that it is a foregone conclusion the bill will pass the House (Greenwire, March 7). He predicted, however, that the bill -- which he says "codifies science denial" -- would stall in the Senate.
Illinois Rep. John Shimkus (R) yesterday said that lawmakers should not be so quick to jump to conclusions on the future of the bill. "As much as my colleagues want to say what the Senate will and will not do and what the president will and will not do, we want to give them the opportunity to weigh in on this decision," he said.
By the time such a bill reached Obama's desk, he said, "perhaps we can change his mind."
Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, an advocacy group, said he doubts the bill will move through the Senate, but suggested that if a provision like the Upton legislation were attached to a spending bill, it would be a difficult decision for the president when it comes to breaking out the veto pen.
"I think it depends on what the bill looks like -- I think [the president] would have to think about it if it was part of his spending bill," agreed Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change. "My experience in the Clinton administration is that the president -- President Clinton -- signed some spending bills with riders he didn't like," she said.
One industry lobbyist suggested that Obama would be willing to engage in some sort of trade-off to pass a "clean energy standard" (CES) and simultaneously scuttle EPA's ability to regulate greenhouse gases.
Claussen said that scenario seems unlikely, partly because the timing would not make sense. "There may be some senators who are thinking about a CES, but it's in the very early stages," she said. "There isn't a real conversation about what it would include, and we have no idea yet if it could get 60 votes in the Senate. In the House, I think the chances are dismal for something like a CES; I just don't see it," she said.
Texas Rep. Gene Green (D) yesterday said that the House should not wait for the bill to stall in the Senate before looking into other options to curb EPA's climate rules. "What happens when the president vetoes this legislation and the votes don't exist in either chamber to override the veto?" Green asked.
Green is in the early stages of crafting alternative legislation that would seek to postpone implementation of EPA's climate regulations until there is more technology available that could rein in greenhouse gases. A Green spokesman said that they don't yet have specific technology or dates in mind, but that the bill would seek to delay implementation for "more than two years."
In the Senate, Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe (R) introduced a companion bill to Upton's legislation that is co-sponsored by Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and most Senate Republicans. Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson (D) is also reportedly considering signing onto the bill, but clearing 60 votes is still expected to be a challenge.
Analysis of the Upton bill circulated to House committee Democrats yesterday by Waxman and Rush suggested that the legislation may have far-reaching impacts, including miring the existing motor vehicle standards in legal ambiguity and blocking California from setting its own motor vehicle standards under the Clean Air Act, since the bill would strip EPA of its ability to grant California the waivers that allow it to set its own standards.
Some Republicans, on the other hand, argued that the bill would spur rising gas prices by hampering American energy production and sending jobs overseas, allegations that Democrats called absurd because current greenhouse gas regulations on large stationary sources primarily call for consideration of energy efficiency provisions, rather than significant changes to construction plans.
Ultimately, O'Donnell was skeptical that this bill would ever be passed by Obama.
"I can't believe that President Obama would ever permit this bill to become law," he said. "If he did, he might as well demand the resignation of the head of the EPA, the head of the Council on Environmental Quality and who knows who else. It would be tantamount to saying he has no confidence in his government -- it would be inconceivable," he said.
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California's much-altered program for electric cars will support sales projections, a review has found.
The International Council on Clean Transportation's analysis of California's zero emission vehicles (ZEV) program found that continuing sales targets through 2026 as proposed by the state would help establish a 'floor' in the event that electric vehicle production flags.
The California Air Resources Board (ARB) later this year will consider requiring automakers to have electric vehicles make up 1.5 to 4 percent of their sales between 2018 and 2021, and 5 to 8 percent between 2022 and 2025. These targets fall within the range of most analysts' sales estimates, the report finds.
"[T]he ZEV mandate can now be viewed as a "floor," establishing minimum production requirements that will maintain some level of investment and momentum even if the voluntary programs in other jurisdictions do not move forward as planned," the report says.
ARB Chairwoman Mary Nichols herself conceded last week that the program has had problems. It has been adjusted seven times since its inception in 1990, reflecting slower-than-expected EV production. "As it turned out, the model of mandating a certain number of vehicles to be sold wasn't the right mechanism for pulling the entire market, but it was very influential, without a doubt," she said at a clean-tech conference in Santa Barbara. "It helped keep investments going in companies that otherwise might have dwindled down to nothing."
