There’s a new federal program aimed at encouraging more water conservation at your
bathoom faucet. Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
There’s a new federal program aimed at encouraging more water conservation at your
bathoom faucet. Chuck Quirmbach reports:
The US Environmental Protection Agency has issued specifications for bathroom faucet
manufacturers to qualify for the agency’s WaterSense label. The EPA wants about a 30
percent reduction in water flow from conventional models.
Kohler corporation engineer Rob Zimmerman says the smaller size of the flow restrictor
inside the faucet’s aerator will be the key to hitting the new target. He acknowledges some
water utilities wanted the new flow limit to be one gallon per minute, instead of the 1.5
per gallon limit specified by the EPA:
“The WaterSense program is flexible enough that as technology improves, they can change the
specification, but at this point the 1.5 was what everyone agreed to.”
The EPA says consumers will also save energy by heating and treating less water.
Finding a balance between natural habitat and commerce on America's rivers is causing problems. (Photo by Lester Graham)
When Lewis and Clark traveled up the Missouri River 200 years ago, they
recorded the abundant wildlife they saw along their way. Fur trapping was a
thriving industry on Frontier Rivers. But it took another 100 years of over-hunting
for the US to realize it was wiping out its wildlife. Today, conservation,
commerce and tourism all intersect on the nation’s big rivers. Each of those
industries relies on a steady supply of water. In the last of three reports, Kevin
Lavery looks at how all of those interests share – and struggle – over water:
Transcript
When Lewis and Clark traveled up the Missouri River 200 years ago, they
recorded the abundant wildlife they saw along their way. Fur trapping was a
thriving industry on Frontier Rivers. But it took another 100 years of over-hunting
for the US to realize it was wiping out its wildlife. Today, conservation,
commerce and tourism all intersect on the nation’s big rivers. Each of those
industries relies on a steady supply of water. In the last of three reports, Kevin
Lavery looks at how all of those interests share – and struggle – over water:
The Missouri River is known as the Big Muddy. Sure, it’s muddy at its mouth
where it joins the Mississippi River near St. Louis. But a thousand miles
upstream, the Missouri cuts a gleaming blue ribbon through Bismarck, North
Dakota. It looks like paradise to Mike Peluso… and with a broad smile, he rushes
his boat smack into the middle of it.
Peluso grew up fishing on this river. It’s a place brimming with history. Lewis
and Clark camped here in 1804. As he’s fishing, Peluso points to a frontier-era
fort that now sits within a state park:
“That’s actually where Custer started off, right up there before he went to his final… Here’s
a bite!”
Peluso lands a 4-pound walleye. It’s the most abundant fish species in the upper
Missouri system, and he wants to keep it that way:
“Just going to let her go down. You know, hopefully my kids at some point in time will get
to enjoy the same thing I just did. (SPLASH). Oh yeah… she took off. Perfect.”
Fishing on the Missouri River is crucial to North Dakota’s economy. In the 1950’s
the Army Corps of Engineers dammed the Missouri River 80 miles north of
Bismarck. The formation of Lake Sakakawea gave rise to a 150 million dollar
annual recreation industry.
That industry largely exists because of the US Fish and Wildlife Service. The
Garrison Dam National Fish Hatchery breeds 80% of the state’s game fish.
There’s about 70 million walleye eggs in one building alone. But officials here
also care for fish that are never meant to be caught.
Rob Holm is with the Fish and Wildlife Service. He watches several pallid
sturgeons circling an 8,000 gallon tank. Each five-foot fish weighs about 60
pounds. The pallid has survived for 70 million years. But Holm says threats to
its habitat have made it an endangered species:
“If we can change things just enough to give them a fighting chance, I think it’s a good
thing. They’ve been around since the time of the dinosaurs. If we miss a beat on it now…
they’re not going to be there in 10 years.”
The pallid sturgeon was harvested for its caviar before it was federally protected.
But illegal catches still happen. Environmental groups see the pallid as a
barometer that gauges the overall health of the Missouri River. Chad Smith runs
the Nebraska field office of American Rivers:
“We lose the pallid sturgeon, that’s an indication that we may start to see problems with
the catfish and the paddlefish and the mallards and the bass, and then people are really
going to start screaming.”
