Month: July 2008

Interview: Grist on Shower Curtains

  • Many new shower curtains contain PVC (Source: DO'Neil at Wikimedia Commons)

A new study looked at off-the-shelf
shower curtains and came up with some disturbing
findings. The Center for Health, Environment
and Justice studied polyvinyl chloride plastic
shower curtains and found that PVC shower
curtains can release as many as 108 toxic
chemicals. Lester Graham talked with Sarah
Burkhalter with the environmental journalism
site: grist.org. He asked just how
much of a concern these PVC shower curtains
are:

Transcript

A new study looked at off-the-shelf
shower curtains and came up with some disturbing
findings. The Center for Health, Environment
and Justice studied polyvinyl chloride plastic
shower curtains and found that PVC shower
curtains can release as many as 108 toxic
chemicals. Lester Graham talked with Sarah
Burkhalter with the environmental journalism
site: grist.org. He asked just how
much of a concern these PVC shower curtains
are:

Sarah Burkhalter: “It depends. This group – The Center for Health, Environment, and Justice –
tested five shower curtains, and their claim is that new-shower-curtain-smell is up to 108 nasty
chemicals that have been added during processing. At the same time, you know, there are
chemicals in everything. So, to an extent, you just have to choose your battles. Shower curtains
have become the emergency-du-jour, if you will. But, there is plenty else to worry about if you
already have a shower curtain. It’s not an emergency.”

Lester Graham: “Now we should point out that these shower curtains are not special shower
curtains. These were bought at Bed Bath and Beyond, and Kmart, and Sears, and Target, and
Wal-Mart. And I don’t even know what I would replace my shower curtain with. Got any ideas
about that?”

Burkhalter: “Sure. Well, the thing about these shower curtains, you know, it’s not even the shower
curtains themselves. It is the plastic they’re made of. And that is plastic #3. Its poly-vinyl chloride,
or PVC, or you may sometimes you may just see it as vinyl. And at grist.org, our advice columnist
always says, ‘no vinyl, that’s final’. That’s her tagline. She says, ‘no PVC for me’. That’s her other
way to remember it. Really, as much as you can avoid this plastic #3. Which, is difficult to avoid.
It’s in toys, and hospital tubing, and jars, and pill bottles. But as much as you can avoid this, is for
the benefit, certainly. As far as shower curtains go, there are a lot of alternatives. You can always
go for a door instead of a curtain. When our advice columnist, Umbra, wrote about this very issue
in 2006, she recommended polyester shower curtains. They also make organic cotton, and nylon.
There’s a different plastic, its PVC-free, its called ethylene vinyl-acetate, or EVA, so if you look for
EVA plastic shower curtains, those are a good alternative. Or, you could always take up
exhibitionism.”

Graham: (laughs) “Well, how hard are these things to find – these other, non-PVC shower
curtains?”

Burkhalter: “They’re going to get easier and easier to find as time goes by. Actually, IKEA phased
out PVC shower curtains over a decade ago. Sears, Kmart, Wal-Mart, and Target are all in the
midst of phasing out PVC. And, actually, Target had a goal for this spring, I think they said 88% of
their shower curtains now don’t contain PVC. So, if you look at the labels, and try to avoid things
that say PVC, you should be able to find alternatives, even in these big box stores.”

Graham: “So, what do you have hanging in your shower?”

Burkhalter: “Well, I have to say that I took a shower this morning, and it is a plastic shower curtain.
But, you know, I’ve had it for a couple of years, and the Center for Health, Environment, and
Justice, when they tested, they found that some of these chemicals hung-out for a few weeks, but
after a month or so, your shower curtain has probably done off-gassing all the chemicals that it’s
going to. So, if you’ve had your shower curtain for a couple of years, you know, really, instead of
trashing it, it’s probably best just to hold on to it. Don’t’ burn it – that is something that you really
don’t want to do with PVC. That’s kind of one of its great dangers, is that it releases dioxin, a nasty
chemical, when it’s burned. So, but as long as you’re not licking it regularly, you can probably hold
on to your old one.”

Graham: “I’ll avoid that. (laughs) Alright, thanks Sarah, thanks very much.”

Burkhalter: “Sure, thanks Lester.”

