Month: February 2010

Interview: ‘Sound Science’

  • Oliver Houck is a Professor of Law at Tulane University in New Orleans. (Photo by Paula Birch, Courtesy of Tulane University)

Every once in a while, we
hear politicians using a
term that everybody thinks
they understand, but people
define differently. Lester
Graham talked with an expert
about one such term heard
a lot these days:

Transcript

Every once in a while, we
hear politicians using a
term that everybody thinks
they understand, but people
define differently. Lester
Graham talked with an expert
about one such term heard
a lot these days:

Lester Graham: I got to thinking about that when I heard Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma call for “sound science” at a recent subcommittee hearing, and then moments later senator David Vitter repeated that call for “sound Science.”

Vitter: “I think the answer is exactly what senator Inhofe and others have been saying—“sound science” complete focus on, complete reliance, on sound science above all else.”

Graham: So sound science, I think most of us think that means well researched, unbiased, verifiable, science. Joining us now, is Oliver Houck, he is a professor of law at Tulane University. So professor, what’s that term—sound science—mean to members of congress?

Oliver Houck: It means whatever they want it to mean. The first thing you have to understand is sound science is not a scientific term at all. It has no scientific definition. It’s like saying sound congressman or sound senator. It’s in the eye of the beholder. In the legal world, everyone knows what sound science is—it’s the science that supports your client’s position, and bad science is the science that’s on the other side. So, in the real world, it’s a very cynical term, and it’s very cynically used. That isn’t to say there isn’t junk science, but in the political world, this is a political term. Frank Lutz, the republican strategist in the early 2000’s sent a very well-known memorandum out to all republican congressman and senators saying that the coming issue was climate change, and the world consensus that this was urgent and something had to be done was overwhelming and irresistible. The only loophole—the only point of attack would be to attack the science. And so they did, with great success.

Graham: Has this term ‘Sound Science’ always been attached to this political baggage?

Houck: Yes it has, but it’s come in different forms, and it’s not always been purely environmental. The term was actually invented by Phillip Morris, and the tobacco institute back in the 70’s, 80’s, and 90’s when the tobacco wars were going on and the industry was denying any addictive effects and any carcinogenic effects. And so Phillip Morris had the audacity in 1992 to set up something called the “advancement of sound science committee” and that was, of course, its lobby to pick apart scientists whose findings were otherwise. While of course Phillip Morris buried all findings of the same effects, and burying that ultimately lead to civil suits and brought it down—but only a peg. This has always been the blast back—if you can stop this thing at the beach by discrediting the science, you don’t have to deal with any regulatory or any other requirements. So-

Graham: So calling for sound science is a delay tactic.

Houck: oh, clearly so, clearly so. And they know it, and they know it.

Graham: Oliver Houck is a professor of environmental law at Tulane University in New Orleans, and author of the book Taking Back Eden: Eight Environmental Cases that Changed the World. Thanks very much.

Houck: My pleasure, thank you.

Related Links

Challenging the EPA Over CO2 Regs

  • Lisa Jackson is the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. (Photo courtesy of the US EPA)

The Environmental Protection
Agency officially found global
warming gasses such as carbon
dioxide are a threat to human
health. Mark Brush reports
three states are challenging
that finding:

Transcript

The Environmental Protection
Agency officially found global
warming gasses such as carbon
dioxide are a threat to human
health. Mark Brush reports
three states are challenging
that finding:

The EPA says it has a duty to regulate greenhouse gasses to protect us from global warming.

The state of Texas, Virginia, and Alabama have filed legal challenges to try to stop the EPA. They say the coming regulations will be bad for the economy. And they call into question the science that EPA based its decision on.

Here’s the Texas attorney general – Greg Abbott:

“The information on which the EPA relies can neither confirm nor deny that there has been global warming, or that temperatures have risen.”

The EPA says it’s evaluated all the science available for the last ten years, and that the evidence is quote “compelling” that climate change is real – and that it’s a threat to human health and welfare.

Those three states challenging the EPA’s decision to regulate greenhouse gases are countered by sixteen other states supporting the EPA’s decision.