The pallid sturgeon needs deep water to lay its eggs. In 2006, the Army Corps of
Engineers released extra water from a South Dakota reservoir to mimic the flood
pulse that cues the fish’s reproduction. It was a highly controversial act 15 years
in the making:
“I’m uncomfortable with the Corps playing God.”
Paul Rhode is with the national shipping advocacy group Waterways Council,
Incorporated. He says the artificial rise meant dropped water levels later in the summer.
That hurt commercial barge operators. Rhode questions the Corps’ methods:
“I hope there are studies going on to try to capture whatever it is that they’re doing to justify
having a spring rise. In past years it was to stimulate least tern and piping plover
populations, and then it was discovered that there was no science behind that. That was
just guesswork.”
The interior least tern and the piping plover are two birds that are also protected
by the Endangered Species Act. Spokesman Paul Johnston says the Corps has
evidence that its methods are working:
“Near Ponca, Nebraska we dredged out an old channel that had been closed off to create
shallow water habitat for the sturgeon and created an island. It was still being groomed
when the terns and plovers began nesting on it. We had to shut the bulldozer operator
down.”
The Corps says it understands the needs of all the different interests along the
Missouri River. That’s why it’s agreed to pay for an independent scientific study
of its habitat construction program. That study is expected to begin this fall. The
Corps says it’s still committed to trying to find a balance between nature and
business on America’s longest river. But barge owners, sportsmen and
environmentalists will try to tip that balance in their favor.
Low-flow toilets left some people flushed with anger when the products
debuted in the 1990’s. But the Environmental Protection Agency is
pushing ahead with a voluntary program to create toilets that use even
less water. Chuck Quirmbach reports some toilet manufacturers say they
want to join the new water-saving market and hope consumers are ready
to buy:
Transcript
Low-flow toilets left some people flushed with anger when the products
debuted in the 1990’s. But the Environmental Protection Agency is
pushing ahead with a voluntary program to create toilets that use even
less water. Chuck Quirmbach reports some toilet manufacturers say they
want to join the new water-saving market and hope consumers are ready
to buy:
Rob Zimmerman admits there are plenty of jokes about toilets, but the
water engineer for the Kohler Corporation takes the bathroom commode
very seriously.
“I’ve heard people say that the toilet is kind of the foundation of
modern civilization… that modern sanitation allowed for the growth of
cities and allowed for the decline of infectious diseases.”
And now Zimmerman has a handle on a new role for toilets: saving water.
Studies have shown that toilets can account for up to 30% of
a household’s water use. Water prices are going up and in some fast-
growing communities water supplies are growing more scarce.
So, the EPA created a voluntary program it calls Water Sense. It aims
to get toilets to use 20% less water than the newer toilets you’ve
probably seen that were mandated back in the 1990’s. This new
generation of toilets goes from 1.6 gallons per flush to about 1.3
gallons, and still meets performance guidelines for producing a clean
bowl.
(Sound of flushing)
Kohler and other toilet makers are trying various ways to get to 1.3
gallons. After looking at a 1.6 gallon model, Rob Zimmerman lifts the
tank lid on a 1.3:
“What you see that’s different here… is remember the other one had
that red flapper? This canister here, that lifts straight up when you flush
it, so all the water can move from all different directions and go down
down the valve. It’s a bigger rush and so the actual time that this
flushes is a little bit shorter than the other one.”
Zimmerman says other higher efficiency models use what’s called a dual-
flush system that sends away one amount of water for liquid waste and
another for solids, with an average of 1.3 gallons.
Another type is the so-called pressure assist, a louder system that
compresses air to force the smaller volume of water out quickly.
Under its new Water Sense Certification program, the EPA has put out
final specifications for the 1.3 models.
Kohler is getting ready to submit six toilet models for certification,
which the EPA compares to its Energy Star program for things like
computers. EPA Water Administrator Benjamin Grumbles says the public
can be confident about a third party certification system the EPA has
created:
“The agency working with the scientific community and with independent
testing organizations want to make sure that consumers, when they see that
Water Sense label, they will be able to have confidence that the
product will perform well, and it will lead to increased savings. Not
just in terms of water, but also reduce the water bill and reduce the
energy bill as well.”
But it may take a while to build that confidence. At a home remodeling
show, bathroom fixtures store owner Rich Libbey said he’s seen low-flow
toilets elsewhere that have not worked properly.
