Tag: clinton administration

Ethanol Part 2: Widening the Dead Zone?

  • Farmer Laura Krouse says the ethanol boom has been great for corn farmers, who she says are finally getting a fair price for their corn. But she says she's worried that there's not enough being done fast enough to reduce the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. (Photo by Rebecca Williams)

Scientists are predicting the Dead Zone in the Gulf of Mexico will reach its largest size ever this summer. Fish and shrimp can’t survive in the Dead Zone. It’s believed to be mainly caused by fertilizer washed from farm fields across the nation. Rebecca Williams reports some scientists say demand for ethanol made from corn could make the Dead Zone even bigger:

Transcript

Scientists are predicting the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico will reach its largest size ever this summer. Fish and shrimp can’t survive in the dead zone. It’s believed to be mainly caused by fertilizer washed from farm fields across the nation. Rebecca Williams reports some scientists say demand for ethanol made from corn could make the dead zone even bigger:


(Sound of tractor raking hay)


“It’s the perfect Iowa day, you know?”


Laura Krouse is tearing apart a bale of hay to mulch her tomatoes.
She’s a thousand miles from the Gulf of Mexico. But she points out,
what happens on farms here ends up affecting life way down South:


“This watershed I live in drains 25% of Iowa. And we’re one of the
richest farming states in the nation – of course we have something to
do with it.”


By “it,” Krouse means the dead zone. All or parts of 31 farm states
drain into the Mississippi River, which empties into the Gulf.
Scientists point to nitrogen fertilizer used on farm fields as the main
cause of the dead zone. All that nitrogen causes an enormous algae
bloom. When the algae dies it drops to the ocean floor. Bacteria eat
the algae and they rob the water of oxygen.


This summer, the dead zone’s predicted to reach a record size. It could get as big as the state of New Jersey.


Laura Krouse has been trying to cut back her own role in the dead zone.
Five years ago, she added something to her farm that’s rare around here.
Krouse cut some of the tile lines that drain water from her farm, and
replaced part of her farmland with a prairie wetland. She says that
made her neighbors nervous:


“We just don’t see people taking land out of production in Iowa very
frequently.”


Wetlands like this one remove nitrogen from the water that flows from
farm fields.


It’s one of the things a government task force on the dead zone
recommended to cut nitrogen loading into the Gulf.


But instead of a big push to restore wetlands, the economic landscape
is changing in the other direction. Demand for ethanol has led to
historically high corn prices. And that’s encouraging farmers to grow
more corn. A USDA report says farmers have planted 14 million more
acres of corn this year than last year. It’s the most corn planted in
the U.S. in more than 50 years.


Laura Krouse says this is not good for the Gulf of Mexico:


“I’m concerned about all the extra corn because it requires nitrogen to
produce that corn and no matter how careful we are and no matter how
expensive it is which causes us to be more and more careful with
application, nitrogen as a molecule just wants to get away. It is
leaky.”


When it rains, nitrogen runs quickly from farm fields and gets into
creeks and rivers. The federal government’s task force on the dead zone has been trying to
tackle all this.


Don Scavia led a group of scientists advising the task force under the
Clinton Administration. The Bush Administration convened a new science
panel to review the original science panel’s work. Don Scavia says
since then, there’s been very little progress in shrinking the dead
zone, or what scientists call an area of hypoxia:


“In fact what we’ve seen in the last year is just the opposite with
this push towards corn-based ethanol production. Even acres that were
set aside into conservation are coming back out into production, into
corn, and the increased nitrogen load to the Gulf this year and the projected record
hypoxia is probably caused by this increased corn production.”


Scavia says if the dead zone keeps increasing, the Gulf shrimping
industry could collapse.


Ironically, the new science panel appointed by the Bush White House is
calling for even bigger cuts in nitrogen than the first panel appointed
by the Clinton Administration. They want to reduce nitrogen from farm
fields and other sources by 40 to 45 percent.


Don Parrish is with the American Farm Bureau. He says those reductions
are too much:


“Those are going to be really difficult and they could cause
significant economic dislocation at a time when I think we need to be
thinking about the products that agriculture produces, and those are
important.”