For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

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The New South, With a Tinge of Green

  • Some are calling Alabama the future 'green hub of the South.' (Photo source: Wikimedia Commons)

When Forbes Magazine ranked states
by their “greenness” the usual
suspects topped the list – Vermont,
Oregon, and Washington – all progressive
states known for their environmental
movements. Maybe not surprisingly,
seven out of the ten “least green”
states were in the South – the land
of coal mines and timber plots.
But as Tanya Ott reports,
there’s a growing environmental
movement down south and some of
its members might surprise you:

Transcript

When Forbes Magazine ranked states
by their “greenness” the usual
suspects topped the list – Vermont,
Oregon, and Washington – all progressive
states known for their environmental
movements. Maybe not surprisingly,
seven out of the ten “least green”
states were in the South – the land
of coal mines and timber plots.
But as Tanya Ott reports,
there’s a growing environmental
movement down south and some of
its members might surprise you:

(sound of cars driving past)

I’m standing in a vacant lot in downtown Birmingham, Alabama. I see overgrown weeds and closed businesses, but James Smith sees something entirely different. He’s President of an international company called Green Building Focus. When he looks at this lot, he sees an uptapped market. He wants to build an eco-industrial park here.

“There are many companies out there in other parts of the country who want to have access to the southeastern market, they realize it’s one of the fastest growing markets in the country. And if you draw a 500 mile radius around Birmingham you hit every major developing area in the southeast. It’s really the ideal location geographically to become a regional manufacturing hub for sustainable products.”

Alabama, a green hub of the south? This is the land of mega-churches and Republicans, not environmentalists.

“The federal trend over the last 10 years, longer than that, no doubt has been if you’re a Republican you can’t be an environmentalist.”


That’s Gil Rogers. He’s an attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center. He says nationally Republicans get a bad rap for denying climate change and trying to roll back the endangered species list. But at the state and local level, things are often different in the south.

“We have a lot of republican champions, as an example, in the Georgia legislature that are Republicans in terms of wanting lower taxes and less government intrusion into a lot of aspects of life. But then will go and realize that there needs to be more done in the way of environmental protection of water resources or of air quality. That those have real public health impacts.”

Rogers says these leaders often have strong ties their own piece of nature – maybe a stretch of land or a river.

“I’m a tree hugging, liberal – I mean a tree hugging conservative, Republican! (laughs) which I know some people may say is an oxymoron. But (laughs)”


But Charlie Houser loves Magnolia River.


(sound of boat motor)

He fires up his pontoon boat to give me a tour. Houser grew up here in Magnolia Springs, Alabama. When he moved back to retire, he worried about what he saw.


“I didn’t see the sea grass. We lost blue crabs, we lost pike.”

He blames agricultural runoff full of chemicals. So, Mayor Houser and the mostly republican town council passed really tough land use rules. All new buildings have to set back 75 feet from the river. New subdivisions have to keep their run-off on site. And it’s working. The brown pelicans are back and the river is less cloudy. The state has named Magnolia River an Alabama Outstanding Waterway.

Gil Rogers, with the Southern Environmental Law Center, says there are still big environmental threats in the south. Coal mining, timber, and other industries. But he’s optimistic.

“People have started to recognize that there’re some real threats from population growth, poor development patterns. So I think there is a movement here going on and it’s unique to the south, I think, in a lot of ways.”

Certainly, it’s creating some interesting alliances – like environmentalists teaming up with hunters. Rogers says, at least in the south, he’s seeing more cooperation than ever.

For The Environment Report, I’m Tanya Ott.

Related Links

Chlorine Carted Out of Canada

  • A Canadian chemical manufacturer shipped rail cars of toxic chlorine away from Vancouver and is storing them in rural Washington State. (Photo source: Wikimedia Commons)

Environmental groups suspect tight
security at the Vancouver Olympics
has shifted an environmental risk
from Canada to the US. Shawn Allee reports:

Transcript

Environmental groups suspect tight
security at the Vancouver Olympics
has shifted an environmental risk
from Canada to the US. Shawn Allee reports:

A Canadian chemical manufacturer shipped rail cars of toxic chlorine away from Vancouver and is storing them in rural Washington State.

The company says it’s part of a long-planned renovation of the chemical plant. Environmental groups suspect the rail shipments were timed to move tanks away from the Olympics.

Fred Millar is watching this development for Friends of the Earth. Millar says terrorists have shown interest in rail cars filled with chlorine gas.

“And that’s what people are mostly worried about because just one chlorine tank car could put out a cloud over any city at a lethal level that’s 15 miles long by 4 miles wide.”

US rail companies make 100,000 shipments of chlorine and similar toxic chemicals per year. Their safety record has largely been good, but accidents have released deadly chlorine gas.

One derailment in South Carolina killed nine people.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

Financing Energy Efficiency

  • More than half the houses in the U.S. were built before 1970. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laborator)

Reducing your carbon footprint
by using less energy can cost
money. Efficient cars, energy
efficient homes, and energy-saving
appliances all take money. That’s
why some states are testing whether
homeowners would be willing
to borrow money to upgrade their
homes and, in turn, save a few
bucks in energy costs. In one
state, the plan is to get private
banks and credit unions to finance
energy efficiency. Peter Payette reports:

Transcript

Reducing your carbon footprint
by using less energy can cost
money. Efficient cars, energy
efficient homes, and energy-saving
appliances all take money. That’s
why some states are testing whether
homeowners would be willing
to borrow money to upgrade their
homes and, in turn, save a few
bucks in energy costs. In one
state, the plan is to get private
banks and credit unions to finance
energy efficiency. Peter Payette reports:

When you hear green building, you might think of a fancy new house with solar panels. But most homes are not new, so reducing the amount of energy communities use means doing something about old houses.

Max Strickland owns a business in Michigan that certifies green homes and buildings. He says more than half the houses in the U.S. were built before 1970.

“We had very little energy code requirements previous to that.”

But upgrades cost money that many homes owners don’t always have. And a lot of people saw whatever equity they had in their house disappear during the past couple of years.

Now, the State of Michigan is trying to help people find the money to make their homes more energy efficient. The program is called Michigan Saves. The state launched the pilot project in a rural area of the state. The pilot is a collaboration of a local credit union, an electric cooperative and a building supply company.
Borrowers will have their new payment tacked onto their monthly utility bill.

Trevor Williams is with Brown Lumber, the building supply company involved in the pilot. Williams says it’s likely most of the improvements will be in heating costs. He says to begin with, home owners will be encouraged to have an energy audit.

“The audit it would say things that need to be done, the top three things that are recommended. Furnace replacement, ceiling ducts and weatherizing the house those going to be the three most common items.”

But homeowners can also borrow money for new energy efficient appliances like refrigerators and hot water heaters. Sometimes loans like this are promoted as immediately paying for themselves. That is, it’s suggested the money you save on your utility bills will fully cover your new payment. That’s not necessarily the case.

Marc McKeller is with Members Credit Union which is financing the project. He says after a few years, people will be able to break even on the costs. Government tax incentives and other rebates will help that happen. But McKellar says people shouldn’t expect to take out a loan, retrofit their house and not have more to pay each month.

“The only way it could be was if a government was to give zero percent loans out and that they received tremendous rebates from the utilities and that they received a tremendous government credit.”


But, McKellar says it’s still a good deal. The interest rate for project’s loans will be a little bit better because the state is backing the loans.

And tight credit means not many banks are loaning people money to make their house energy efficient and not many people are putting money into a home that’s lost value because of the housing market bust. That’s one of the reasons they need to run a pilot project.

“They’re trying to determine through this study, how do you get a consumer to actually do this and what are the benefits?”

The directors of Michigan Saves hope to roll out a statewide program later this year. So far no banks have agreed to participate but there are other credit unions interested in the concept.

For The Environment Report, I’m Peter Payette.

Related Links

Nuclear Loans Guaranteed

  • If all goes according to plan, the nuclear reactors will go up in six to seven years and cost around 14 billion dollars. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

The Obama Administration
announced that it will back
the cost of constructing two
new nuclear reactors. Mark
Brush reports, if they’re
constructed, they’ll be the
first reactors built in the
country in nearly three decades:

Transcript

The Obama Administration
announced that it will back
the cost of constructing two
new nuclear reactors. Mark
Brush reports, if they’re
constructed, they’ll be the
first reactors built in the
country in nearly three decades:

The Southern Company plans to build the reactors in Georgia. They say, if all goes well, they’ll go up in six to seven years and cost around 14 billion dollars.


Investors have seen nuclear energy as a risky bet. But now that the President says the government will guarantee the loans, Wall Street might be enticed back to nuclear energy.

And then there’s the question of safety. President Obama’s Energy Secretary is Steven Chu. He says these new generation reactors are safe.

“We expect that the newer generation reactors will be ideally completely passively safe. Which means that, uh, you don’t actually need to control the reactor. If you lose control of it, it will not melt down.”

Some environmentalists say nuclear energy is not worth the costs – and there’s still no permanent place to store nuclear waste that’s radioactive for thousands of years.