Related Links

Gl Compact Goes to Washington

  • Lake Superior's South Shore, Wisconsin (Photo by Dave Hansen, courtesy of the EPA)

There’s a new agreement that says the
Great Lakes water has to stay in the Great Lakes.
It’s been approved now by all eight of the states
and the two Canadian provinces that border the
Lakes. Rick Pluta reports the agreement is now
on its way to Congress:

Transcript

There’s a new agreement that says the
Great Lakes water has to stay in the Great Lakes.
It’s been approved now by all eight of the states
and the two Canadian provinces that border the
Lakes. Rick Pluta reports the agreement is now
on its way to Congress:

The Great Lakes region was worried that drier parts of the country and the world might
be eyeing the largest supply of freshwater on Earth.

Ten years ago, a Canadian company got permission from Ontario to send millions of
gallons of water to Asia via tanker ships. Fierce opposition from around the Great Lakes
region put an end to that project. But regions neighboring the Great Lakes basin still see
them as a possible cure for their water shortages.

Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm says the Great Lakes compact offers an answer to
anyone outside the region who wants to get their hands on that water.

“Can’t touch this. (laughs) That’s what we say. They need to look at their own way of
preserving and managing their resources.”

When Granholm signed new laws in a ceremony here on the Lake Michigan shoreline,
Michigan became the last of the eight Great Lakes states to formally join the compact.

The compact was put together by leaders of the US states and two Canadian provinces
that border the lakes. Granholm says, once it’s adopted by Congress and signed by the
president, it will give the Great Lakes states new authority to protect their water.

“This allows me as governor to veto any large diversion of water, so we can put a stop to
it ourselves. It really allows us the autonomy of protecting these Great Lakes overall.”

It took 10 years for the Great Lakes states to get the compact through their legislatures
and signed by their governors. Members of Congress from the region are hoping it won’t
take quite so long to get it to the president’s desk.

Chicago Congressman Rahm Emanuel is expected to lead the effort to get the compact
through the US House. He says congressional hearings will begin this year and the
compact should be approved in time for it to be sent to the new president in early 2009.
Emanuel says he’s not expecting any problems.

“Because people understand and know, this is our Yellowstone Park, this is our Grand
Canyon. This is a national treasure. There’s been a lot of work and years of effort to get
this done. The good news is a lot of the chairmen of the committees that are relevant, come
from the Midwest, know how important the Great Lakes are and will act with due speed
in getting it done.”

Both the Republican presidential candidate John McCain and Democratic candidate
Barak Obama have said they would sign the compact.

Environmental groups are among those backing the deal. But many of them say it
still comes up short because it does not stop bottled water from leaving the Great Lakes
region.

Cyndi Roper is with Clean Water Action.

“Water is water. You can’t fill a tanker with water and take it out of the Great Lakes, but
you can fill that same tanker with bottles of water and ship them to other parts of the
country and other parts of the world, and we believe as we move forward, that’s a very
dangerous precedent to set.”

She says that’s because many millions of gallons can still trickle out of the lakes – even if
it’s 12 ounces at a time.

For The Environment Report, this is Rick Pluta.

Related Links

A Bog’s Goodbye

  • Greg Seymour, with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, walking through Cranberry Bog (Photo by Christina Morgan)

It’s normal to want to protect special
places in nature. But in some cases, these
places are disappearing simply because of nature.
Christina Morgan reports on an ancient spot that
might disappear in our lifetime. The people who
love it want to save it, but they might have to
let it go:

Transcript

It’s normal to want to protect special
places in nature. But in some cases, these
places are disappearing simply because of nature.
Christina Morgan reports on an ancient spot that
might disappear in our lifetime. The people who
love it want to save it, but they might have to
let it go:

For four generations, J-me Braig’s family has visited a rare
site, a bog left behind by glaciers thousands of years ago.

“As a child, I used to go out there and play on it, with my
grandmother, and we would pick cranberries; my brother and I would play on it. ”

Braig says her grandmother used to take a boat out to the bog
in a lake in Ohio. Her grandmother made pies and wine with
the cranberries.

Braig is a lake historian who’s worried about the bog. That’s
because it’s shrinking.

But before we talk about why it’s shrinking, though, it’s important
to know what makes this tiny area special.

Webster’s dictionary defines a bog as soft, waterlogged
ground. This bog, Cranberry Bog, is soft and waterlogged.
But it’s not ground. There’s no dirt. The bog is a 10 acre
patch of sphagnum moss.