“Some of the Carribean Islands that are desert islands flush on a
European quart of water, but they don’t clean the bowl. So, later on in
the evenings, for example at a bar or resort, the toilet gets kind of
gamey.”
But Libbey says he’s willing to give companies like Kohler the benefit
of the doubt of reliably getting to 1.3 gallons per flush. Like most
high-efficiency energy-saving systems, the up-front costs are a little
higher.
The Kohler Corporation says its new high-efficiency toilets might cost
an extra fifty dollars to buy, but estimates the financial payback of
using less water could come in just a couple years.
Biologists in Canada are taking extreme measures to prevent
the disappearance of a mysterious fish. For the first time ever, they’ve stocked one of the Great Lakes with American eels. David Sommerstein reports:
Transcript
Biologists in Canada are taking extreme measures to prevent the disappearance of a mysterious fish. For the first time ever, they’ve stocked one of the Great Lakes with American eels. David Sommerstein reports:
Eels spawn in the Sargasso Sea. They swim thousands of miles up the Atlantic Coast, up the St. Lawrence River, and into Lake Ontario.
Once the most populous fish in the lake, eel numbers have been plummeting since the 1980s. In a desperate move, the province of Ontario captured 144,000 baby eels from the Atlantic, nursed them, and then released them into Lake Ontario to see if they’ll live.
“It’s a grand experiment. What we need to do urgently is get eels back into the system.”
Rob McGregor is with Ontario’s Ministry of Natural Resources. He says Lake Ontario eels are among the biggest and most productive of the species in North America.
“Losing them is a big concern.”
McGregor says it’ll take a decade or more before he knows if the eels reproduce and the experiment can be declared a success.
For The Environment Report, I’m David Sommerstein.
Plans to dump a chemical weapon by-product into a river have been put on hold. Brad Linder reports a group of lawmakers is calling for further study of those plans:
Transcript
Plans to dump a chemical weapon byproduct into a river have been put on hold. Brad Linder reports a group of lawmakers is calling for further study of those plans:
Under international law, the United States is obligated to neutralize its stockpile of VX Nerve agent. The Army has been destroying VX at a plant in Indiana. Then the plan was to ship the remains of the material to a facility in New Jersey for further treatment before dumping the waste into the Delaware River.
But New Jersey’s congressional delegation pushed for a complete study of the project. Representative Rob Andrews says the region relies on the Delaware River for commerce and drinking water.
“A quantity of VX that could fit on the head of a pin would kill you if it touched your skin. Any possibility that any residue of that VX would be put into the river is unacceptable, because the health consequences would be catastrophic.”
The Army says the VX would be completely neutralized before being dumped in the river, but Andrews isn’t convinced.
A government study should be complete early next year.
Cars and trucks are Americans’ favorite way to get around. But a study that’s the first of its kind in the U.S. suggests children’s health might be suffering from our love affair with the automobile. The GLRC’s Shawn Allee has our story:
Transcript
Cars and trucks are Americans’ favorite way to get around. But a study
that’s the first of its kind in the U.S suggests children’s health might be
suffering from our love affair with the automobile. The GLRC’s Shawn
Allee has our story:
The University of Southern California studied kids who live near busy
roads and freeways. They found they were fifty percent more likely to
develop asthma than kids who lived farther away.
Professor Rob McConnell co-authored the work. He says homes aren’t
unique. Other places, such as school playgrounds, could pose risks if
they’re near roads, too.
“I think there’re some practical implications for parents or for physical
education teachers in terms of having children exercise away from a
major road.”
McConnell says studies of children in Europe back up his own
conclusions.
Environmentalists say the findings confirm their suspicion that decades
worth of clean air regulations haven’t gone far enough.
Coyotes have started to lose their wildlife habitat, and now they are adapting to cities and suburbs. (Photo courtesy of Michigan Department of Natural Resources)
Justin Brown is one of the researchers tracking coyotes in the suburbs. His research is exploring the predator's impact on Canada geese.
Coyotes have even found their way into downtowns of major cities.
A coyote was recently found in New York City's Central Park. Coyotes frequent Chicago's downtown Lincoln Park, in search of food such as young geese and other waterfowl.
