A surplus of carbon dioxide is created during big events like the Superbowl. To counteract this, the NFL has plans to plant trees in Detroit. (Photo by Sarah Lawrence)
Officials from the National Football League plan to plant acres of trees in Detroit. They’re hoping to offset extra greenhouse gases that will be emitted during next year’s Super Bowl. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Celeste Headlee reports:
Transcript
Officials from the National Football League plan to plant acres of trees in Detroit. They’re hoping to offset extra greenhouse gases that will be emitted into the local atmosphere during the upcoming Super Bowl. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Celeste Headlee reports:
The U.S. Department of Energy estimated an extra 260 tons of carbon dioxide were released into the atmosphere during the last Super Bowl in Jacksonville, Florida. A team of scientists from Princeton University determined three and a half to four acres of trees were required to absorb the extra greenhouse gases. Similar computations are now being done to determine how many trees to plant in Detroit.
Deborah Gangloff is the executive director of American Forests, a group that helps companies design what are called carbon neutral programs.
“We can address a great deal of the excess carbon dioxide issue with trees. Trees are going to sequester lots of carbon dioxide. What matters most is not the type of tree you plant, but whether that tree is well suited to the site, whether it s a healthy tree and whether it’s in its growing climate.”
She says these programs can t solve the problem of excess greenhouse gases unless they re paired with conservation and reduced consumption.
Fuel prices are higher this winter… but corn prices are down. That’s kindling a demand for corn stoves in some parts of the country. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shamane Mills reports:
Transcript
Fuel prices are higher this winter, but corn prices are down. That’s kindling a demand for corn
stoves in some parts of the country. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shamane Mills reports:
I always thought corn was something you ate. But I’m watching as my brother-in-law is stoking
his stove with golden kernels…
“In my case I use five gallon pails of corn, then just pour in slowly…”
(sound of kernels spilling into hopper)
I’d never seen a corn stove and my brother-in-law, Steve Springer, says he never thought he’d use
one. Once he did, he was hooked.
“Well, one thing about it is, it’s a renewable resource. Being a farmer myself, it’s something we
grow ourselves. This was in our home when we purchased the home – never had any exposure to
it. Since then, I like it immensely. Kicks out lot of heat.”
Corn stoves first became popular in the 1970’s when corn prices plummeted. There were
problems with the early stoves. Hardened clumps of burned corn, called clinkers, had to be
cleaned up and the corn didn’t burn efficiently.
Today, the stoves are making a resurgence because corn prices are down. New corn stoves are
better than the ones back in the 70’s. The stoves now have an agitator to stir the corn for a more
even burn and fewer clinkers.
Ed Bossert sells corn stoves at a store near where the Springers live. He says business is brisk.
“A lot of people come in to save money, a lot of people come in because it’s a renewable
resource, a lot of people come in because the pollution factor is basically nothing.”
Corn stoves produce less carbon dioxide and soot than burning wood or coal, so they seem more
environmentally friendly. But critics point out that the farm machinery used to grow the corn
burns fuel and generates pollution, so any gain from a cleaner burning fuel may be lost during
planting and harvesting.
While the environmental argument simmers, sales of corn stoves continue to heat up. Bossert says
he now sells as many corn stoves as he does wood stoves.
In larger cities such as Madison, Wisconsin the corn stoves don’t sell as well. At Top
Hat Fireplace & Chimney, only three customers have purchased corn stoves despite the best
efforts of sales staff like Mark Gilligan. Showing off the store’s one and only corn stove model,
he says it’s easy to maintain….
“They actually locate down below an ash drawer. That actually sits down below. There isn’t a
whole lot of ash from these pellet and corn stoves because it uses most of it up.”
Most corn stove dealers say a bushel or two a day will keep the cold away. With corn about two
dollars a bushel, that can seem like a bargain compared to natural gas prices, which are 20%
higher this year. But the initial cost of residential corn stoves can be steep.
Craig Tawlowicz owns Countryside Heating in north-central Wisconsin. He says new corn
stoves can cost two thousand… on up to six thousand dollars.