California can deepen the program by starting to figure out how the vehicles' electricity use might affect greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, the report says. It also cautions that any EV policy will have limited effects.
"Although the global level of support for vehicle electrification is encouraging, major obstacles must be overcome before any pure electric drive vehicle can compete with continually improving conventional power trains and achieve deployment volumes sufficient to make an environmental difference," the report says.
At least some industry members agree. Executives from General Electric Co., which launched a seven-city tour today in San Francisco to promote its EV services, acknowledged technical obstacles to widespread adoption.
GE's own fleet of conventionally fueled vehicles, for example, travels about 85 miles a day per car, on average. That's probably too close to the typical EV's 100-mile range for comfort, said Clarence Nunn, CEO of GE's capital solutions division, which leases cars and equipment to businesses.
Rebates and other incentives can only stimulate the demand side so much, he said. "What's going to change consumers' buying behaviors?" he asked. "We haven't seen that yet."
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The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee met yesterday to hear testimony on bills that would make household appliances more energy efficient and repeal a ban on 100-watt incandescent light bulbs.
Most of the discussion revolved around the heated light bulb debate, which Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) acknowledged is a largely symbolic one.
"Light bulbs have really become a hot topic around the Hill now," said Murkowski, the committee's ranking member, right before the testimonies. "They have become more of a symbol of the overreach of big government. I can sympathize with that."
The light bulb bill, sponsored by Sen. Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.), seeks to repeal a ban on incandescent light bulbs that use 100 watts or more set to go into effect next year. The ban came as part of legislation added to an omnibus energy bill passed in 2007.
Of the seven people who testified, most were members from energy industry trade groups. All opposed the repeal of the light bulb ban, except Howard Brandston, a lighting designer. In his testimony, Branston said the 2007 provision is a "de facto ban on incandescent light bulbs" that will "have a significant negative impact on almost every residence in our country."
"Some of the most knowledgeable people I know have begun to stockpile a lifetime supply of incandescent lamps to protect themselves from the need to use compact fluorescent lamps," Brandston said.
Much of the discussion revolved around whether the light bulb ban would restrict consumer choices. Kathleen Hogan, the deputy assistant secretary for energy efficiency at the Department of Energy, repeatedly stated that the ban won't apply to all incandescent bulbs, but to those that use 100 watts or more.
"It's not a ban," Hogan said. "It sets performance levels for light bulbs by asking them to be 30 percent more efficient."
Hogan added that a number of different light bulbs, including incandescents, already meet those standards.
Later on, Kyle Pitsor of the National Electrical Manufacturers Association and Steven Nadel of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy echoed that point by bringing bulbs that would work under the new regulations. They included energy-efficent incandescent, compact fluorescent and LED bulbs.
"I'm sitting here with four or five different light bulbs by every manufacturer, who are going to get out there and compete," said Mark Cooper, a researcher at the Consumer Federation of America.
"And if dimmability is so important," Cooper continued, referring to a common perception that incandescents give off a more attractive glow, "then that incandescent which meets the standard will win in the marketplace."
At one point in the hearing, committee Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) pointed out that the committee room is the first in Congress to switch all its lights to LEDs.
Two similar bills have been introduced in the House. One, introduced by Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), carries the same "Better Use of Light Bulbs" title. Another was introduced by Rep. Michele Bachmann. Both have been referred to the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Its chairman, Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), co-authored the 2007 legislation that bans 100-watt bulbs. An Energy and Commerce committee aide said Upton will work with committee to "learn all the facts about what has happened in the market since enactment of the law."
The bill that didn't receive as much attention seeks tougher efficiency standards on about 20 household appliances, including air conditioners and water dispensers. Congress has tweaked appliance standards five times since 1987 in similar measures. The bill failed in the Senate by one vote during the lame-duck session this past December.
Each witness spoke in favor of it except Brandston, who didn't comment on it.
Joseph McGuire, president of the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, said the bill would save "more than 9 quads of energy over 30 years and save consumers billions of dollars in reduced energy bills."
He added that under it, clothes washers and dishwashers would use 5 trillion less gallons of water over the next 30 years and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by about 550 million metric tons.
Most of the senators remained mum on the issue, except for Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who made his opposition to both measures clear when addressing DOE's Hagen.
