The Senate's climate and energy bill was supposed to be introduced last April. It's release was delayed when Republican Senator Lindsey Graham withdrew his support. (Photo courtesy of The Architect of the Capitol)
The Senate is releasing their version of a climate and energy bill. And as Mark Brush reports, some political insiders are saying it’s now or never for action on energy and climate:
Transcript
The Senate is releasing their version of a climate and energy bill. And as Mark Brush reports, some political insiders are saying it’s now or never for action on energy and climate:
Most environmental groups argue that the Gulf Oil spill highlights the need to pass sweeping new energy legislation. And some political observers say Democrats will never have a bigger majority in the Senate than they do now.
So now might be the time for quick passage of the Kerry-Lieberman bill.
But a few others say there’s no need to rush things.
A climate and energy bill should be good policy first.
Frank O’Donnell is with the environmental group Clean Air Watch:
“There appears to be this real race to get something done before this window closes. The best kind of public policy is not always carved out under those circumstances.”
O’Donnell says the conventional wisdom that there will be no better time than now could be wrong.
He believes there will be other opportunities to pass climate change legislation in the future.
Senator Lindsey Graham has walked out on the bill– saying he can’t go forward because the Democratic leadership is now playing politics with immigration policy.(Photo courtesy of the US Senate)
A climate and energy bill was supposed to be introduced in the Senate this week. But Mark Brush reports… politics are getting in the way:
Transcript
A climate and energy bill was supposed to be introduced in the Senate this week. But Mark Brush reports… politics are getting in the way:
Senators John Kerry – a Democrat – Joe Lieberman – an Independent – and Lindsey Graham a Republican have been working on a climate and energy bill.
There have been months of delicate negotiations.
But Senator Graham has walked out – saying he can’t go forward because the Democratic leadership is now playing politics with immigration policy.
Dan Weiss is the Director of Climate Strategy for the Center for American Progress – a liberal public policy group. He says all these delays come with costs:
“Every day that we wait to reform our energy policies, we buy a billion dollars worth of oil from other countries… Iran will earn an extra hundred million dollars in oil revenue… China will get further ahead of us in developing the clean energy technologies of the future.”
The House passed a climate and energy bill last year, but a Senate bill has been repeatedly delayed.
On Tuesday, October 17th the number of people living in the US will cross the 300 million mark. Mark Brush has more:
Transcript
On Tuesday, October 17th the number of people living in the US will cross the 300 million mark. Mark Brush has more:
The US Census Bureau says after birth rates, death rates, and immigration rates are calculated, one person is added to the population every 11 seconds. So, by the time this report is over, 5 more people will have been added. What’s driving population growth in the US? Experts say natural increases account for 60% of the growth – that’s when birth rates outpace death rates – and immigration accounts for the rest of it, about 40%.
The Population Reference Bureau looked at population trends from 1970 to 2000. According to the Bureau, more of us are living alone. The researchers say one-person households account for more than a quarter of the population. That means on average there’s more housing and more energy being used for each person in the US. The US is expected to hit the 400 million mark in about 37 years.
John Munter grows hazelnuts on his farm in northern Minnesota. He says the bushes are better for the environment than corn or soybeans, and that hazelnuts could be an important food in a future of climate change. (Photo by Stephanie Hemphill)
You might have tried hazelnut flavoring in your coffee. And we all know about the hazelnuts in European chocolate bars. Hazelnuts – or filberts – are traditionally grown in Turkey, Italy, and Oregon. Now, researchers are developing varieties that could thrive in more challenging climates, such as the Great Lakes region. A man in northern Minnesota is growing hazelnuts. It’s part of his attempt to live off the land. And he says hazelnuts are the perfect crop for a future of global climate change. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill visited his farm:
Transcript
You might have tried hazelnut flavoring in your coffee. And we all know about the hazelnuts in
European chocolate bars. Hazelnuts – or filberts – are traditionally grown in Turkey, Italy, and
Oregon. Now, researchers are developing varieties that could thrive in more challenging
climates, such as the Great Lakes region. A man in northern Minnesota is growing hazelnuts. It’s
part of his attempt to live off the land. And he says hazelnuts are the perfect crop for a future of
global climate change. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Stephanie Hemphill visited his
farm:
John Munter lives on 40 acres of hay fields and woods. He and his wife and their four children
live in a ranch-style house in the middle of the fields. Munter works at a Northwest Airlines
reservation center. But his heart is here at the farm. It was settled by his grandfather, a Finnish
immigrant, 90 years ago.
Munter has a full beard. He wears round wire-rimmed glasses. And when he goes out to do the
chores, he puts on a fraying denim jacket that must be 50 years old. It belonged to his great-
uncle.
(sound of Munter walking outdoors)
“Here’s our maple sugaring operation… this is the garden here, you can see it’s pretty small.
We’re so busy it’s hard to spend a lot of time gardening… and to my right is the log sauna…”
John Munter has a lot of projects. He wants to be as self-sufficient as he can on the farm.
Twelve years ago he planted some hazelnut bushes south of the old farmhouse. They’re protected
from the north wind here, and they’ve grown to about seven feet tall.
This is a new crop for northern Minnesota. There are wild hazelnuts growing around here, but no
one had tried the newer varieties, that are bred to produce more and bigger nuts.
Four years ago, Munter’s bushes began producing nuts. He’s especially happy with one of the
bushes.
“It really just pounds out the nuts. They’re not real big, but they’re plentiful, last year we got
maybe two pounds of nuts from this little bush right here… Now this bush here produces nuts
early. They’re a signal to me because when the squirrels start attacking my nuts, they take after
this one first because they ripen earlier. You can see a bush loaded with hazelnuts, and the next
morning it’s stripped. And then they go to the next bush, and the next one, and so on. (Hemphill:
‘Then how do you get anything out of them?’) Well, I’m letting the animals have them at this
point, because I’m too busy with all my other projects to process all these little nuts.”