Most bogs surround a glacial lake. Instead, Cranberry Bog is
surrounded by a lake, and floating. Here’s what happened.

Nearly 200 years ago, crews digging in an ancient river bed
created a reservoir to feed the Ohio and Erie canal. The
reservoir filled, the mossy bog floated to the surface. How or
why it stayed, no one knows.

“An absolute oddity. It shouldn’t be here.”

Greg Seymour is with the Ohio Department of Natural
Resources. He says the ancient bog is home to likely the only collection
of plants of its kind in the world.

More than 150 plants, a
handful native to Canada. Nudged southward by the glacier,
the plants are tricked by the cool bog mat into thinking they
never left home.

The bog is shrinking for several reasons. Waves from passing
boats loosen the bog mat. Storms topple trees
which rip out chunks of the mat. But Seymour says the biggest
threat is the bog’s chemistry, which makes the site its own
worst enemy.

“The number one factor is going to be the chemical reaction
between the alkaline lake waters and the acidic bog.”

The pH balance is off – way off. Cranberry Bog is doomed to disappear, probably within 30
years.

But area historian J-Me Braig remains upbeat, saying ever
since she can remember, someone has had a scheme to save
Cranberry Bog.

And sure enough, there is a new group determined to preserve the
ancient bog.

George O’Donnell leads Friends of Cranberry Bog. He and
others think one way to generate interest in the site, is to inventory of all that the bog has to offer.
Such an inventory is being done by the bog’s neighbor 8 miles
to the north, Dawes Arboretum.

Tim Mason is the manager of natural resources there. He says even
if the inventory and other efforts to preserve the bog fail, they
have a plan B. Dawes created a restoration area where pieces
of Cranberry Bog that break off are placed.

“We can just hold on to what’s there. It takes thousands of
years for the peat moss material to grow; so to create that is something we would certainly not see in
our life times.”

Saving the bog – or just preserving its pieces – are a long shot.
Yet the efforts persist. Historian J-Me Braig is one of many people
who hope for success. But even Braig admits, after more than
10,000 years, Cranberry Bog has had a pretty good run.

For The Environment Report, I’m Christina Morgan.

Related Links

From the Trash to the Tank

  • Ethanol can be made from material that would end up in a landfill (Source: Patrick-br at Wikimedia Commons)

For the past few years, ethanol’s been
a political darling, but lately it seems the
party’s over. There’s concern the industry’s
using too much corn. That’s contributing to
rising food prices. Well, some companies want
to avoid the controversy. Reporter Shawn Allee explains they want to make ethanol from
stuff we leave behind at the dinner table:

Transcript

For the past few years, ethanol’s been
a political darling, but lately it seems the
party’s over. There’s concern the industry’s
using too much corn. That’s contributing to
rising food prices. Well, some companies want
to avoid the controversy. Reporter Shawn Allee explains they want to make ethanol from
stuff we leave behind at the dinner table:

To give you a sense of how touchy the ethanol issue’s gotten, consider what happened to Presidential
candidate Barack Obama. Last year, he supported mandates to add billions of gallons of ethanol to our
fuel stream. But recently, on ‘Meet the Press’, he was defensive.

“If it turns out, we got to make changes to our ethanol policy to help people get something
to eat, that’s the step we take. But I also believe ethanol has been an important
transitional tool for us to start dealing with our long-term energy crisis.”

Obama and other ethanol backers say we’re not stuck with corn-based ethanol. We can use wood chips
or energy crops like switchgrass.

But this cellulosic ethanol is a ways off.

First, the technology’s expensive. Plus, farmers don’t even grow energy crops now.

So, some companies hope to make ethanol from stuff that doesn’t need farms at all. It would come
from garbage cans, like this one at a coffee shop.

“In that receptacle there’s a lot of paper, and there’s some food bits and there’s some
scraps. So, we’re able to turn that into sugar. And the weak sugar, then we ferment, we distill into alcohol, and we get the ethanol.”

Zig Resiak is with a start-up company called Indiana Ethanol Power. He says garbage could compete
with corn.

“If you have a corn-to-ethanol facility, you’re going to pay for the feedstock. Trash, as a feedstock, we don’t
pay for it. The municipalities actually pay us to take the trash, just like a
landfill will take the trash.”

