More Money for Polluted Hot Spots?

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

Congress might vote this fall
on a plan to triple the amount of money
for cleaning up pollution hot spots
around the Great Lakes. Chuck Quirmbach
reports:

Transcript

Congress might vote this fall
on a plan to triple the amount of money
for cleaning up pollution hot spots
around the Great Lakes. Chuck Quirmbach
reports:

The Great Lakes Legacy Act is supposed to remove contaminated sediment from harbors.
But, clean-up has been slow because there’s not enough money.

Although tens of millions of dollars have been authorized in the past, Congress and the
Bush Administration have not actually spent much of it on clean up projects.

EPA regional administrator Lynn Buhl says despite the history of the Legacy Act, more
money should be authorized.

“First of all, there needs to be an appreciation of how many players are involved in these
projects. They don’t come together overnight. I think we’ve done well to have completed
five already.”

Congress could increase the amount of authorized spending from 54 million dollars a
year to 150 million per year.

The EPA acknowledges a potential tripling of the funds for the Great Lakes Legacy Act
might not sit well with some Congressional budget hawks.

For The Environment Report, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

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Trees as Odor-Eaters

  • Researchers at the University of Delaware have found that planting trees around poultry farms has many benefits (Photo courtesy of the USDA)

As suburbs are built closer to
farms, there are sometimes complaints
about the odors. Researchers are now
working to smooth things out between
farmers and their new neighbors. Jessi
Ziegler has the story on one
of the simple solutions they found:

Transcript

As suburbs are built closer to
farms, there are sometimes complaints
about the odors. Researchers are now
working to smooth things out between
farmers and their new neighbors. Jessi
Ziegler has the story on one
of the simple solutions they found:

If you’ve ever driven by a chicken farm, you know the
smell can get pretty bad.

So, imagine living by one, and smelling it every single day.

Well, researchers may have come up with a solution –
trees.

Planting a few rows of trees around a farm can do all sorts
of good.

They capture dust and ammonia. And they block noise
and odor.

Also, they make the farm look a lot prettier. Which,
researcher George Malone says, can make a big difference.

“There’s been other studies to indicate that attractive
farms, statistically, have less odor than unattractive farms.
Perception is reality of what we deal with.”

And the perception is, the better you think a farm looks,
the better you think it smells.

For The Environment Report, this is Jessi Ziegler.

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Turbines and Bats: A Deadly Combo

  • Many bats are being killed by wind turbines (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)

The wind turbine industry has made
changes to reduce the number of birds killed
by the spinning blades. But scientists are
finding that more bats are being killed.
Rebecca Williams reports one research team
thinks it now knows why:

Transcript

The wind turbine industry has made
changes to reduce the number of birds killed
by the spinning blades. But scientists are
finding that more bats are being killed.
Rebecca Williams reports one research team
thinks it now knows why:

It’s been a mystery why bats are getting killed by wind turbines. They’re
usually great at avoiding collisions because they sense moving objects
even better than still ones.

A team from the University of Calgary looked at dead bats near
turbines. They found that 90% of the bats had internal bleeding.

Erin Baerwald is the lead author of the study. She says there’s a sudden
drop in pressure near the tips of the turbine blades. And when bats fly
close enough, the pressure drop makes their lungs over-expand and
burst. She thinks the bats are attracted to the turbines.

“Maybe they see these tall turbines as trees.”

That’s because most of the bats that are getting killed are tree roosting
bats.

Baerwald says researchers are looking at ways to change turbines to
avoid killing bats.

For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Leafy, Irradiated Greens

  • The Food and Drug Administration has now approved irradiating iceberg lettuce and spinach to kill the bacteria. (Photo by Ken Hammond, courtesy of the USDA)

The government has cleared the way
to irradiate some produce. Lester Graham
reports if produce companies do use radiation,
it might reduce contamination of leafy greens:

Transcript

The government has cleared the way
to irradiate some produce. Lester Graham
reports if produce companies do use radiation,
it might reduce contamination of leafy greens:

The last few years a lot of people have gotten sick from salmonella and e.coli
contamination. The Food and Drug Administration has now approved irradiating
iceberg lettuce and spinach to kill the bacteria.