As wildlife habitat is displaced by subdivisions, some animals are adapting to their new surroundings. That’s created new food for some kinds of predators, such as coyotes. The GLRC’s Lester Graham reports on how their range is expanding:
Transcript
As wildlife habitat is displaced by subdivisions, some animals are
adapting to their new surroundings. That’s created new food for some
kinds of predators, such as coyotes. The GLRC’s Lester Graham reports
on how their range is expanding:
Wile E. Coyote hasn’t always had the greatest life out in the wild.
(Sound of Roadrunner)
So… some coyotes are moving into the city, and why not? There’s a
smorgasbord for coyotes in the city.
(Sounds of ducks and geese)
We’re in Lincoln Park in downtown Chicago. Coyotes are occasionally
sighted around here. Rob Curtis has seen one in his neighborhood a few
miles north of here, but the wildlife photographer had a close encounter
with a coyote here in Lincoln Park.
“Well, I knew that it was living there because people had seen it before,
but I hadn’t seen it. And then, I was trying to photograph a rare bird that
was in front of the fence there and I was camouflaged and it came up
right in front on the other side of the fence without it noticing me, and
then it just walked on.”
The coyotes eat just about anything they can get a hold of: rats, young
geese, squirrels… and… sometimes pets. In the Chicago suburb,
Arlington Heights, coyotes have been a problem.
Police Sergeant Nick Pecora says sometimes coyotes are pretty brazen.
“In the last 18 months Arlington Heights has lost one Yorkshire Terrier,
taken off the patio in the owners presence, and in one case the dog had an
electronic collar on and when the coyote took it, it received a shock and
dropped the animal and ran away.”
Pecora says some Arlington Heights residents haven’t been too keen on
what some see as an intruding predator.
“Coyotes are indigenous to the area and – maybe it’s the perception that
this is a large animal and the bunnies, the skunks, the squirrels, that’s
what Arlington Heights is used to, and a 35-pound animal walking
through your yard, I think they’re perceived as the big, bad wolf, if you
will.”
And… although there hasn’t been a documented case of a coyote
attacking a human… some worry that they might.
Not too far away researchers are putting radio collars on coyotes to see
where they’re going and what they’re doing.
(Sound of tires on gravel)
Justin Brown is with a research project out of Ohio State University.
He’s just located the spot where a coyote is hiding. We can’t see him,
but we know he’s there because of the signal his collar is emitting.
“We very rarely see them, especially during the day. At the night —
during the night, occasionally we’ll get good visuals, but for the most
part during the day times you never see them.”
Brown and his colleagues are trying to figure out why there are more
coyotes in the suburbs and cities. One of the reasons is car and deer
accidents. Coyotes feed on the carcasses. The huge increase in Canada
geese is another reason.
“Food ranges from deer to geese to even just dog food people leave out.
There’s definitely a high variety of foods available to them. For habitat,
it can be anything, any little wood lot, anywhere that they can find a little
hiding spot for the daytime and then during the evenings they run (in) a
lot of areas you wouldn’t expect such as residential areas and
commercial parking lots. They pretty much run it all, anywhere that they
might come across a meal.”
You’d think there wouldn’t be that many places for a coyote to hide in
the city and suburbs. But, Brown says they hide in parks, golf courses, in
wood lots, graveyards… anyplace with a little cover. Brown’s research team
leader, Stan Gehrt, estimates there are something like two-thousand coyotes
in the Chicago metro area.Justin Brown says the truly amazing thing is that
coyotes have learned to adapt so well… and even survive a lot of automobile
traffic.
“We’ve actually seen animals where they’re actually figuring out traffic
patterns. They know which roads are going which ways. We’ll see them
cross roads where they’ll actually look only the direction traffic should
be coming and then go and then stop in the middle and look in the other
direction for traffic and then go. So, they’ve definitely figured out how
the road systems work. It’s just amazing to see how they survive in this
environment.”
And, the experts say, the coyotes are probably here to stay. Most
residents don’t want the police to shoot the animals. So some
municipalities tried to trap and relocate the animals to a more rural area,
but coyotes are very territorial, and they immediately head back to the
place where they were trapped. Often they’re hit by cars on the journey
back, but sometimes they make it home, and the predator in the suburbs
is back and hungry.