“So this is a long term investment. Most of the time, turn around savings, usually five to six
years pays off your investment.”
Wood stoves are not only more traditional, but they’re generally cheaper. So, wood stoves are
more popular. At Hearth and Home Fireplaces, Claire Barton says despite that… more customers
are considering corn stoves.
“It certainly makes sense for someone who has grain available to them and many of them will
burn corn as well as oats, wheat, barley, cherry pits. Things like that.”
The National Corn Growers Association promotes a lot of corn products. You’d think corn stoves
might be one of them – but spokeswoman Mimi Ricketts says it’s not one of the 600 items the
group touts.
“The National Corn Growers Association determines its issues based on priorities of member
states. Corn stoves is not one that’s been put on our radar screen. We are aware of them but we
have not actively promoted corn stoves.”
That’s probably because compared to other buyers of corn, such as livestock farms, corn syrup
processors and ethanol makers, corn stoves just don’t use a lot of corn. It’s not considered a big
market for farmers.
Instead, the big sales are going to those who make or sell the corn stoves. And because farmers’
harvest was so large this fall, corn stove retailers have found their cash crop this winter.
So far, coal-burning power plants have been a dominant source of electricity for the U.S. They've also been known to be bad for the environment. New technology makes coal a cleaner source of fuel, but some environmentalists have their doubts. (Photo by Lester Graham)
A new kind of cleaner, coal-fired power plant will soon be built somewhere in the Midwest. American Electric Power, the nation’s largest producer of electricity, says the new plant will be more efficient and pollute less than traditional coal plants. But critics say if utilities were doing more to promote energy efficiency, they wouldn’t need to build new power plants that burn fossil fuels. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner
reports:
Transcript
A new kind of cleaner, coal-fired power plant will soon be
built somewhere in the Midwest. American Electric Power, the nation’s
largest producer of electricity, says the new plant will be more efficient
and pollute less than traditional coal plants. But critics say if utilities
were doing more to promote energy efficiency, they wouldn’t need to build
new power plants that burn fossil fuels. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Erin Toner reports:
Coal-fired power plants are blamed for contributing to air pollution and global warming and aggravating health problems such as asthma. In the 1970s, Congress passed the Clean Air Act to reduce air pollution. But since many coal plants were built before the Clean Air Act, they’ve been exempt from pollution control updates.
So there are a lot of older, dirtier power plants out there. At the same time, demand for electricity is increasing. To meet demand, many utilities, including Ohio-based American Electric Power, are looking at building new plants, or adding on to their old ones. American Electric Power spokesperson Melissa McHenry says the company needs a new plant that will last at least 30 years.
“As we looked forward, you’re looking at increasingly stringent air quality regulations, so we wanted to ensure we would have a plant that would have improved environmental performance.”
And McHenry says the cleanest, and most efficient coal-burning process, is something practically brand-new to the industry. It’s called Integrated Gasification Combined-Cycle, or IGCC. It converts coal to gas, and then removes pollutants from the gas before it’s burned. The process results in almost zero emissions of sulfur dioxide, which causes acid rain, nitrogen oxides, which cause smog, and mercury, which is toxic to people and animals. There’s also much less carbon dioxide pollution, which is believed to contribute to global warming. And gasification is said to be twice as efficient as traditional coal plants.
There are a couple of IGCC plants in the US, but they’re small – only about a quarter of the size of a traditional coal plant. American Electric Power’s IGCC plant would be the biggest one to date – a full-size plant that would serve the power needs of more than a million homes in the Midwest. American Electric Power Spokesperson Melissa McHenry says this plant be only the first of its kind.
“We’re stepping up to build the first one and we think there will be more as we need additional generation capacity. And we think other utilities, you know, obviously other utilities have announced plans to look at this since we have announced ours. The U.S. has significant reserves of coal available, and we think it’s very important that we are able to use this domestic fuel source in a more environmentally responsible way going forward.”
Most environmentalists agree that IGCC is a much improved way to make power. But they say it’s not the best way, since it still depends on a non-renewable energy source – coal. Environmental groups say relying on coal is not a long-term solution to growing energy needs. Although, the coal industry says there is at least a 200-year supply. Marty Kushler is with the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy. He says utilities should consider ways to reduce the need to build new power plants.
“There are a number of other resource options available that can be achieved at a lower cost than building and fueling and operating a new power plant, such as energy efficiency. Energy efficiency can save electricity at a cost that is less than half the cost of building, fueling and operating a new power plant.”
But getting people to use less power isn’t that easy. Kushler says more states should implement power bill surcharges to fund programs to encourage the public to use more energy efficient appliances and cut electricity use.
But even with those kinds of programs, almost everyone agrees coal will be a part of the American energy mix for some time. And people in the energy industry say gasification is the future of coal power.
Jim Childress is with the Gasification Technologies Council. He says the only drawbacks right now are money. IGCC is about 20 percent more expensive than traditional coal power production. And he says there are a lot of bugs to work out in engineering one of these plants.
“The base technology is set. The question mark is based upon marrying that technology with about three, four, five major components and getting the darn thing to run right.”
Childress says the tough part is getting technology that’s working now on a small scale to work in a full-size coal plant.
American Electric Power says its Integrated Gasification Combined-Cycle plant will cost 2 billion dollars, and should be online by 2010. The company is expected to announce a site for the new plant by summer.
Ethanol often is made from corn, and one of the by-products, distillers grains, can be eaten by cows (Photo by Scott Bauer, courtesy of the USDA Agricultural Research Service)
From cows come dairy products and beef, the by-products of the cow - manure - can be anaerobically "digested," and the by-products of that process can be used to carbonate soft drinks. It might seem like an environmental and economic dream, but some are not supportive of this idea. (Photo by Bram Dejonckheere)
It’s rare when a factory and a mega-farm can help reduce pollution. But a project planned in the Midwest promises just that. The project would produce a fuel additive that is thought to reduce air pollution; provide a market for farm goods; create scores of jobs… all while not harming the environment. The Ohio project is getting millions of dollars of help from the state and federal governments. But some people doubt the project will accomplish all it promises. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tamara Keith
reports:
Transcript
It’s rare when a factory and a mega-farm can help reduce pollution. But a project planned in the Midwest promises just that. The project would produce a fuel additive that is thought to reduces air pollution, provide a market for farm goods, create scores of jobs – all while not harming the environment. The Ohio project is getting millions of dollars of help from the state and federal governments. But some people doubt the project will accomplish all it promises. Tamara Keith reports:
The project is called Harrison Ethanol. It will include an ethanol factory, using millions of bushels of corn to produce the gasoline additive. At the same location, thousands of dairy and beef cattle will live in fully enclosed barns. And then there’s the small power plant, which will be fueled by manure produced by the cattle. Wendel Dreve is the project’s director.
“I think the nicest way of describing our project is it’s a vertically-integrated, agriculturally-based industrial development.”
Dreve began working on the project nearly 4 years ago. He’s retired from the oil and gas industry and built a home in eastern Ohio farm country. His neighbors approached him about starting up a corn-powered ethanol factory – something that has not existed in Ohio in a decade.
“I told them that I didn’t think we could build a ethanol plant in Ohio because there are no state subsidies, so we had to figure out a way to raise the revenue streams internally and the only way we could figure out to do that was to employ animals.”
The 12-thousand cattle housed on site, will eat the main byproduct of ethanol production, a corn mush called distillers grains. The cattle will generate money too, from sales of milk and meat. But the cattle will create manure… lots of manure… about 50 million gallons of it a year. Dreve has a solution for that, too: a power-generating anaerobic digester.
“It eliminates nearly all of the odor, it processes all of the wastes from the entire facility. So it’s like an industrial waste treatment plant on site.”
60 times a day, manure will be flushed out of the animal barns and into the digester. A large, cement structure, where the manure is broken down by microbes.
“And at the other end, you get water and methane and carbon dioxide and some solids.”
