President Barack Obama speaks at a townhall meeting on healthcare reform. (Photo by Chuck Kennedy, courtesy of the White House)
Big industry is planning to target several
key US Senators who’ll vote on a climate
bill this fall. Lester Graham reports an
industry-funded group plans to hold 19
rallies at Senators’ townhall meetings:
Transcript
Big industry is planning to target several
key US Senators who’ll vote on a climate
bill this fall. Lester Graham reports an
industry-funded group plans to hold 19
rallies at Senators’ townhall meetings:
Rallies on health insurance reform can be pretty rowdy at times. It looks like you can expect the same over climate change legislation.
The American Petroleum Institute, and other big industry types formed a group called “Energy Citizens.”
They say the current climate change bill will mean higher energy prices and the loss of millions of jobs. A video on their website portrays everyday folks opposed to the idea.
“The principle of the government trying to help the environment is a good thing, but I don’t think this legislation is the best way to go about it.”
A memo from the American Petroleum Institute to oil company execs encourages getting those kind of people to townhall meetings. Environmental groups say it’s a fake grassroots movement.
A spokesperson for the Petroleum industry says oil companies are not against climate change legislation, just the climate legislation being considered by Congress.
The boardwalk in Ocean City, Maryland. Before beach replenishment, you could get your feet wet standing underneath the boardwalk. Now, as you can see, the water is 200 feet away. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
A dune piled high with sand helps protect Ocean City from the sea. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
A wide stretch of beach separates homes and hotels in Ocean City from the water. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
Condos in Ocean City once had water washing into their ground level parking lots. Not anymore. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
It’s beach weather – and along the mid-Atlantic one of the most popular beaches is Ocean
City, Maryland. For years, engineers have been battling back the ocean to save the beach
and the town. And as Tamara Keith reports, that fight is only going to get tougher and
more expensive if predictions of sea level rise from climate change become a reality:
Transcript
It’s beach weather – and along the mid-Atlantic one of the most popular beaches is Ocean
City, Maryland. For years, engineers have been battling back the ocean to save the beach
and the town. And as Tamara Keith reports, that fight is only going to get tougher and
more expensive if predictions of sea level rise from climate change become a reality:
When the sea level rises, Ocean City feels it. It’s on the front lines – a barrier island on
the edge of the Atlantic.
(sounds of water)
Terry McGean is the city engineer for a town he describes as a working class resort.
“Our industry is tourism, and the real reason people come here is the beach.”
But in the 1980s, that beach was reduced to a narrow strip. Not so today, all thanks to a
massive, and expensive, beach replenishment project. In 1991 countless tons of sand
were brought in, dunes were built. But that wasn’t the end of it.
To keep up with erosion, McGean says the beach here at Ocean City has already been re-
nourished 4 times.
“Approximately every 4 years we’re doing a re-nourishment project. To give you an idea
of the scale, that’s 100,000 truck loads of material that we’ll put on here. Though it
doesn’t actually come on a truck? No. It’s pumped in a dredge from out in the ocean.”
It is a constant fight, because the waves keep coming, keep pulling the sand back out to
sea. Scientists say this is partially just normal erosion. But some of it at least can be
blamed on global climate change and sea level rise. Over time, they say, the share of the
problem caused by climate change will grow.
“If you hadn’t done the beach replenishment do you have any sense of what this would
look like right now. There probably would have been no public beach left in many of
these areas.”
So far fending off the sea has cost $90-million, split amongst local, state and federal tax
dollars. But engineers estimate some $240-million in storm damage has been prevented.
“Holding back the sea is an economic proposition. If you’re willing to spend the money,
the sand exists to elevate any given barrier island.”
Jim Titus is the project manager for sea level rise at the Environmental Protection
Agency. And he’s been sounding the alarm about climate change for years. And he says
policy makers and the public will eventually have to decide which beaches, which
communities are worth saving.
“The challenge for communities like Ocean City is to persuade everyone else that they
are one of those cities that are too important to give up. And then to get their residents to
cooperate in doing what it takes to do to gradually elevate the entire community with a
rising sea.”
But if you think in geologic time, like University of Maryland professor Michael Kearney
does, there isn’t a whole lot of hope for barrier islands like Ocean City.
“It’s essentially a pile of sand. There’s really nothing permanent about it.”
Kearney studies coastal processes.
“The long term prospect of any barrier surviving the projected rates of sea level rise, even
at the moderate rates – the so-called moderate rates, that the IPCC predicted is pretty
slim.”
Ocean City engineer Terry McGean just isn’t buying it. He thinks Ocean City can survive
sea level rise.
“I think that we can design towards it and we can probably build towards it and with
responsible actions we can live with it.”
As long as there’s enough sand and money to keep it going.
A living shoreline near the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. The native grasses and sandy shore provide habitat for terrapins, the University of Maryland mascot. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
A bulkhead near Kent Island in Maryland. Bulkheads are popular with property owners, but bad for habitat. (Photo by Tamara Keith)
Stephen Hult, who coordinated the planting of native grasses at this living shoreline project in Woodland Beach (Photo by Jana Davis, of the Chesapeake Bay Trust)
The community is trying to restore the beach with rock and dirt and sand and
grasses to hold it all together. This is what's called a living shoreline. (Photo by Jana Davis, of the Chesapeake Bay Trust)
Scientists are pretty certain climate change is going to cause the sea level to rise. It’s
happening already, actually. In communities around the Chesapeake Bay, people are
getting a sneak preview. Tamara Keith reports some people there are trying to work with
nature rather than resist it:
Transcript
Scientists are pretty certain climate change is going to cause the sea level to rise. It’s
happening already, actually. In communities around the Chesapeake Bay, people are
getting a sneak preview. Tamara Keith reports some people there are trying to work with
nature rather than resist it:
(sound of kids planting)
It’s been raining in Woodland Beach. The community is just off of the Chesapeake Bay
in Maryland. The ground here is so soft you sink into it. Mud is everywhere. And that’s
just fine with the volunteers planting native grasses on a sloping hillside.
Stephen Hult is trying to keep things in order.
“And when we plant them we want them all the way down. I’m telling everyone twice.”
Hult heads up shoreline restoration projects for the local property owners association.
And there’s a lot of shoreline to restore.
“The shoreline, in parts of the community since the 1930s, have eroded 20 feet. Year to
year, one barely notices, but if you look at aerial maps of what it used to be like
compared to what it is, it really is quite dramatic.”
There’s been tons of erosion here. The land all along the mid-Atlantic coast is also
slowly sinking. Combine that with global sea level rise and you get erosion in overdrive.
Hult says the community is trying to restore the beach with rock and dirt and sand and
grasses to hold it all together. This is what’s called a living shoreline.
“We have now, with this project it will be well over half a mile of living shorelines that
we’ve installed.”
It’s a relatively new concept, a more natural approach to the gnawing problem of
shoreline erosion. Living shorelines create buffer between the water and homes. They are
kinda like the tidal wetlands that used to be here – before property owners started building
sea walls, also called bulkheads.
Jana Davis is associate director of the Chesapeake Bay Trust. It’s one of the organizations
funding this shoreline restoration. And Davis also happens to live here.
“It’s a wonderful alternative that provides just as good shoreline protection while also
providing a lot of really important habitat benefits that a bulkhead or rock sea wall does
not provide.”
Good for wildlife, and she says, it’s adaptive in the face of sea level rise.
“If sea level were to rise another foot, for example. The marsh could kind of migrate
inland, whereas if you had a bulkhead obviously there’s no migration because it can’t
move.”
But most of the people with bulkheads are NOT buying it. They want to protect their
property from the sinking land and rising water, and a lot of them don’t think a bunch of
rocks and grass are going to cut it.
Kevin Smith is chief of restoration services for the Maryland Department of Natural
Resources.
“There’s many places you can go and look at miles of shoreline and not see any natural
shoreline at all. It’s all armored off.”
Smith met me at a nature center along the bay. A few years ago, a stretch of bulkhead
here was replaced with a living shoreline. The natural ebb and flow of these shorelines
has made some property owners skeptical. They want the shoreline to stay put.
“If these types of projects don’t protect that shoreline from erosion, then homeowners are
not going to want to do it.”
But Smith insists these projects do work, and long term they’re going to be more
sustainable and more flexible than bulkheads – which over time will lose the battle
against the constant pounding of the rising sea.
Cities have started to use car sharing programs in order to save money (Photo by Ed Edahl, courtesy of FEMA)
Car sharing has long been considered a green
alternative to owning a car. Both in terms of
expense and the environment. Companies like
Zipcar have made this concept mainstream in
a lot of urban areas. Now some cities are
trying out car sharing with their municipal
fleets. Tamara Keith has more:
Transcript
Car sharing has long been considered a green
alternative to owning a car. Both in terms of
expense and the environment. Companies like
Zipcar have made this concept mainstream in
a lot of urban areas. Now some cities are
trying out car sharing with their municipal
fleets. Tamara Keith has more:
Karyn LeBlanc works in the Washington DC department of transportation, so maybe it’s not surprising that she was one of the first to try out the city’s FleetShare program.
“It’s this one over here, right here, says 6067 is the license plate on it.”
A white Honda Civic powered by natural gas is waiting for her in a parking lot behind a city office.
She went online to reserve the car and it’s expecting her. At least the very smart computer transponder thingie in the front windshield is expecting her. LeBlanc presses something that looks like a credit card up to the device.
“So, we place this right here and you hear that little click and the car opens.”
The tank is full, the keys are inside, and LaBlanc is off and running.
(sound of driving)
“I would say I use fleetshare 2 or 3 times a week for any meeting that I need to go to or that I need to get to. So I go where I need to go. I park it. I go to my meeting. I get back in the car and I go back to the office.”
For people who use Zipcar this process will sound very familiar. The company has simply brought its car-sharing technology to Washington DC’s municipal fleet.
So far DC has about 60 new cars outfitted with Zipcar gear. But here’s the remarkable thing, those 60 cars are replacing 360. How? The new cars are getting a lot more use than the old ones.
“We’re getting up to 71% utilization on all these cars.”
When we spoke to him, Dan Tangerlini was DC’s Deputy Mayor.
We’re standing in the middle of a municipal parking lot. On one side there are empty spaces where the fleetshare cars park – on the other side there are just a bunch of white city cars.
“You see all this white iron around here. All these DC government vehicles that are kind of sitting static because these are assigned to individuals and those individuals don’t have a reason to be in that vehicle right now.”
Tangherlini says this system will save the city about 6 million dollars over the next five years – which is welcome at a time when budgets are tight.
Which might explain why Scott Griffith’s phone keeps ringing. He’s Zipcar’s CEO and says the company is now in talks with 25 cities.
“They all have the same challenges, not enough tax money, too many cars. They do need to move people around during the day and we’re trying to make that happen in the most efficient way.”
But this isn’t just about money. Griffith says when people share cars they end up driving more efficiently. When they have to book in advance rather than a bunch of individual trips they stack all their stops in one trip.
Car sharing isn’t new for cities like Chicago, San Francisco and Philadelphia. They’ve had programs in place for some time where city workers can use cars loaned out by private car sharing companies. They use the same one the public uses.
Eli Masser helped form the relationship in Philadelphia between the city and the non-profit Philly Car Share which he co-founded.
“One of the benefits of car sharing with municipalities or most businesses for that matter is residential demand is in the evenings and on weekends and most business demand and municipal demand is during the day.”
Which means those cars are busy well beyond the 40 hour work week. Critics say this model is far more efficient than what Zipcar is doing in DC. But Masser says there’s an even better model – a hybrid of DC and Philly.
Ideally cities would have a relatively small city-owned fleet of shared cars and even heavy machinery. But most city workers would car-share with the public.
Trussville, Alabama Mayor Gene Melton may not be a staunch environmentalist - take a look at his car - but he still thinks greenspace is important in his city (Photo by Gigi Douban)
David Dobbs, Trussville's high school environmental science teacher, takes his students out behind the school to check on the river. (Photo by Gigi Douban)
For many small town mayors, growth is all good. After all, more houses means more tax revenue, more retail, more jobs. One Alabama mayor agrees, but he also recognizes green space is an amenity worth keeping. And for that, the timing couldn’t be better. Gigi Douban reports:
Transcript
For many small town mayors, growth is all good. After all, more houses means more tax revenue, more retail, more jobs. One Alabama mayor agrees, but he also recognizes green space is an amenity worth keeping. And for that, the timing couldn’t be better. Gigi Douban reports:
Here at the grand opening of a subdivision in Trussville, Alabama, a few dozen families gather outside the sales office for the usual ribbon cutting with giant scissors.
(sound of applause and cheers)
Soon, everyone heads down to the Cahaba River. The river literally will be in the backyard of these houses once they’re built. On the river, they’re having a rubber duck race.
(announcement of duck race)
It’s gimmicky, but these days developers will do just about anything to attract potential buyers.
Another developer had approached Trussville about building homes along the Cahaba River, but then the housing market took a nose dive. The developer wanted out.
Trussville Mayor Gene Melton says the city would have been crazy not to buy the land.
“This property was probably going to sell for $35,000 or $40,000 an acre. We got to the point where we were able to acquire this for $4,500 an acre.”
The city could have turned it into an industrial park or zoned it for retail. But instead, they’ll turn it into a greenway. It’ll connect to nearby parks with the river as the centerpiece.
Now, the mayor of Trussville is not a staunch environmentalist, by any measure. He tools around the city in a gas guzzling SUV. He’s pro-development. But, he says, the same way a city needs development, it needs greenspace, too.
“Have you ever flown in to a big city like Atlanta or Los Angeles and for miles and miles all you see is rooftops? Well that’s how not to build a city.”
The Cahaba River watershed stretches through Alabama’s most populous county. Recently, heavy development along the Cahaba has polluted the water. It’s endangered habitats not just here, but downstream. Trussville is very near the headwaters, so what happens there affects the entire river.
Randall Haddock is thrilled about the new greenspace. He’ a field director with the Cahaba River Society, a conservation group. Haddock says the Cahaba River is among the most biologically diverse in the country.
“It turns out that Alabama has more fish species, more snails, more crayfish, more turtles, freshwater snails more than any other state in the US. So when it comes to things that live in rivers, we’re at the top of the list by a long way.”
(sound of people walking near river)
Haddock says all along the Cahaba, he’s seen plenty of examples of how not to build near the river.
He says this greenspace is an example of how easy it is to minimize impact. Keeping grass on the ground not only means a cleaner river, but it might help reduce flooding.
“When you make so many hard surfaces, the water runs off real fast and gets into the river real quick. And you’ve increased the volume of water and the only response that a river can make is to get bigger.”
The bank erodes, the water is polluted and soon, you start to see species diminish.
(sound of high school students)
David Dobbs is the city’s high school environmental science teacher. He takes his students out behind the school to check on the river. The result: a clean bill of health.
“All the little bugs, they end up being food for the fish, and the more they are of the good ones that are here, that means there’s more food for the fish, so therefore there’s more fish, it’s a very healthy part of the river.”
Trussville, like many small towns, still says without growth, there’d be no city. But now they know, that growth has to protect one of its top amenities – the river.
Cyrus Haghighi owns a food and gift
shop in Chicago's Andersonville neighborhood,
which has become a retail hot-spot in recent years.
Haghighi worries suburbanites will avoid his shop
once Chicago hikes its parking prices. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
Donald Shoup teaches urban planning
at the University of California, Los Angeles.
He suggests most curb-side parking in this
country is priced so low that spaces fill quickly,
which encourages meter cruising and wasted gasoline. (Photo courtesy of UCLA)
The neighborhood of the meter price hikes (Photo by Shawn Allee)
Nobody likes to pay more than
they need to for parking, but a lot
of cities are bumping up the price
lately. Chicago’s going with one
of the biggest hikes. In most
neighborhoods prices are doubling,
and they’ll jump again and again
for years to come. Shawn Allee wondered what might happen to
businesses when parking gets pricier:
Transcript
Nobody likes to pay more than
they need to for parking, but a lot
of cities are bumping up the price
lately. Chicago’s going with one
of the biggest hikes. In most
neighborhoods prices are doubling,
and they’ll jump again and again
for years to come. Shawn Allee wondered what might happen to
businesses when parking gets pricier:
I’m in a neighborhood miles from Chicago’s glitzy downtown, but there’re still
plenty of shops, restaurants and furniture stores to attract shoppers up here.
One problem the neighborhood has is parking.
Until recently, it only cost 25 cents per hour to park here. As you can guess, the very
cheap price for parking has meant very few parking spots available for people who
are driving through.
Now, the neighborhood’s going through a change. It’s bumping up to 75 cents per
hour, and in a few years it will cost 2 dollars per hour.
So, I’m here to see what businesses think will happen to their bottom line once this
price increase for parking comes through.
I’m gonna start at this grocery store.
It’s called Pars Grocery – the sign here says it serves up Mediterranean food, teas,
and gifts.
The owner’s Cyrus Haghighi.
Haghighi: “So of course nobody would come and it would be too expensive for them
to spend too much money for the parking, and I don’t know why they’re doing this
– it makes everybody worried.
Well, that’s one owner who thinks the parking price increase is going to scare
shoppers away.
But I went around the neighborhood to get some other opinions, and I’m now at
another store – the Andersonville Galleria.
I have a clerk here.
His name is Rafe Pipin
Rafe what do you think of the parking price increase?
Pipin: “With the parking meter rates being a quarter an hour now, what happens a
lot of times is that store employees or managers take up the parking on the street
and stay there all day, whereas this may might provoke them to look for parking
further away. So they wouldn’t have to feed higher meter rates all day and open up
space for people visiting the neighborhood to do some shopping.”
Okay. We have two opinions.
One, higher prices will scare people away.
And, another that higher prices might free up space for more paying customers.
Who’s got it right?
Well, I put this to a kind of parking guru.
His name’s Donald Shoup, and he teaches at UCLA.
I’ve told Dr. Shoup about how tight parking is in this neighborhood and where prices are
headed.
“The higher prices that drive away some people will attract other people who are
willing to pay for the curb parking if they can easily find a space. Well, who do you
think will spend more in a store or leave a bigger tip in a restaurant? Somebody
who will come only park free or someone who’s willing to pay the market price for
parking if they can easily find a vacant space?”
Dr. Shoup says cities often make parking too cheap.
He says this discourages public transit.
Plus, it wastes gas because meters fill up fast, and shoppers keep driving around to find
the few empty ones.
Shoup says politicians just don’t want to increase fees.
In Chicago’s case, the city privatized parking meters, so the city made one tough decision
that will last 75 years.
Shoup says there’s a better way – set aside some of the parking money and spend it in
neighborhoods that generate it.
Donald Shoup says some people still won’t like parking price increases.
But he says there’s plenty of fuss at first, but then people eventually chuck over the
additional money and forget the increase ever happened.
James Abajian is an artist who lives in
Elgin, Illinois. His entire apartment is stuffed
with tools, paint, and works like this one. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
Abajian has turned nearly
all of his apartment into studio space. Both the
dining room and living room hold artwork, both
finished and in progress. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
Elgin is considering
several sites to turn into an artist colony, including
this building which currently houses Elgin's community
college. ArtSpace of Minnesota is helping Elgin develop
affordable artist housing in its downtown. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
The stereotype of the
starving artist isn’t always true,
but, let’s face it, some artists
have a tough time finding affordable
places to both live and work. Shawn
Allee reports how one city’s
trying to solve this problem while
revitalizing its downtown:
Transcript
The stereotype of the
starving artist isn’t always true,
but, let’s face it, some artists
have a tough time finding affordable
places to both live and work. Shawn
Allee reports how one city’s
trying to solve this problem while
revitalizing its downtown:
The City of Elgin Illinois has a housing crisis – not so much for average residents, but for
some artists.
It’s not that they’re homeless, it’s just, well, to understand. It helps to meet an Elgin
artist.
“Come on in.”
“Are you James?”
“Yeah.”
This is James Abajian.
“Don’t really mind the house, I’ve been working on a couple of projects.”
When I get in, I’m dumbstruck.
Wood sculptures cover Abajian’s floor, and his dining room has stacks of paper and
canvas, and right where most apartments would have a TV, Abajian’s got an unfinished
drawing.
“It’s like a wine glass or a martini glass, and it’s on different angles.”
“Is it a charcoal drawing?”
“Yeah, it’s charcoal.”
Abajian started art eight years ago.
He says he’d like to make a living with it and rent a fancy studio, but he’s just not there
yet.
So, he lives where he works.
“My apartment is nothing but paintings and frames.”
“I think the major space that doesn’t have charcoal or something on it is your
couch.”
“Couch. That’s about it. Yeah.”
It can take a while for artists like Abajian to hone their craft, so, they make do with space
not meant for working.
It’s enough for the city of Elgin to step in and try to help at least some artists find better
quarters. Oh, and, by the way, the city thinks the solution might solve a problem it has,
too.
Ed Schock is Elgin’s mayor.
I find him downtown, outside a two-story brick building.
“So, where are we, Mayor?”
“We are looking at the Elgin Community College downtown campus building.”
Schock is considering whether this building might work as an artist colony – a place
where Elgin artists could afford to live and work.
“There are an unusual number of artists here who would like to continue to do their
art, but economic reality’s set in, one of the biggest one’s is housing. Plus, just
having 45-50 residents downtown is a big plus. One of our strategic goals is to
increase the number who reside in the downtown.”
Inside, Schock and I meet staffers from a non-profit group that’s helping Elgin develop
artist housing.
(sound of walking up stairs)
They’re with ArtSpace of Minnesota.
ArtSpace wants to see the building first-hand – they need to make sure it’s the best fit for
Elgin and the artists.
Wendy Holmes says lots of cities want artists to make older parts of town more attractive.
Holmes says it works for cities – but it doesn’t always work for artists in the long run.
“Artists have traditionally been displaced from their spaces because artists make
areas interesting and hip and desirable to move into and other people tend to move
in behind them. And those people can afford to pay higher rent therefore the artists
are usually forced out because their rents will be too high for the artists themselves
to afford.”
ArtSpace does something about that – it uses federal low-income housing credits, so rents
stay affordable, and struggling artists stick around.
Another staffer, Heidi Kurtze asks about public transit, grocery stores, and how much
light these windows get.
“You need natural light into your living space, but for artists in particular, natural
light is a critical piece for them to do the work they do.”
Kurtz takes this as seriously as a family buying a house – after all, this could be some
artists’ home for decades.
It could take two years for ArtSpace to finish its Elgin project.
Artists like James Abajain will have to make due until then.
Ray and Irene Zukley of Zion,
Illinois were forced to sell this Lake Michigan
beach cottage to make way for Zion Nuclear Station
back in the late 60s. The Zukley's and other Zion
residents hoped the plant would last for at least
forty years, but after fits and starts, it closed
fifteen years early. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
The Zion nuclear station is a
few hundred yards from the shoreline of Lake Michigan.
Its generators have been off line for more than a decade. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
Ray Zukley was a jeweler by trade. He
created pendants with images of the nuclear station's
twin cooling stations and sold them as reminders of Zion's
biggest economic boom. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
America has a new flirtation with
nuclear power. Utility companies are fanning
out across the nation to set up shop. And
they’ve given the government more applications
for new nuclear plants than they have for
decades. Many towns fell under the spell of
nuclear power in the past, but some power plants
stopped running decades earlier than planned,
and towns are stuck with what’s left behind.
Shawn Allee profiles one town’s tarnished
relationship with nuclear power:
Transcript
America has a new flirtation with
nuclear power. Utility companies are fanning
out across the nation to set up shop. And
they’ve given the government more applications
for new nuclear plants than they have for
decades. Many towns fell under the spell of
nuclear power in the past, but some power plants
stopped running decades earlier than planned,
and towns are stuck with what’s left behind.
Shawn Allee profiles one town’s tarnished
relationship with nuclear power:
Irene and Ray Zukley have been together so long, they finish each others sentences.
Especially when I ask how things were in Zion, Illinois back in the 60s.
Zuckley: “The factories were getting downgraded.”
Allee: “What were those?”
Zuckley: “It was the curtain factory, the cookie factory, chocolates and Zion fig
bars.”
But just then, the power company said it would spend hundreds of millions on a nuclear
power plant.
Irene Zukley says most people welcomed it.
“Ray and I never worried about it, you know we just wanted progress is what we
wanted. When you think of having taxes lowered for everybody in Zion, that made
you feel, what else would come in and do that?”
Irene and Ray Zukley were forced to sell their family’s beach cottage to make room for
Zion reactor number one.
Beachfront neighbors did the same.
But, like the Zukleys predicted, taxes and jobs rolled into Zion.
It was supposed to be a forty year windfall.
But it didn’t last.
When you visit the power plant, it’s nearly empty.
“What we’ve got here is what used to be a full-fledged control room.”
Ron Schuster runs what’s left of the Zion nuclear power plant.
Once, it had more than eight hundred employees.
Now, Schuster and about fifty workers help manage the regional power grid.
They also monitor radioactive spent fuel waste.
The generators have been offline since 1997.
“There were large pieces of equipment essential to making electricity that would
have needed total replacement going forward. We’re talking significant dollars so
the economic decision by the board of directors that Zion station would go into safe-
store mode.”
That means the power plant and Zion have been in limbo for ten years.
The radioactive fuel is still on site, but the plant provides no power, few jobs and a
fraction of the property taxes.
Delaine Rogers is Zion’s economic development director. She says the town didn’t plan
on this.
“You’re in a community that has welcomed you. We haven’t had an antagonistic
relationship. They’re not going to close. But they did. And it took 17 million dollars
of our local revenues. We were facing losing all our arts and music and sports in our
schools. How do you fund police the police department. How do you fix potholes? It
was a very scary time.”
Lately, the power company’s gone back and forth about when it will decommission, or
dismantle, the power plant.
It could be done ten years from now or it could take decades more.
But even when most of the buildings are gone, there’s still the radioactive spent fuel.
“They’re just going to leave it. They’re going to put a football-sized concrete pad
filled with 80-90 casks of stored fuel on site, above ground. Tell me how you get a
private developer to think residential or retail. I’m not buying the first condo.”
Dozens of towns are stuck in relationships with dormant nuclear power plants.
Delaine Rogers says the town of Zion is in the same position.
She won’t call it a bad relationship, but says it sure would be nice to know exactly where
it’s going, or when it will be over.
Rick Delisle co-owns two commercial buildings,
one of which is depicted in this photo that dates
from the time of Zion, Illinois' founding. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
The nuclear industry is eager to
build new nuclear power plants, but for
now they’re just far-off plans. The real
growth industry is in containers to hold
radioactive spent fuel. Dozens of closed
nuclear plants need somewhere to put spent
fuel waste, and these containers fit the
bill. Shawn Allee looks at why one town’s
bracing for their arrival:
Transcript
The nuclear industry is eager to
build new nuclear power plants, but for
now they’re just far-off plans. The real
growth industry is in containers to hold
radioactive spent fuel. Dozens of closed
nuclear plants need somewhere to put spent
fuel waste, and these containers fit the
bill. Shawn Allee looks at why one town’s
bracing for their arrival:
Illinois’ Zion nuclear power plant hasn’t produced electricity for eleven years.
It’s so close to Lake Michigan you can smell the beach. But other than that, the empty
parking lots and office space make the place seem dead.
The plant manager says that’s not the case.
“I think a lot of people have a vision of us playing cards or swinging our golf clubs
on the beach. I would say we’ve been extremely busy the entire time.”
Ron Schuster says he and other workers remove hazards from the station, like diesel fuel
and electrical equipment.
But one hazard is still here: the spent nuclear fuel.
And when the power plant is dismantled, that radioactive waste will be put in new
containers.
They’re concrete casks.
Schuster: “A cask is approximately fifteen feet tall. It looks like a small silo and
there is no radiation exposure on the outside of these things.”
Allee: “So from this office window, can we see where the casks might go?”
Schuster: “We’ve got four spots on this site that have been at least looked at. When
it comes time to actually put the fuel in dry-cask storage it will be a huge structure,
about as big as a football field.”
Schuster’s confident this will be a simple and safe solution.
Not everyone in Zion so convinced.
“This cask issue, just sitting on the site was never appealing to me.”
Rick Delisle co-owns two commercial buildings close to the power plant.
In other towns with spent-fuel casks, nuclear power plants sometimes get turned into non-
nuclear power plants or into parks.
But Delisle and the city of Zion are hoping to do more – maybe build new commercial
buildings or even homes.
Delisle says having concrete containers full of radioactive waste left on-site could make
their work harder.
“So, I hope the casks are relocated somewhere else. Having them next to a
population of about 23,000 people is probably not a great place for it to be.”
Other communities are in the same position – they’ll be left with spent fuel casks even if
their dead nuclear plants get torn down.
There’s a simple reason.
“We don’t really have a final resting spot for these casks at the moment.”
Dave Lochbaum is with the Union of Concerned Scientists, an advocacy group.
“The federal government is way behind schedule providing a repository for high-
level waste.”
Lochbaum says the government has one storage place in mind.
It’s inside Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, but that’s still just being studied.
Power companies can sometimes move spent fuel to other plants or facilities.
But Lochbaum says politically, that just won’t fly.
“There’s no revenue from electricity being generated, so it’s a hard sell to go to a
community and say we’d like to have you store spent fuel for decades into the
future. The easiest way out is to leave it where it is, because those communities have
already accepted that fate.”
Well, cities like Zion say they didn’t accept this exact fate.
They bought into nuclear power for jobs and property taxes – they didn’t count on
babysitting spent fuel waste.
But that’s likely to happen, because the government won’t take it. The power companies
won’t dare move it, and the towns can’t move themselves away.
Scientists say that inhaling those fine particles often found at construction sites is bad for the lungs and the
heart
(Photo courtesy of the National Centers for Environmental Prediction)
For most of us, the dust kicked
up by a construction site seems like a
minor nuisance. But it can be a health
hazard. As Karen Kelly reports, construction
dust is one source of air pollution that’s
largely been ignored:
Transcript
For most of us, the dust kicked
up by a construction site seems like a
minor nuisance. But it can be a health
hazard. As Karen Kelly reports, construction
dust is one source of air pollution that’s
largely been ignored:
If you’ve ever had the good fortune of living near a construction site, you
probably know a bit about dust.
Here in Ottawa, Canada, Mahad Adam can tell you all about it.
(construction sound)
For the past year, he’s lived across the street from a construction site that fills
an entire city block.
And he says the air quality can be terrible.
“Sneezing a lot, yes. Since the dust comes in during the whole day that they’ve
been working, it was constant dust inside the room so it was like having an
allergy.”
Trucks and bulldozers drive in and out of the site all day. They’re tracking mud
on the streets and the air is filled with dust.
Once that dirt is on the pavement, it’s kicked back up by every car that passes
by.
The construction site’s supervisor, Brad Smith, says he’s received lots of
complaints about the dust from nearby residents, especially seniors.
“I’m used to the dust and the dirt, whereas some of the people with breathing
problems and stuff that live in the community will be affected negatively more
than we are.”
In fact, too much dust can even be dangerous for people with respiratory
illnesses such as asthma.
To keep it under control, he says his company flushes the dirt off the streets
twice a week and then vacuums the rest up with a special truck.
He says the amount of cleaning they do depends on who they’re working for.
“My client is the city of Ottawa and they wrote that into the contract during
tender time. Whereas other projects I’ve been on, it can get into a bit of an
argument because it costs us and we push back a little bit.”
Smith says his company could get a fine if they leave debris on the roads.
But it’s hard to find a specific law – whether here in Canada or in the U.S. –
either at the national level, the state level, or even the local level that deals
directly with the dust coming off of construction sites.
The officials I talked to said that’s because it’s a temporary nuisance.
But what got me thinking about it was the research from Professor Brian
McCarry at McMaster University in Ontario.
He drove around his city measuring air pollution at different sites and he found
the cloud of dust kicked up when you pass a construction site is not something
you want to be breathing.
“In some cases you’re kicking up so much dust that the fine particles –
the things that cause health effects – are at levels that are there for concern.”
Scientists say that inhaling those fine particles is bad for the lungs and the
heart.
But McCarry says keeping the air clean around a construction site is actually
not that hard.
“It’s just housekeeping, it’s nothing more complex than that, and if you tell
them the housekeeping is higher in this area than elsewhere, they’ll do it.”
That can mean spraying down dusty roads with water or a sticky pine
substance.
Or using the vacuum truck more frequently in areas where there’s construction.
When companies started doing that, McCarry says there was a big drop in the
air pollution at those sites.
President Barack Obama speaks at a townhall meeting on healthcare reform. (Photo by Chuck Kennedy, courtesy of the White House)