There’s no question corn for ethanol is at the top of that list right
now. Ethanol’s popular. It’s making farmers richer. It’s making the
chemical companies that supply nitrogen richer. The government task
force has to figure out how to cut back on all the nitrogen that’s
needed to grow all the corn… that’s needed for billions of gallons of
ethanol.


For the Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Polluters Pay Less Under Bush

  • A new report concludes that under the Bush Administration, polluters are less likely to be taken to court. (Photo by Shealah Craighead, courtesy of the White House)

The Bush Administration is not punishing polluters as much. That’s according to a new
report issued by a group of former Environmental Protection Agency attorneys. Mark
Brush reports:

Transcript

The Bush Administration is not punishing polluters as much. That’s according to a new
report issued by a group of former Environmental Protection Agency attorneys. Mark
Brush reports:


The report concludes that under the Bush Administration, polluters are less likely to be
taken to court. They’re less likely to be investigated. And they’re less likely to pay civil
or criminal penalties when compared to the Clinton Administration. Eric Schaeffer is the
director of the Environmental Integrity Project, the group that released the report. As an
example of lax enforcement, he says the EPA often takes no action when power
companies pollute:


“I think power plants routinely violate particulate matter standards. They exceed opacity
requirements. They are even in some cases blowing stack tests, which are really hard to
fail, and you just don’t see much response.”


An EPA spokesman says they’re committed to holding polluters accountable. As proof,
he says they’ve reached a record number of settlements in the last three years that force
companies to clean up.


For the Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

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Adapting to Climate Change

Businesses are beginning to talk about climate change in different
terms. Instead of debating whether humans are causing it, there’s a
lot more talk about what climate change might mean to the business
climate. Lester Graham reports there are questions about what might
happen to affect business as global temperatures and weather patterns change:

Transcript

Businesses are beginning to talk about climate change in different
terms. Instead of debating whether humans are causing it, there’s a
lot more talk about what climate change might mean to the business
climate. Lester Graham reports there are questions about what might
happen to affect business as global temperatures and weather patterns change:


For the last couple of decades, the people who’ve been arguing that we
have to do something to reduce the greenhouse emissions causing global
warming avoided one subject:


“People did not want to talk about adaptation or coping with climate
change because that was seen as a cop-out.”


That’s Rosina Bierbaum. She was a science advisor during the Clinton
administration and is now the Dean of the School of Natural Resources
and Environment at the University of Michigan.


The fear was, if you could figure out a way to cope with global
warming, you wouldn’t do anything to reduce the emissions causing it.


But Bierbaum says with concensus among the majority of the scientists in
the world that global warming is happening and humans are contributing,
the point has been made. Time to move on:


“It’s only really been, I would say, in the last two years that the
science has become so clear, that the changes are occurring so fast.
And we’re seeing them already… that society is realizing we’ve got to
cope with those changes now and there are more in store for us.”


Actually, Bierbaum thinks we’re really kind of behind in thinking about
the consequences of global warming. It’s not just the polar ice caps
melting and the rising sea levels. There are a lot of everyday sort of
things that will likely change.


For instance, what kind of plants should you put in your home
landscaping? Will the tree you plant today survive in the changing
climate? How flexible is your business if the climate changes weather
patterns?


Thomas Karl is the Director of the National Climatic Data Center at the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He says people have
to start thinking about things like that. And Karl says it’s not just
higher temperatures, but sudden dramatic changes, such as maybe no snow
in the Northern states for a couple of years at a time. Or dry spells
that could make rivers so low that barges can’t travel up and down
them:


“What really has important impacts are the extreme events. I think the
questions being asked along these lines are ‘How vulnerable am I to
these episodic conditions?’ and ‘What do we need to do to prepare
ourselves for the possibility that things may not change gradually, but
could be quite abrupt change?'”


Some of those extreme events are heavier storms. As hurricane Katrina
showed, that could affect a lot of things. For example, the oil
industry is looking at its refineries in the Gulf of Mexico. With more
and more intense hurricanes, could it be worth building
refineries somewhere else?


There’s a lot at risk.