For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

Mixed Messages on Oil and Gas Drilling

  • Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced that there would be more auctions for drilling leases this year. (Photo courtesy of NOAA)

The federal government leases public
land to oil and natural gas companies
for drilling. For at least the last
decade, energy companies have called
the shots. The Obama Administration
has indicated things are different now.
Conrad Wilson reports, there are some
inconsistencies in the Obama Administration’s
plan to reign in the industry:

Transcript

The federal government leases public
land to oil and natural gas companies
for drilling. For at least the last
decade, energy companies have called
the shots. The Obama Administration
has indicated things are different now.
Conrad Wilson reports, there are some
inconsistencies in the Obama Administration’s
plan to reign in the industry:

Because of the recession, we’re not using as much energy. For the last
several months, there’s been a glut of oil and natural gas. Big oil and
natural gas companies saw record profits a couple of years ago – but those
profits are down now.

If you ask the energy companies, it would seem the biggest culprit is not
the economy, but the federal government.

For instance, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar is blamed for energy
companies’ falling profits. That’s because he’s criticized oil and gas
companies for acting like they have a right to drill on as much public land
as they want.

“Trade groups for the oil and gas industry repeatedly launch attacks that
have all the poison and deception of election year politics. Trade groups
for the oil and gas industry need to understand that they do not own the
nation’s public lands, tax payers do.”

That sounds like tough talk, right? And in many ways it is. There have
been some major reforms that change the way business is done between the
government and and oil and gas drillers.

But behind all this stick waving, the industry’s also getting a carrot. In
a conciliatory gesture, Salazar announced that there would be more auctions
for drilling leases this year.

The industry says it needs access to even more land. Kathleen Sgamma
directs government affairs for the Denver-based trade group Independent
Petroleum Association of Mountain States. In November, her office issued a
report criticizing the Department of Interior. Among the many concerns, was
the amount of land offered for lease.

“Our full paper looked at all of the things that the Interior Department is
doing to make it more difficult to develop American natural gas and oil on
federal lands. And one of those things is a slow down in permitting.”

But the government says a slow down in permits and leases is not causing
lower profits for oil and gas. As it is, companies are not drilling or
pumping where they already have leases – because there’s a glut of
supplies.

In Western Colorado, the Thompson Divide Coalition wants to cancel leases
and prevent drilling. Lisa Moreno heads up the alliance of ranchers,
hunters, and conservationists.

“The fact of the matter is, is the industry has a huge amount of acreage
under lease that they haven’t developed.”

Moreno says energy companies have leased about 47 million acres, but the
oil and gas companies are only using about one-third of that land right
now.

So why do oil and gas companies want more land? Even if energy companies
don’t use the lands for drilling, they’re still an important asset.

Jeremy Nichols is Climate and Energy Program Director for WildEarth
Guardians. Nichols says leases represent assets and are used to attract
investors.

“And so drilling is just part of what they do. They’re also basically land
holding companies. You know, they’re buying and selling each other left and
right. And so it’s more than just to drill or not to drill. It’s a lot
more, it’s a lot more complicated than that.”

If that’s the case, why is the government opening more leases?

Well, Jeremy Nichols thinks Interior Secretary Ken Salazar is trying to
kiss and make up.

“You know, I’ll be honest I think Salazar appearing conciliatory. But the
oil and gas industry is going to be critical no matter what Salazar does.
The oil and gas industry just doesn’t like to be regulated; they don’t like
to be told what to do. And so they’re going to complain no matter what.”

And so, more of the public’s land will be held by oil and gas drillers who
won’t be producing much until the economy recovers, prices go up and they
can make more money.

For The Environment Report, I’m Conrad Wilson.

Related Links

President Obama Gags Federal Employees

  • Some say this is similar to the kind of gag orders issued during the Bush Administration. (Photo by Pete Souza, courtesy of the White House)

The Obama Open Government
Directive is supposed to open
government to the people.
Lester Graham reports everything
is not as open as you might hope:

Transcript

The Obama Open Government
Directive is supposed to open
government to the people.
Lester Graham reports everything
is not as open as you might hope:

Some agencies have posted new websites that encourage the public to talk with the government.

At the same time, officials in the government were telling their people not to talk to the public or the media and threatening disciplinary action toward some employees who posted on the web things they knew about government proposals.

Recent memos from Forest Service officials order their law enforcment employees not to talk to any national media or any local reporter covering a national issue without approval from the Washington press office.

Jeff Ruch is the executive director of the group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

“So, it’s hard to maintain on one hand you’re being transparent and on the other hand the people who know what’s going on aren’t allowed to speak.”