Dennis Olson is a scientist at Iowa State University. He says like irradiating meat,
people will accept this too.

“There are a lot of consumer activists groups that are opposed to the technology and
they get a lot of media attention that says consumers hate it or don’t want it. And yet, in
fact, when we’ve introduced the products – with some education – consumers are very
willing to accept it.”

Olson says the FDA should okay irradiating other produce too. It’s expensive, but it
might mean fewer costly recalls for produce companies, and means longer shelf life for
lettuce and spinach.

For The Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

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Weevils vs. The Mile-A-Minute Weed

  • The mile-a-minute weed (Photo courtesy of the USDA)

Sometimes biologists fight foreign
pests with other foreign animals. But that
can be risky because it can create a bigger
problem than the one it’s supposed to solve.
Sabri Ben-Achour reports on one of the latest attempts to stop a weedy pest:

Transcript

Sometimes biologists fight foreign
pests with other foreign animals. But that
can be risky because it can create a bigger
problem than the one it’s supposed to solve.
Sabri Ben-Achour reports on one of the latest attempts to stop
a weedy pest:

On farms, backyards, and rights of way up the Eastern Seaboard a pointy leaved thorny
newcomer is becoming increasingly visible. It’s called mile-a-minute weed.

Bob Trumbule is an entomologist. He leads me through a stream valley north of
Washington DC where blackberries and small trees are being swallowed up by this
invasive vine.

“So now we’re getting into the mile-a-minute here. Basically what it does it, it’s an
annual vine, it grows up and over plants, it smothers them, out competes them for
sunlight, and weighs them down.”

The weed is native to Eastern Asia: China and Japan. It was introduced accidentally in
Pennsylvania in the thirties. From there, it’s spread to seven other states. It prevents new
trees from sprouting in forests. But back in Asia, it’s not a dominating species like it is
here.

Judith Hough-Goldstein is a professor at the University of Delaware.

“Part of the reason is because it doesn’t have anything that’s feeding on it. It’s gonna be
without its predators so it can out-compete other plants.”

Over several years, biologists searched for something that would eat the vine. They
found a tiny, black weevil in China. It feeds on the plant and lays it’s eggs there, keeping
things in check – in Asia.

“Here are the weevils. I’m gonna give you a glimpse of them here in the cup. They look
almost like little ticks. I’m gonna put them down here in the mile a minute weed patch,
and basically what they’ll do – they’re tough little guys – they’ll climb around and in the
past experience have started to feed almost immediately.”

Up close, they look like little anteaters, poking around the leaves with long snouts.

This may sound risky. There are lots of examples where similar approaches have gone
wrong. A parasite was introduced in North America to control gypsymoths. It attacked
native silkmoths. Mississippi catfish farmers used Asian carp to control algae. They got
loose and are taking over the Mississippi River system and threatening the Great Lakes.

And Trumbule admits nobody knows for sure exactly what might happen.

“Any scientist that might say otherwise is not being honest with themselves or the person
asking the question.”

But he says a lot’s been learned since the days when any scientist could introduce a
species on a whim. These days, exhaustive testing and federal permits are required
before anything is released.

That’s why for almost ten years Judith Hough-Goldstein has been trying to determine if
the weevil would eat anything else. Tests were conducted in a U.S. Department of
Agriculture ‘quarantine facility’ with sealed windows and its own re-circulated air supply.

“So what we found was that, in fact, this particular weevil is extremely host specific. The
insect has evolved to depend on the plant.”

So much so that the weevils and larvae actually starved to death rather than feed on other
plants.

In field tests in New Jersey and Delaware, the weevils have decimated mile-a-minute
weed. Some researchers say it’s the most impressive biocontrol they’ve worked with.

For The Environment Report, I’m Sabri Ben-Achour.