Franklin Nutter is the President of the Reinsurance Association of
America: the insurers of the insurance companies. He says with more
forest fires in the West, and unpredictability in agriculture, and more
violent storm surges on the coasts… all due to climate change, it’s
going to cost:


“Someone has to pay for the repair and recovery. If the insurance
mechanism is going to be the intermediary that translates those costs
into people’s premiums, then the answer is insurance premiums are going
to have to match those.”


And that means we’re all going to pay higher insurance costs because
some people and businesses are going to ignore, or miscalculate, how
climate change is going to affect them:


“The Association of British Insurers did a study looking at just the
effect of climate change on insurability and held steady population
growth, property values, all of those things. And they concluded that
you could see insurance premiums rise by 60% by mid-century just as a
result of climate change.”


That means if nothing changed: no inflation, no currency change…
nothing except global warming, insurance rates go up 60% during the
next 30 to 40 years. You’re already seeing it.


Some climate change experts say we can slow the impacts of global
warming by reducing greenhouse emissions now. But we’re already
seeing change… and we will see more.


There will be winners in global climate change. Some growing seasons
will be extended. Some areas will get more precipitation. But there
will likely be a lot more losers as businesses and people either can’t
or won’t adjust to the changing climate of their region.


For the Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.

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Judge Says No to Roadless Area Logging

A federal judge says the Bush Administration broke the law when it opened up protected forestland to logging. A rule under the Clinton Administration kept nearly one third of all national forestland off limits to logging and new road building. But last year the Bush Administration repealed that rule. Mark Brush has more:

Transcript

A federal judge says the Bush Administration broke the law when it opened up protected
forestland to logging. A rule under the Clinton Administration kept nearly one third of all
national forestland off limits to logging and new road building. But last year the Bush
Administration repealed that rule. Mark Brush has more:


The federal judge said the Bush Administration did not comply with environmental laws
when it repealed the so-called Roadless Area Conservation Rule.


The Administration opened the door to more road-building and logging. And it
required states to petition the federal government if they wanted their roadless areas
protected.


Just last month in Oregon, the first protected roadless area was opened up to logging. The
trees were killed four years ago in a fire. Patty Burel is a spokesperson for the U.S.
Forest Service. She says the federal court’s ruling won’t affect the current timber sale:


“It’s our understanding, from what we’re hearing from our legal counsel, that nothing
prohibits us from continuing, so we’re continuing to proceed with the plan of operation
with these two fire salvage sales.”


It’s expected that the timber industry and some states like Idaho will appeal the judge’s ruling.


For the Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.

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Epa Proposes New Air Pollution Rules

Environmentalists say the Bush administration is ignoring the government’s own scientists in new proposed air pollution rules. The rules reject advice to further restrict soot and other fine particle pollution. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

Environmentalists say the Bush administration is ignoring the
government’s own scientists in new proposed air pollution rules. The
rules reject advice to further restrict soot and other fine particle pollution.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:


Environmental Protection Agency’s own staff scientists and the
independent Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee both found the
EPA needed to issue more restrictive rules regarding fine particulate
matter, that’s soot emitted from sources such as diesel trucks and coal-
burning power plants.


After reviewing 2000 studies linking particulate matter to asthma, heart
attacks, and early death for people with heart and lung disease, the
scientists concluded that standards set by the Clinton administration in
1997 did not go far enough to help reduce health risks. Despite that, the
Bush EPA appointees basically plan to keep restrictions where they are.


The power plant industry indicates further restrictions would be a
financial burden to it, and provide only marginal public health benefits.


Environmentalists say the Bush administration’s proposed rules ignore
mountains of medical research showing this kind of air pollution causes
serious health problems.


For the GLRC, this is Lester Graham.

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Administration Seeks Money for Areas of Concern

The Clinton administration is asking Congress for money in the
2001 federal budget to speed along pollution clean-up plans in some
Great Lakes areas. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham
reports… some believe it’s in part an election year move:

Energy Budget Brightens Some Programs

The federal budget is a bit brighter for some energy savings programs…
but dimmer for others. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham
reports:

Proposed Cuts May End Harbor Dredging

Maintenance of small recreational harbors on the Great Lakes could
be cut if the Army Corps (CORE) of Engineers has to trim its budget any
further. This month (October, 1998), Congress rejected a Clinton
Administration request to stop dredging small harbors. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson has the story: