Plug Power does sell these dishwasher-sized fuel cells for your home, but in places like India (Photo courtesy of Plug Power)
Researchers and start-up companies are looking for new ways to power the country. There’s been a lot of hope for hydrogen. But as Mark Brush reports there have been some bumps for companies on the road to the new hydrogen economy:
Transcript
Researchers and start-up companies are looking for new ways to power the country. There’s been a lot of hope for hydrogen. But as Mark Brush reports there have been some bumps for companies on the road to the new hydrogen economy:
There has been a lot of excitement about hydrogen fuel cells for awhile now.
Ten years ago we talked to a rep at a company called Plug Power. He was excited about selling a dishwasher-sized fuel cells that could power and heat your home.
“The only barrier to fuel cells is that people don’t know about them.”
Turns out, that wasn’t the only barrier.
It’s expensive to make these things, and the units weren’t as efficient at heating as they hoped they would be.
But the company is still around, and they are still hopeful about fuel cells for your home.
Andy Marsh is the president of Plug Power.
“So the industry hasn’t moved ahead as rapidly as we would like. It sometimes takes many more years to makes some progress than you had originally hoped.”
Marsh says his company is selling fuel cells in places like India, but he says fuel cells for our homes in the US are probably still three to five years away.
Ocean vessel loading grain at elevator in Superior, Wisconsin. Nine foreign ships have been identified in the lawsuit against international shipping companies. (Photo by Jerry Bielicki, USACOE)
Even if ballast water is pumped out of ships, puddles and sediment usually remain at the bottom of the tank, both of which can contain non-native living organisms. (Photo courtesy of NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory)
For decades foreign ships have brought tiny stowaways – called invasive
species – into the United States. And once they get loose, they upend
ecosystems and cause billions of dollars in damage. The shipping
industry has yet to seriously address the problem, and now conservation
and environmental groups are suing the companies they say are most at
fault. Mark Brush has more:
Transcript
For decades foreign ships have brought tiny stowaways – called invasive
species – into the United States. And once they get loose, they upend
ecosystems and cause billions of dollars in damage. The shipping
industry has yet to seriously address the problem, and now conservation
and environmental groups are suing the companies they say are most at
fault. Mark Brush has more:
In 1988, the now infamous zebra mussel slipped out of a ship’s ballast
tank near Detroit. It didn’t take long for it to spread, first
throughout the Great Lakes, then through the Ohio and Mississpi rivers,
then on to Alabama and Oklahoma, and now it’s as far west as Nevada.
The mussels clog up intake pipes at water and power plants and mess up
the food chain. In some places in the Great Lakes, they’ve severely
damaged the sport fishing industry.
And that’s the damage just one foreign pest can do. More than a
hundred have gotten in and more are on the way. The government has
done little to stop the spread of these pests from foreign ships. In
2005, a federal court in California ordered the EPA to set up a system.
The EPA appealed that ruling.
Andy Buchsbaum is the Director of the National Wildlife Federation’s
Great Lakes office. He says ballast water from foreign ships should be
regulated:
“The law is very clear. The Clean Water Act says you cannot discharge
pollution into navigable waters, like the Great Lakes, without first
obtaining a permit. Period. Any discharge without a permit
is illegal.”
So, instead of waiting for the EPA to act, several environmental and
conservation groups, including Buchsbaum’s group, say they are planning
to sue several shipping companies that operate ocean-going boats on the
Great Lakes. They’re targeting nine boats they feel are the biggest
violators.
Industry representatives have said that ballast water regulations would
hurt international shipping, but in the Great Lakes, it’s estimated
that ocean-going ships make up only 6% of the overall tonnage.
Joel Brammeier is with the Alliance for the Great Lakes, one of the
groups that intends to sue the ship owners. He says a few ocean-going
boats have caused a lot of damage:
“The cost savings that we’re seeing from allowing unregulated ocean
shipping on the Lakes pales compared to the economic burden that
invasive species are placing on the Lakes. That’s stunning. The
ocean-going shipping industry is actually bringing in less than the
region is losing because of the things that ocean going ships
unintentionally bring in.”
The environmental and conservation groups who intend to sue say there
are ballast water cleaning technologies available now. The National
Wildlife Federation’s Andy Buchsbaum says they’re willing to back off
their lawsuit if the ship owners promise to clean up their ballast
water:
“This legal action is not designed to shut down the shipping industry
in the Great Lakes. That is not our intention. Our intention is to
get these guys to comply with the Clean Water Act. And that means
putting on treatment technology and getting permits.”
The shipping industry says it needs more time. Steve Fisher is with
the American Great Lakes Ports Association. He concedes there are some
technologies to clean up ballast water:
“I’ll be very frank with you. There’s technologies out there that will
do something.”
(Brush:) “So, why not use those?”
“Because a ship owner needs to know how high the bar is before he jumps
over it.”
In other words the ship owners won’t clean up their ballast water until
the federal government tells them how clean is clean, and so far, the
federal government hasn’t done that.