Resiak’s company isn’t the only one to figure this out. At least three other ethanol firms are asking
cities to hand over their trash, and cash. Besides being cheaper, there might be other advantages to
using garbage for ethanol.

Bob Dineen is with the industry group the Renewable Fuels Association.

“We have garbage all across the country.”

Here’s why that matters.

Before it makes it to the pump, ethanol needs to be blended at refineries. Dineens says those
refineries are far from corn farms and rural ethanol plants, but refineries are often close to big metro
areas, and big-city trash.

“A company that is able to produce from local landfill refuse – he’s clearly going to have an
advantage in terms of transportation, feedstock costs, and all the rest.”

Well, that’s the theory, anyway. The market hasn’t tested garbage-based ethanol yet.

So, what exactly is stopping companies like Indiana Ethanol Power from giving it a go?

Resiak says it’s simple – cities just haven’t been willing to part with their trash.

“Municipalities are very comfortable with putting it in the back of a truck and letting it go to the landfill. They don’t think about it twice. But for us to come in and say we’re going to
take it cheaper and we’re going to save you millions of dollars a year on your tipping fee – that’s different
and that’s kind of scary, and they want to take a good, strong look at that.”

Resiak predicts by the time cities do come around to the idea, there will be even more companies ready to
take garbage bags out of their hands.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

U.S. Lax on Chemicals

  • Toy makers use phthalates to make hard plastic pliable (Source: Toniht at Wikimedia Commons)

News about dangerous chemicals in toys,
cosmetics and cleaning products has a lot of
Americans spending extra money. People want to
make sure they’re choosing things that are safe
for their families. Julie Grant reports that
other countries are ahead of the US in efforts
to improve the safety of all products:

Transcript

News about dangerous chemicals in toys,
cosmetics and cleaning products has a lot of
Americans spending extra money. People want to
make sure they’re choosing things that are safe
for their families. Julie Grant reports that
other countries are ahead of the US in efforts
to improve the safety of all products:

So you might expect that the government has tested those
chemicals to make sure they’re safe. But you’d be wrong.

Daryl Ditz is senior policy advisor at the Center for
International Environmental Law.

He says the US Environmental Protection Agency has never
assessed the hazards of most chemicals used in every day
products.

“That means the EPA doesn’t know, and you and I don’t know,
which materials on the shelves are more dangerous and
which are less.”

Ditz says only a few hundred chemicals have been
thoroughly tested by the U.S. government, but there are
80,000 chemicals used in products on the market.

In the U.S., the EPA has to prove a chemical is harmful to
keep it off the market.

(sound of toy store)

Dorothy Bryan is shopping at this upscale toy store in Northeast Ohio.

She’s got three grandkids. She’s looking at an
organic cotton bunny, colorful wooden blocks, and of course
Thomas the Tank Engine. She
pays more for toys at this store than she would at the big box
retailer. But Bryan says they’re worth it.

“They’re not toxic. That’s the big part. They’re not the
plastic toxic things.
I purchase usually the wooden toys. The little one puts
everything in his mouth.”

But most kids’ toys are made of plastic. And lots of plastics are made with phthalates. It makes them pliable.

But phthalates are endocrine disruptors. They’re gender-bender chemicals that make girls develop earlier and reduce testosterone levels in boys.

That’s why
California has banned the use some phthalates in toys. So
have Japan and the European Union.

But Daryl Ditz, chemical expert at Center for International
Environmental Law, says regulators in the U.S. don’t have
much power to ban phthalates or other chemicals.
Chemicals here are innocent until proven guilty.

“That is, companies can sell virtually anything in a product or in a barrel unless it’s been proven
to be dangerous.”

But other countries are starting to take the opposite
approach. Ditz says the European Union is rolling out a new
set of laws that make chemicals guilty until proven
innocent.

“They’re putting the responsibility squarely on the shoulders
of the chemical makers. As opposed to having the
environmental authorities look for a needle in the haystack,
they’re saying, ‘this should be the responsibility of the
companies who make these materials.’”

Under the EU law, manufacturers will have to study and
report the risks posed by each chemical: whether they
cause cancer, birth defects, or environmental problems.

The Bush administration and chemical manufacturers tried to
block the European law. But they couldn’t.

Ditz says leaders in the
chemical makers’ trade group are now running around like
their hair is on fire. They’re worried – the costs to comply
could be in the tens of millions of dollars for some
companies that export chemicals to Europe.