"You're really anti-choice on every consumer item that you've listed here, including light bulbs, refrigerators, toilets, you name it," he told her. "You restrict my purchases. You don't care about my choices. You don't care about the consumer, frankly."
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Hand in hand with its push to improve efficiency, the United Kingdom's Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) yesterday unveiled a plan to encourage heating from low-carbon sources -- the first of its kind in the world.
The Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), released just two days after a sweeping road map to schedule carbon-cutting initiatives over the next five years, will initially provide £860 million ($1.38 billion) to kick-start a £4.5 billion ($7.2 billion) green capital investment goal for 2020.
"It'll help the U.K. shift away from fossil fuel, reducing carbon emissions and encouraging innovation, jobs and growth in new advanced technologies," said Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change Chris Huhne.
This will go toward subsidizing businesses and residents to adopt low-emitting heat technologies such as solar heat pumps, biomass boilers and ground-source heating. Larger industries would be able to invest in anaerobic digesters, biomethane injectors and geothermal equipment. Returns will range, according to the size of the installation and source of the energy, from 1.9 pence (3 cents) per kilowatt-hour for biomass to 8.5 pence (14 cents) for solar thermal.
"We've been consulted so that this is as attractive [a plan] as possible," said a spokesperson for DECC. "I'm sure industry will help make renewable heat something that's accessible to homes."
Heating is the source of 46 percent of the country's CO2 emissions, with 95 percent of heating fuel coming from fossil fuels, according to DECC. Several other renewables programs are already in place in the country, including the Renewables Obligation and Feed-In Tariffs schemes to help drive demand for renewable electricity, and the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation.
The incentive is planned in conjunction with the passage of the "Green Deal" in the proposed energy bill currently making its way through Parliament. Under the Green Deal, residents would be eligible for incentive payments to increase the efficiency of their homes, through improved insulation and other retrofits (ClimateWire, March 9). While the Green Deal targets heating efficiency, the RHI deals with the source of the heat.
The first phase will apply to non-domestic sectors. Recipients should expect payments by September, said a DECC spokesperson, with payments to households starting in October 2012 -- after the expected passage of the Green Deal. Until then, £15 million ($24 million) in "premium" payments will be disbursed to help cover the costs of new heating systems.
To be eligible for premium payments, one must live in a well-insulated home and be willing to give feedback on the new technology. Priority will also be given to those living on the gas grid -- as opposed to the electricity grid -- to heat their homes, which is both more expensive and carbon-intensive.
DECC projects renewable heating to grow to 13,000 installations in the industrial sector and 110,000 in the commercial and public sector by 2020, supplying 25 percent of the heat demand overall. Tariffs will be paid over 20 years for technology installed after July 15, 2009.
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Construction on Brazil's Belo Monte hydrolectric dam in the Amazon Basin began this week, starting with infrastructure work to provide roads in the region.
The $11.2 billion dam on the Amazon's Xingu River is slated to begin producing energy on Dec. 31, 2014. It could become the third-largest dam in the world.
The dam is needed to satiate the demand for energy that grew along with economic growth last year, says the Brazilian government. But indigenous and environmental groups say development with displace many thousands of residents and possibly trigger violence in the Amazon state of Pará.
"Belo Monte allows Brazil to achieve two objectives. First, it manages to meet the energy needs of the country, which will foster growth in development, while at the same time maintaining low levels of greenhouse gas emissions," said Mauricio Tolmasquim, the president of Brazil's Energy Research Co.
Earlier this month, Sheyla Juruna, a prominent indigenous activist from the region, traveled to London to stir awareness of the negative impacts of the project.
"We are here to show the international community that we are not being heard and that the Brazilian government is seriously violating our rights," she said. "The government speaks about sustainable development and human rights. How can this be true when they are forcing these projects of destruction on us?"
Last year, Hollywood film director James Cameron visited the dam. "If this goes forward, then every other hydroelectric project in the Amazon Basin gets a blank check," he said. "It's now a global issue. The Amazon rainforest is so big and so powerful ... that its destruction will affect everyone."
However, some locals welcome the 20,000 jobs the dam is expected bring to the local economy.
Tolmasquim said the dam's design stresses environmental sustainability and minimal impacts to the human and natural environment.