The EPA and the shipping industry say they’re working on the decades
old problem, but the groups that intend to sue say they’re not moving
fast enough. More invasive species are getting in. They’re hoping the threat of a
lawsuit will help force more action sooner.
Foreign ships like this one from Cypress are known as "Salties." They account for about 5% of ship traffic on the Great Lakes. If a salty dumps its ballast water in a Michigan port, they first have to show the state that they've sanitized the water. International shipping agencies have sued the state over this law. (Photo by Mark Brush)
The fight over foreign invasive pests in cargo ships is heating up. Mark Brush
reports environmental and conservation groups are going to court to defend
one of the toughest ballast water laws in the country:
Transcript
The fight over foreign invasive pests in cargo ships is heating up. Mark Brush
reports environmental and conservation groups are going to court to defend
one of the toughest ballast water laws in the country:
It’s been estimated that invasive species in the Great Lakes do billions of dollars in
damage every year. To stop foreign pests from getting into its waters, the state of
Michigan passed a law that affects all ocean-going ships stopping in
its ports. It requires them to sanitize their ballast to eliminate
invasive species that stow away in it.
International shipping agencies sued the state. They say Michigan’s
law will hurt interstate commerce.
Andy Buchsbaum is the director of the National Wildlife Federation’s
Great Lakes office. It’s one of the groups defending the ballast water
law. He says the international shipping industry might have opened
itself up to counter litigation:
“They fired the first shot – the ocean going shipping industry fired
the first shot, but it’s only the first shot. And I think you’re going
to see an awful lot of action that follows through on this. They’re
going to regret that they filed this lawsuit.”
A hearing on Michigan’s Ballast Water law is scheduled to take place
this May.
Waste from former industrial plants can pollute some of the nation’s
most natural areas, including state and national park land. Brad
Linder reports that even a treasured historic site made famous by George
Washington is at risk:
Transcript
Waste from former industrial plants can pollute some of the nation’s
most natural areas, including state and national park land. Brad
Linder reports that even a treasured historic site made famous by George
Washington is at risk:
General George Washington and his troops braved cold weather and
starvation for six months in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. The site’s now
a national historic park. But for much of the 20th century, part of the
site was also home to an asbestos manufacturing plant.
Attorney Andy Hartzell is with the state of Pennsylvania, which recently
reached an agreement with the federal government to split the 11
million dollar cleanup cost. He says just because the site holds
historic significance doesn’t mean it was safe from industrial waste:
“Since the industrial revolution our country’s had an industrialized
society, and standards were different in the 1800s than they were in
the 1900s, than they are today. So, sometimes things like this happen.”
Much of the asbestos has already been buried on site, and removing it
would be more dangerous than leaving it in place. Only the asbestos on
the surface will be moved.
Billions of fish and other aquatic organisms
are killed every year by industrial plants located on
waterways. Brad Linder reports that environmental
regulators are hoping to bring those numbers down:
Transcript
Billions of fish and other aquatic organisms
are killed every year by industrial plants located on
waterways. Brad Linder reports that environmental
regulators are hoping to bring those numbers down:
Power plants, oil refineries, and other industrial plants often have
cooling systems that rely on river water. But when water is sucked
into the cooling tanks, so are fish and other tiny organisms.
John Hughes is the state of Delaware’s environmental secretary. He says companies could use systems that recycle water but few want to spend the money:
“Every refinery in America looks up into the air and
worries about their emissions. That’s where the bulk of their
investments go in pollution controls. And when you bring up water, you
get that blank look, like ‘what now?'”
Hughes says federal rules let companies sidestep water regulations if
upgrading is considered too costly. But Hughes says
he is asking local companies to step up… and if that doesn’t work,
his state might pass tougher regulations.
The President’s proposed budget calls for big boosts in military and homeland security spending. And deep cuts to many domestic programs. As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams reports, the Great Lakes are getting their share of cuts too:
Transcript
The President’s proposed budget calls for big boosts in military and
homeland security spending. And deep cuts to many domestic programs.
As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams reports, the
Great Lakes are getting their share of cuts too:
Several groups are calling the President’s budget a net loss for the Great
Lakes.
A fund that helps states update their outdated sewage treatment plants is
slated to get one of the biggest cuts. Programs that protect fisheries from
the destructive sea lamprey would also get cut back.
Andy Buchsbaum directs the Great Lakes office of the National Wildlife
Federation.
“We knew that it was going to be a tight budget year, but it really was pretty
shocking to see the level of cuts in key Great Lakes programs. Now
there were some programs that went up but by and large across the board
the programs were severely cut, in things that are just critical.”
One action Buchsbaum says is critical is stopping the Asian carp from
getting into the Great Lakes. Right now, there’s no federal funding for an
electric barrier designed to keep the invasive carp out.
It’s now up to Congress to decide whether to go through with these
proposed cuts.
Plug Power does sell these dishwasher-sized fuel cells for your home, but in places like India (Photo courtesy of Plug Power)