But many individual companies have already started to
comply with the law.

Walter van het Hoff is spokesperson for Dow Chemical in
Europe. He says cataloging Dow’s 7000 chemicals is a
huge effort, but they don’t have a choice.

“You need to comply; otherwise you cannot sell them
anymore in the European Union.”

There are a half billion consumers in the EU and Dow wants to keep them. Dow and other
manufacturers might have to reformulate – or even abandon
some chemicals if the EU decides they’re unsafe.

While the U.S. is not considering a comprehensive chemical
review like Europe’s new laws, about 30 states are
considering new regulations on chemicals in toys. The Toy
Industry Association doesn’t want a patchwork of laws, so
it’s called for national toy safety standards.

For The Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

Wind Tax Credit Blowing Away?

  • Wind companies want taxpayer help (Photo courtesy of the Department of Energy)

The wind power industry has been growing.
But to keep growing, wind companies want more
taxpayer help. Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

The wind power industry has been growing.
But to keep growing, wind companies want more
taxpayer help. Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Some of the recent growth in wind generation is being fueled by a national
production tax credit. It’s due to expire at the end of this year.

The American Wind Energy Association is asking the public to encourage Congress to renew the
credit.

Association spokesman Jeff Anthony says, without the tax break, there’d be a slow down in new
wind projects and a potential loss of jobs.

“The longer it takes, the more in danger we’re putting the jobs in the wind industry at risk from a
drop-off in activity, both in project installations and in new manufacturing installations in this
country. So we need the PTC extended as soon as possible.”

Anthony acknowledges there’s a dispute in Congress over how to pay for the credit. Some
critics call the production tax credit ‘corporate welfare’.

For The Environment Report, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

Related Links

Investors Wary of Diesel From Coal

  • (Photo courtesy of the US Geological Survey)

The price of gasoline and diesel fuel from
foreign oil is making people think about other ways
to fill up. Lester Graham reports the coal industry
is pushing the idea of making diesel out of coal
from the US:

Transcript

The price of gasoline and diesel fuel from
foreign oil is making people think about other ways
to fill up. Lester Graham reports the coal industry
is pushing the idea of making diesel out of coal
from the US:

The technology to make diesel fuel out of coal has been around for a while. Germany
used it in World War II.

Recently, researchers at Rutgers and the University of North Carolina developed a
more efficient way to convert coal to diesel.

So, what’s stopping coal-to-diesel? Money and risk.

Coal to diesel is feasible – if the price of oil is above $50 a barrel. Oil is around $143 a
barrel right now. So, the money is good.

Phil Gonet is president of the Illinois Coal Association. He says now investors want
some government assistance.

“That guarantees that investors will at least get their money back if OPEC starts to play
around with the world price of oil.”

And make diesel from foreign oil cheaper than diesel from domestic coal.

For The Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

West Nile Virus Here to Stay

  • USGS Wildlife Veterinarian testing an American crow for previous exposure to the West Nile Virus (Photo courtesy of US Geological Survey)

We’re heading into West Nile virus season.
Rebecca Williams reports experts say it’s now a
seasonal epidemic:

Transcript

We’re heading into West Nile virus season.
Rebecca Williams reports experts say it’s now a
seasonal epidemic:

West Nile virus is at its peak between mid-July and mid-September.

You can get infected from a single mosquito bite.

Most people who get infected won’t get a serious case of it. But people
over 50 have a higher risk of getting really sick. The virus can cause
high fever, paralysis and even death.

Dr. Lyle Petersen is with the Centers for Disease Control. He says West
Nile Virus is here to stay. And he says even if your area hasn’t had an
outbreak recently, that doesn’t mean it won’t happen.

“We really can’t predict exactly when and where these outbreaks are
going to occur so everybody needs to take precautions.”

He says you should use insect repellants, repair window screens, and
drain standing water around your house.

For The Environment Report I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

Super Mosquito to Fight Malaria?

  • (Photo courtesy of the US Geological Survey)

Researchers have created a genetically
modified mosquito. Rebecca Williams reports the
scientists hope the mosquito will help save lives:

Transcript

Researchers have created a genetically
modified mosquito. Rebecca Williams reports the
scientists hope the mosquito will help save lives:

Malaria kills more than one million people every year. The disease is
spread by mosquitoes.