"No indigenous land surrounding the area of the project will be flooded. No indigenous community will be moved out of their land," he said. "This is a very different project from other major projects, such as the Three Gorges Dam project [in China], which was estimated to have relocated 1 million people."
But opponents continue to fight the development.
"The struggle to resist the Belo Monte Dam and protect the Xingu River is far from over," said Christian Poirier, the Brazil program coordinator for environmental group Amazon Watch. "Resistance on the ground will not waver" (Tom Phillips, London Guardian, Mar. 10). -- TS
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Public worries about the environmental impacts of natural gas drilling could harm the future of the industry, executives said at a conference in Houston on Wednesday.
Natural gas companies need to work on public image to dispel fears of water contamination, said Scott Sheffield, CEO of Pioneer Natural Resources. Reports from The New York Times and the Oscar-nominated documentary film "Gasland" have linked companies to the polluting of water resources. They point to the process of hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," the method used to free natural gas from rocks underground, as the source of the contamination.
Skepticism is especially high in the Northeast, where the Marcellus Shale formation is attracting natural gas producers to an area whose residents are not used to seeing drilling rigs.
"I think the bulk of that is happening in states like Pennsylvania and New York, where the amount of drilling growth is something they haven't seen before and the system is not really set up to handle the volume of activity from the public's perspective," said Stacy Schusterman, CEO of Samson Investment.
The industry is also working to convince ratepayers that natural gas is a reliable source of energy and not prone to volatility, as some believe.
"The message is just getting out there that there is a lot of supply," said Guy Buckley, a vice president of corporate development at Spectra Energy, a natural gas pipeline and storage company.
At about $4 per million British thermal units, prices of natural gas energy are low. But utilities are reluctant to commit, worried that prices will eventually rise.
"You've got to change some of these big decisionmakers like power generators, and those decisions will get made as they become more secure that the shale gale is real, it's here and that prices are reasonable," Buckley said (Jennifer Dlouhy, Houston Chronicle, March 10). -- TS
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To cope with a rise in atmospheric carbon, vegetation in Florida is changing the way it absorbs water, a study has found.
Through photosynthesis and transpiration, plants absorb carbon dioxide and release moisture through tiny pores called stomata. Comparing modern plants with samples from peat bogs and museums, ecologists have found that over time, the number of stomata found on leaves has decreased due to rising levels of carbon dioxide.
Water evaporates from the stomata, and the plant pulls up more water from the soil. Fewer stomata mean that less water is released. In the long term, increasing CO2 in the atmosphere will decrease the rate of evaporated water into the atmosphere by half, the researchers predict, with harsh consequences for rainfall and weather patterns.
"Our analysis of that structural change shows there's been a huge reduction in the release of water to the atmosphere," said David Dilcher, a researcher at the University of Florida. "The carbon cycle is important, but so is the water cycle."
Although this will lead to more soil moisture at first, less rainfall will eventually lead to less water in the ground, added Dilcher.
The study was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (Discovery News/MSNBC.com, Mar. 8). -- TS
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With a fuel economy of more than 50 miles per gallon on the highway, the new Chevrolet Cruze Eco sounds like one of the many hot new hybrids or electric vehicles on the market.
It's not. It runs on a conventional gasoline engine.
While hydrogen, electric and other alternative cars get all the hype, efficient models powered by conventional engines may provide the best immediate hope. These cars are able to attain similar fuel economies to the alternative cars by being stripped of unnecessary weight, streamlined to move smoothly and equipped with gas-sipping engines.
General Motors, Ford and Hyundai have all been selling cars this year with conventional engines that can get 40 mpg on the highway. This exceeds the efficiency of some hybrids.
"The buzz has been all about electric vehicles and hybrids, but to me, the real buzz should be about the old internal combustion engine," said Jeremy Anwyl, CEO of Edmunds.com, an automotive website. "It ain't dead yet."
Engineers of the Cruze Eco dropped its weight by 200 pounds, installed shutters to close part of the grill and reduce wind drag at higher speeds, added a rear spoiler and cut its height by 1 centimeter. All of this made it more efficient.
With a manual transmission, the Eco is rated at 42 mpg on the highway by the government but can get up to 50 mpg under the right conditions, reviewers say. The new Ford Focus and Hyundai Elantra are rated at 40 mpg (Peter Whoriskey, Washington Post, March 9). -- JJP
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