Related Links

Coal: The Comeback Kid

  • Memorials to miners and past mining disasters dot the public spaces in rural parts of southern Illinois. This granite obelisk is in honor of mining near West Frankfort, which is in the heart of Illinois coal country, and close to several operating mines. In 1980, Illinois had 18,000 coal miners - now, the workforce is less than 4,000. Mining experts say new digging permits, new hires and new investment in Illinois coal signals a comeback, though it's unclear mining employment will reach former heights. (Photo by Shawn Allee)

America has a love-hate relationship
with coal. We burn coal to make half our
electricity, but we’re always fighting coal’s
air pollution. Some regulations decimated
the coal industry in one key state. Shawn
Allee reports miners there are caught
between a slow comeback and another round of
regulation:

Transcript

America has a love-hate relationship
with coal. We burn coal to make half our
electricity, but we’re always fighting coal’s
air pollution. Some regulations decimated
the coal industry in one key state. Shawn
Allee reports miners there are caught
between a slow comeback and another round of
regulation:

Coal was once king of the Southern Illinois economy, but no longer.

Nathan Threewitt lives in the area. He explains mining jobs evaporated.

Nathan Threewitt: “Eighteen years ago, give or take a couple, people went from
making a nice, upper-class living to nothing at all. Couldn’t find work, everybody
had to move.”

Shawn Allee: “Did you have that happen in your own family?”

Threewitt: “Yep. My dad’s got ten brothers and sisters. They went from, everybody
had clothes for school, everybody had food to eat, to, we don’t know how the hell it
was gonna happen.”

Even though Threewitt has a tough history with coal – he’s actually trying to get into the
industry.

In fact, I find him while he’s taking a break from a coal mining training class at Rend
Lake College.

I know at one time, classes like these had been canceled.

I track down instructor David Colombo to see what’s changed.

David Colombo: “This room is where I train miners for the most part.”

Shawn Allee: “What’s this?”

Colombo: “Ugh. This is a high voltage cable.”

Allee: “This is almost as thick as your arm.”

Colombo: “This isn’t the biggest of the bigs, either.”

Right now, only about four thousand Illinois miners need to be familiar with equipment
like this.

But Colombo gets calls from mining companies in the area who need trained workers.
So, his school’s growing to keep up.

Shawn Allee: “Why have faith that you’re going to need space for miners to be
trained?”

David Colombo: “With the mining permitting that’s going on, is the highest it’s been
in thirty years.”

Colombo: “Gentlemen in this afternoon’s class will start sinking a mine within the
next week or two. Right now it just employs ten people, but in a year from now, that
same mine’s probably going to employ a hundred and ten people.”

People use words like rebound and comeback when they describe the Illinois coal
industry. To understand what happened, you have to dial back a little.

“It was really the effect of Clean Air Act amendments of 1990.”

This is John Mead. He heads coal research at Southern Illinois University.

He says Illinois coal is blessed with high energy, but it’s cursed with sulfur that caused
acid rain and lung disease. The amendments aimed to cut that.

“Most utilities were able to switch to lower-sulfur coal, and that’s just what they
did.”

In fact, utilities opened new mines out West where the coal has less sulfur.

As for an Illinois coal turn-around?

“Today, sulfur and other materials in the coal can be controlled pretty effectively
with technology.”

So, now Illinois coal can better compete with lower-sulpher coal.

But here’s the thing. There could be another pollution clamp-down in the works.

You know about global-warming, right? Well, carbon dioxide’s a big cause, and coal
produces carbon dioxide in spades.

Scientists say cutting coal emissions would be a quick way to cut carbon.

So, miners in Southern Illinois get mixed messages – the country wants their coal again,
but maybe not for long.

Miner-to-be Nathan Threewitt says he’s thought this through.

Nathan Threewitt: “Well, if anybody looked at the economics of it, it’s gonna go
back. Coal used to be fifteen dollars a ton, it’s now 65 dollars a ton. You’re gonna
have these coal companies with coal left in the ground, it used to not be worth it to
get the money out, now it’s worth it.”

Shawn Allee: “You like those odds.”