Marcelo Jacobs-Lorena is a researcher at Johns Hopkins Malaria
Research Institute. He’s part of a team that has bred a genetically
modified mosquito. It can’t get infected by the malaria parasite.

“If we go to a region where malaria is prevalent and we are able to
substitute the local mosquito population by the modified mosquito that
cannot carry the parasite, then the net effect will be interruption of
transmission.”

Jacobs-Lorena says they’re confident the super mosquito is safe to
release into the wild.

But he says they’ll have to convince a lot of people that it’s okay to let it
out of the lab.

For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

Green Fuel From Green Slime

  • Roger Ruan directs the Center for BioRefining at the University of Minnesota. He's experimenting with algae that grow quickly in the nutrients in wastewater. He says the oil-rich algae are a potential source of biodiesel. (Photo by Stephanie Hemphill)

When people talk about bio-fuels,
they usually mean ethanol from corn or diesel
fuel from soybeans. But there are lots of
possibilities. One of them is algae. Algae
contains a lot of oil. The US Department of
Energy experimented with algae for nearly
twenty years after the oil crisis of the 1970s.
But with fuel prices so high, scientists around
the world are looking at algae again. Stephanie
Hemphill reports one researcher thinks
he’s figured out how to grow lots of algae, fast:

Transcript

When people talk about bio-fuels,
they usually mean ethanol from corn or diesel
fuel from soybeans. But there are lots of
possibilities. One of them is algae. Algae
contains a lot of oil. The US Department of
Energy experimented with algae for nearly
twenty years after the oil crisis of the 1970s.
But with fuel prices so high, scientists around
the world are looking at algae again. Stephanie
Hemphill reports one researcher thinks
he’s figured out how to grow lots of algae, fast:

Roger Ruan has been trying for years to figure out how to turn algae into diesel,
economically. He’s the director of the Center for BioRefining at the University of
Minnesota.

Ruan says there’s no question it can be done; some people are already producing algae
oil. They’re growing it in open ponds. It’s used for pharmaceuticals, food supplements,
and cosmetics.

“Right now, based on an open pond system, per acre per year, you can easily get 5,000
gallons of oil, and soybean would probably give you 50. That’s 100 times difference.”

So algae can be far more efficient at producing diesel fuel than soybeans. But how do
you grow enough algae to make a dent in the nation’s energy demand?

Ruan is turning to an unlikely partner: the local sewage treatment plant.

“Wastewater has lot of nutrients: phosphorus, nitrogen, are all available in wastewater,
and actually you spend lot of money to remove these from wastewater, so if we can kill
two birds with one stone, that would be the best, and that’s what we’re hoping to do.”

(sound of treatment plant)

St. Paul, Minnesota’s sewage treatment plant sits on the bank of the Mississippi River.
The basement of the building where the solids are separated from the liquids is a
brightly lit space. It’s filled with big steel pipes and valves and tanks.

Off to one side, Ruan’s team is setting up a rack of aquariums – the future home of juicy
green algae. When everything is ready, some of the partially-treated waste will be
diverted into the tanks, where it will feed the algae.

The waste is still full of stuff that’s bad for the river, but good for algae.

“It’s got a fair amount of phosphorus, and some ammonia nitrogen that the algae are
going to need.”

Bob Polta is manager of research and development at the treatment plant.

It’s easy to see why he likes this idea: every day the facility has to remove 4 tons of
phosphorus and more than 16 tons of nitrogen from the waste stream.

The algae experiment, if it works, will allow them to do some of that removal in a more
cost-effective way. And this could be the answer to Roger Ruan’s problem of trying to
create enough algae to make enough oil to compete with petroleum diesel.

Polta says there’s a big potential, both for cleaning wastewater and for producing
energy in the same place.

“All the wastewater treatment ponds in the small communities around the state are
essentially using algae to treat wastewater; it’s just that they’re not being harvested. It’s
just that we’re getting two goals together here, and two research groups, one is essentially taking algae and
harvesting the oil and making biodiesel, and the other is using algae as a treatment
scheme, and to see if we can make this thing really fit.”

Polta expects by the end of the year he’ll know more about whether this is a practical
idea.

Roger Ruan says within six-to-ten years someone, somewhere, will be producing diesel
from algae on a commercial scale.

For The Environment Report, I’m Stephanie Hemphill.

Related Links