You have to take the long view with hazelnuts. Right now, these bushes are 12 years old, and
they’re just beginning to produce nuts. But Munter says in ten years, he could get hundreds of
pounds.
He could sell them to candy-makers, or just eat them. They’re high in protein and vitamins. And
Munter says the oil is as healthy as olive oil. Most hazelnuts come from Europe and Oregon.
John Munter is determined to show they’ll grow in northern Minnesota.
“They’re great for climate change too. Because they bend and don’t break… in hurricanes,
tornadoes and wind storms, whatever… if a forest fire burns it over, they’ll pop back up from the
base there.”
John Munter says hazelnuts could be an important source of food if the climate gets harsher.
Munter’s not the only one in the Great Lakes region trying out hazelnuts. Some researchers say
they’re the crop of the future. They say the bushes are better for the environment than corn and
soybeans.
Hazelnut bushes stay in the ground for years, so the soil isn’t eroded by plowing. And they’re
very good at absorbing fertilizers. That means excess fertilizer doesn’t run into nearby streams.
A few farmers are planting them, and thinking of switching gradually, from corn and soybeans, to
hazelnuts.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Stephanie Hemphill.
People who come to the United States to escape persecution in their home country often face two major adjustments: Life in a new country, and life—for the first time—in a major city. A farm in Illinois takes part in a program designed to ease that transition. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman reports:
Transcript
People who come to the United States to escape persecution in their
home country
often face two major adjustments: Life in a new country, and life—for
the first
time—in a major city. A farm in Illinois takes part in a program
designed to ease
that transition. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman
reports:
The demons of torture were threatening to rob Thaddee Essomba of his
life.
Essomba was a political activist in the West African nation of
Cameroon.
Someone evidently didn’t share Essomba’s views, and they wanted to make
him
pay.
Essomba fled Cameroon, leaving behind his home, his family, and
everything he
knew. He didn’t stop running until he arrived in Chicago.
Chicago was unlike anything Essomba had ever seen. Skyscrapers,
apartment
complexes and elevated trains were all new to him. Miles and miles of
concrete
and asphalt surrounded him. Adjusting to life in the city was almost
as difficult as
adjusting to life in a new country. All this, while trying to recover
from the
physical and psychological scars of torture.
Then, Thaddee Essomba discovered the farm.
(sound of farm fades in)
“For me to come here is really to go back to the source. Because when
you live in
the city, you know you get a little bit, you like to be in touch with
the nature. And
really I was missing that.”
(sound of goats)
The farm is called Angelic Organics. For the past decade it’s been
hosting visitors
from the Marjorie Kovler Center for Survivors of Torture in Chicago.
The Center
helps people fleeing persecution to recover and re-settle in the United
States.
People come to the center from all over the world. Many of them are
from rural
areas and aren’t used to living in a city.
Tom Spaulding is a former volunteer at the Kovler Center. He now works
at
Angelic Organics Farm. He says a visit to the farm can be a key stop
on the road
to recovery for torture victims.
“They’re living now in Chicago in a huge metropolitan area, and they’re
from rural
backgrounds, and some of them are farmers. And to be on a farm that’s
somewhat
like what they were used to back home—because it’s a small farm, it’s
diversified
vegetables and livestock. And so it’s, maybe it’s just because it
touches a lot of
things from peoples’…what was familiar from back home. And maybe that
in a
sense helps.”
For many of the people here, it’s a familiar setting. John Fallah
fled a civil war in
Liberia two years ago. He had to leave his family behind when he
escaped.
While he says he enjoys life in Chicago because he doesn’t feel
threatened
anymore, Fallah says the farm reminds him of home…
“I’m very much impressed of what I am seeing on this farm. There is no
difference from how we do the farming in Africa and here.”
(sound of chickens, goats)
This was Fallah’s first visit to the farm. Some of the Kovler Center’s
clients have
made the 80-mile trip from Chicago many times. Thaddee Essomba says
the farm
has become an important part of his life.
“When I came here you know I feel myself very relaxed. I enjoy myself,
you
know, my soul was really in touch with the nature, and I feel very
happy you
know and why sometime every year I try to come back to be, to feel that
sensation.”
For Essomba and the other survivors of torture, that sensation can be
an important
part of the healing process.
Essomba has even found a way to give back to the community surrounding
the
farm. He’s been teaching area kids about life in his native country.
It’s a land far
away, a place the kids have probably even never heard of. But as
Essomba has
learned, the nation of Cameroon has some very important things in
common with
the rural Midwest.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chris Lehman.
Pleasure boaters from Canada will find getting permits to enter Great Lakes ports across the border a little more demanding since the terrorist attacks on the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
Pleasure boaters from Canada will find getting permits to enter Great Lakes
ports across the border a little more demanding since the terrorist attacks
on the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
It used to be… a Canadian boater simply had to send in an application for
what’s known as an I-68 permit to the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization
Service and once it was received, they could freely travel back and forth.
Kimberly Weissman is with the INS office. She explains, since September
11th, the new rules first require Canadians to go to a port of entry.
“Going in for an inspection… it’s no longer done by mail. You
have an interview and you take a photograph and have fingerprints. Once all
of this is complete, you know, you’ll be given your one year permit and then
you will no longer be required to go to a port of entry for any other
further inspections.”
Weissman says the U.S. government didn’t want to hurt the marina and
tourist-based businesses in the Great Lakes, but felt the new stricter
program was necessary for the security of the country.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
The Senate's climate and energy bill was supposed to be introduced last April. It's release was delayed when Republican Senator Lindsey Graham withdrew his support. (Photo courtesy of The Architect of the Capitol)