Threewitt: “Yeah, I do. I’m rolling the dice on it.”

Threewitt figures, he’s got time to build a career from coal, while America makes up its
mind just how clean it wants its coal-fired electricity.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

Related Links

Botulism and the Beach

  • The beach looks beautiful... until you stumble on dead birds and fish killed by Type E botulism. (Photo by Rebecca Williams)

A deadly toxin is spreading across
the Great Lakes, killing fish and birds.
Rebecca Williams reports scientists are
trying to put the puzzle together as quickly
as they can:

Transcript

A deadly toxin is spreading across
the Great Lakes, killing fish and birds.
Rebecca Williams reports scientists are
trying to put the puzzle together as quickly
as they can:

(sound of waves lapping the beach)

It’s one of those perfect beach days. Not too hot, not too crowded. Everything’s
just right.

Unless you don’t like rotting fish and dead birds full of maggots.

Hunter Brower is hanging out at this Lake Michigan beach. He says he’s seen a
lot of dead gulls here in recent years.

“It’s disgusting. We’re out here to enjoy our time and it’s just not right.”

The birds and fish are being killed by Type E botulism. Basically, it’s food
poisoning. For about a decade now, botulism has been killing huge numbers of
birds in the Great Lakes.

We’re talking about more than 75,000 birds – and scientists think that’s probably
a very conservative estimate. That’s because birds could be dying and not
reaching the shore. And it’s very hard to know how many fish are getting killed.
They’re harder to diagnose.

“It’s really one of nature’s most potent toxins.”

Mark Breederland is with Michigan SeaGrant. He says some studies show the
toxin can paralyze fish.

“They can actually lose their orientation and be bobbing up and down vertically
and that would be easy pickin’s if you’re a loon.”

Loons and other birds eat those poisoned fish, or, even grosser, they’ll eat the
maggots in dead birds on the beach, and get sick. The toxin can make birds lose
control of their neck muscles. Their heads fall in the water and they drown.

Beaches full of dead fish and birds aren’t great for tourism. But scientists are
more worried about what this means for endangered species – from the giant lake
sturgeon to the tiny piping plover.

Mark Breederland says they’re also worried about the thousands of migratory
birds that get killed on their way south in the fall.

“They’re just driving down their migratory highway, pulling over for a rest stop to
get something to eat, and that’s their last and final resting spot.”

So scientists are trying to pin down what’s going on.

There’s one main hypothesis. It involves some nasty little critters: invasive zebra
mussels and their cousins, the quaggas. They got into the lakes in the ballast
water of foreign ships.

Both mussels suck in lake water and filter it. They’ve made the lakes a lot clearer
than they used to be.

The clearer water means more sunlight can reach the lake bottom, and that
kick-starts algae growth. When the algae die, it sucks oxygen out of the water.
And, all of that is perfect for a bacterium that produces the botulism toxin to go forth
and multiply.

Okay, now, remember those pesky mussels? Scientists suspect they can take in
the toxin but they’re not affected by it. But fish that eat the mussels get sick.

One fish in particular loves to eat mussels. It’s the invasive round goby. And
there are lots and lots of gobies in the Lakes. That could mean lots of poisoned
snacks for bigger fish and birds.

Researchers have a bad feeling about all this, and they’re trying to confirm their
hunches.

(sound of boat engine starting up)

Brenda Moraska LaFrancois is headed out on Lake Michigan to investigate. She’s
part of a team that’s collecting samples from the lake bottom.

She says this is a tough mystery to unravel.

“These are really complicated systems and unfortunately they’re continuing to
change.”

As soon as scientists think they have a handle on what’s going on, some new
invader gets in and messes everything up again. So it’s really hard to know what
could be done to stop the outbreaks.

The experts say, if you go to the beach, it’s safe to swim. But you shouldn’t eat any
fish or waterfowl that seem sick.

Your local wildlife managers might tell you: don’t touch it, but get something to
bury the dead animal down in the sand, so other birds won’t feed on it and spread the
toxin.

For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Canada’s Blue Flag Beaches

  • Toronto is now getting its beaches certified as safe by an international program called 'Blue Flag' (Photo by Julie Grant)

Beaches on the Great Lakes have
been closed a lot this summer because of
pollution. But instead of raising the
white flag of surrender, in Canada, they’re
starting to raise a blue flag. Julie Grant
reports the Blue Flag Programme certifies
a beach is safe:

Transcript

Beaches on the Great Lakes have
been closed a lot this summer because of
pollution. But instead of raising the
white flag of surrender, in Canada, they’re
starting to raise a blue flag. Julie Grant
reports the Blue Flag Programme certifies
a beach is safe:

(sound of beach)

It’s a clear, cool summer morning by Lake Ontario. Some
people are playing volleyball, others are walking along the
boardwalk at Woodbine beach, on the east side of Toronto.
Nobody is swimming in the lake.

Beach person 1: “No I don’t swim here.”

Beach person 2: “I grew up here, and I’ve never actually
swam in Lake Ontario. Sometimes they were closed and it
was always off and on, so it never seemed like a good thing
to do.”

Beach Person 3: “It’s gross, man. It’s pretty nasty. One
time I found a couple of Band Aids. After that, I was like, ‘I’m
not going back in this water.’”

City leaders say those views are outdated.

Lou DiGeranimo is Toronto’s general manager of water.
He’s in charge of everything from drinking water to sewers
and storm water runoff.

DiGeranimo says the Lake’s bad reputation lingers
from the time when Toronto was a major port for lumber, for
shipbuilding, and for foundries.

“When you talk to certain people in the city, they remember
the old industrial heart of our city and they think that Lake
Ontario is polluted and you shouldn’t swim in it. Well we beg
to differ. You can swim in it and our water quality is actually
quite good.”

DiGeranimo is trying to change the public image of Lake
Ontario one beach at a time. So far he’s been able to get six
Toronto beaches certified as safe by an international
program called Blue Flag. DiGeranimo says the blue flag
shows that someone besides the city is checking up on the
beaches.

“There’s an external group, Environmental Defense, that
actually, we work with. And they themselves are part of a
larger international group who come round and audit to
make sure that we are following the program accordingly.”

Thousands of beaches in The Caribbean, Europe and South
Africa fly blue flags. Toronto has some of the first beaches
in Canada to be certified by the program. The city has to
test water quality every day. It also has to provide
lifeguards, recycling containers, and environmental
education programs.

But water quality is usually the biggest obstacle for beaches
trying to get a certification.

(sound of beach)

A blue flag waves in the wind at Toronto’s Woodbine beach.
But not without considerable cost. The sewer used to
overflow regularly here into Lake Ontario. The city built
underground retention tanks to store sewage overflow until it
could be sent to a treatment plant.

But multi-million dollar sewer fixes usually are not possible
for many cities.

So DiGeranimo says people also need to take action at
home. Toronto has been trying to educate people to be
careful what they wash down the drain. And DiGeranimo
says Toronto banned the use of some lawn chemicals
because they were polluting the Lake.

“If I took a bag of chemicals and then just dumped it in the
river, I could charge you for impairing the water quality. But
if you dumped it on your lawn first, and then it ended up in
the creek, that would be okay. So in the city we passed a
bylaw that restricted the use of certain chemicals.”

That kind of ban would be a tough sell in most U.S. cities. It
wasn’t easy in Toronto either.

But Jody Fry says it’s helped the city earn Blue Flags at
many beaches. Fry is Canada’s national Blue Flag program
coordinator. She says people on all shores are starting to do
the work to certify their beaches.

“It raises awareness both at the beach and throughout the
community of what actions people can take to help improve
the water quality. Which, I think, people are looking for,
because they want to help contribute to protecting the
environment.”

The city of Toronto hopes to raise Blue Flags at five more
beaches soon. For now, they want to spread the word – if
you see a Blue Flag flying at the beach, it’s a signal that you
can trust that the water is clean for swimming.

For the
Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

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