Ruch says this is similar to the kind of gag orders issued during the Bush Administration.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

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Fixing Up Foreclosures

  • Megan McNally in front of her home in Buffalo. She purchased the house for $3,800. (Photo by Emma Jacobs)

In many older cities, some
neighborhoods are known for
their abandoned houses. A
lot of these will decay beyond
repair and end up as debris
in landfills. Emma Jacobs
takes us to one hard-hit
neighborhood, where one house
has become a laboratory for
doing green construction:

Transcript

n many older cities, some
neighborhoods are known for
their abandoned houses. A
lot of these will decay beyond
repair and end up as debris
in landfills. Emma Jacobs
takes us to one hard-hit
neighborhood, where one house
has become a laboratory for
doing green construction:

(sound of climbing steps)

Last year, at age 20, Megan McNally bought a house.

”This is the front room. Um, this is gonna be the bathroom. Doesn’t look like much now. It’ll get there.”


Not just any house. She wanted to find a project in this neighborhood to tie to the environmental science she studied during the year.


While home from college for a summer, McNally had been working with a nonprofit, Buffalo Reuse. It works in a neighborhood of East Buffalo with rows of abandoned homes. She paid $3800 dollars at the city’s foreclosure auction for a small, wood-frame house that had been vacant for three years.

“I really wanted to help some effort in Buffalo and so I was trying to brainstorm and I sat down with Michael and we sort of came up with this idea of buying a house.”

(sound of truck)

Michael is–Michael Grainer, who runs Buffalo Reuse. We make a coffee run and he tells me this neighborhood is part of a city whose population has shrunk by half.

“What we’re trying to do is to build a base of projects that are undergoing some kind of transformation and also lots that are undergoing a transformation.”

McNally’s house looks like it’s in good shape, but it had also taken a lot of abuse.

“On the outside, it looks really great. You could move in tomorrow. But as I came in here the first weekend it was leaks that people didn’t take care of. There was…this floor we had to cut out because it was all rotted from black mold.”

McNally had no prior knowledge of home repair. Transforming this house soon escalated as she found she would be replacing the plumbing and heating. But in some way, she’s also found her lack of experience to be an asset in recruiting help.

Ken Hicks is helping to measure out a part for a radiator in the front room. He turned up near dusk one day last winter. McNally was under the house checking the foundation, and Hicks, a construction worker was helping out the owner next door. He saw her feet sticking out from underneath. When she crawled out they started talking.

“It was a big joke, you know. We went back and forth and I said, you know, it was just so weird to see you in that situation and that situation and that predicament. And we just started from there,”

Slow work during a down economy means Hicks spends more time on volunteer jobs. He’s become one of the main people McNally turns to with questions about plumbing and carpentry.

“Being really young, you can ask a lot of stupid questions, and people go, ‘Oh man, this girl,’ but then go on and like, answer it in a way where maybe they wouldn’t be so open with somebody else.”

“Anything you can possibly do wrong has been done has been done in this house. But all those things that I’m talking about are now corrected, and there’s so much more knowledge here.”

There’s still months of work left, but McNally knows she will be living here soon. She has learned both a lot of construction skills and a lot about teaching, herself. She holds workshops to help the neighbors who are left take on their own properties. Her house, still unfinished, is a good training ground for beginners. McNally also realized people are less afraid to approach her with their questions than the experts she first had teaching.

“It’s hard putting things together. And, I don’t know, there’s been times where you just want to sit down and you get so frustrated that you don’t know how to do something that I think it’s really important to have people there who say, whatever, it’s ok and it’s ok that you don’t know everything, because you know, once you figure it out or ask questions, or just do it (laughs) and hope that things work out for the best, they usually do.”

For The Environment Report, I’m Emma Jacobs.

Related Links

Pushing Power Companies for More Renewables

  • Renewable energy groups say they want the federal government to tell power companies that more power has to come from renewable energy. (Photo courtesy of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory)

Renewable energy groups are
calling on the federal government
to do more to support their
industries. They want the
government to set standards
for where the country gets
its power. Mark Brush reports:

Transcript

Renewable energy groups are
calling on the federal government
to do more to support their
industries. They want the
government to set standards
for where the country gets
its power. Mark Brush reports:

The groups say they want the federal government to tell power companies that more power has to come from renewable energy. Most power companies in the country are basically regulated monopolies.

Denise Bode is the president of the American Wind Energy Association. She used to work as a public utility regulator. Bode says it’s up to the government to ask one question when they regulate these monopolies.

“What’s in the public interest? And, you know, often times as a state public utility commissioner I would make the determination as to what kind of power generation that we would authorize our utilities to do and what was in the public interest.”

Bode says it is in the public interest to get more power from cleaner, renewable sources.

Some big utilities oppose having one federal standard – and there are a lot reasons why they oppose it – but one of them is that states are already handling it. There are 30 states that have some kind of renewable targets in place.


For The Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

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