The methane will run power generators, creating “green energy,” which can be sold at a premium. The carbon dioxide from the manure will be sold to make carbonated sodas. This would be the first anaerobic digester powered by cattle manure in Ohio, and one of only a handful nationwide. Dreve says his digester will be much better for the environment than open-air manure lagoons, the cheaper method most commonly used by farmers.
But not everyone agrees. Bill Weida is an economist and director of the Grace Factory Farm Project which opposes large concentrated animal farms. Weida says most anaerobic digesters are paid for with some kind of government assistance. Harrison Ethanol is no exception. The project received a 500-thousand-dollar grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to help pay for the digester.
“No one in their right mind who is looking for an economic investment would build a digester. The only reason you’d build one is if you had some sort of a government subsidy that would help pay for it.”
Harrison Ethanol also is receiving seventy-million dollars in financing assistance from the state of Ohio. In fact, the company indicates it got some very good legal and accounting help, to find the perfect location for the project to take advantage of state and federal tax credits. Add to that federal ethanol subsidies and federal subsidies for corn production, and Harrison Ethanol is getting plenty of help from taxpayers.
Ken Cook is executive director of the Environmental Working Group. He says ethanol might reduce air pollution and reliance on foreign oil, but it is not economically viable without those huge taxpayer subsidies.
“The worry is that what we’re really doing is bailing out failed agriculture policy with heavily subsidized energy policy. We’re going into the corn industry with another set of subsidies to basically turn corn, that would have been exported at a loss, into corn that is used to make fuel at a loss to taxpayers.”
That’s not how state officials see it. Bill Teets is a spokesman for the Department of Development which has been working to bring several ethanol plants to Ohio.
“We think that this is a great project because you help farmers, you create manufacturing, you have something that helps benefit the environment and it seems to be a good type of project that we can really benefit from.”
And if everything goes as planned, Wendel Dreve will build 2 more ethanol and cattle operations in Ohio. He’s already secured tax dollars from state and federal sources for those plants.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Tamara Keith.
States are competing to have FutureGen, a power plant that claims to be pollution-free, built in their state. (Photo courtesy of U.S. Department of Energy)
Coal-burning power plants from Great Lakes states are often blamed for much of the pollution that hits the East Coast. But now, the federal government is proposing a massive research project that they say could eventually perfect a way to burn high-sulfur coal without sparking pollution. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Bill Cohen has this report:
Transcript
Coal-burning power plants from Great Lakes states are often blamed for much of the pollution that hits the East Coast. But now, the federal government is proposing a massive research project that they say could eventually perfect a way to burn high-sulfur coal without sparking pollution. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Bill Cohen has this report:
The feds are proposing a massive one-billion-dollar plant that’s billed as the world’s first non-polluting, coal-burning power plant. About twenty states say they’ll compete for it. Ohio is one of them. Mark Shanahan of the Ohio Air Quality Development Authority says the plant will first turn coal into gas. And then either recycle or safely store the by-products.
“And when it turns to gas, it’s able to pull out the pollutants much more efficiently and economically. It will pull off hydrogen for fuel cells and it will also test the ability to put carbon dioxide into very deep geology to basically bind it up forever deep in the earth.”
The U.S. Energy Department will pay for most of the plant, but it will be several years before it’s actually online.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Bill Cohen in Columbus.
Mark Kubiske checks the valve that controls the flow of greenhouse gases to a stand of sugar maples, birch and aspen. (Photo by Jennifer Simonson)
One part of the greenhouse gas-making facility. (Photo by Jennifer
Simonson)
A stand of trees is surrounded by pipes that release greenhouse gases. (Photo by Jennifer Simonson)
Scientists from around the world are studying how higher levels of carbon dioxide will affect forests 100 years from now. They’re doing that by pumping higher levels of CO2 and ozone into stands of trees. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson visited the experimental forests and has this story:
Transcript
Scientists from around the world are studying how higher levels of carbon dioxide will affect forests 100 years from now. They’re doing that by pumping higher levels of CO2 and ozone into stands of trees. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson visited the experimental forests and has this story:
(sound of “quiet area”)
The north woods of the Great Lakes states are stands of millions of acres of pine, maple, birch, and aspen forests. It’s a perfect place to try to figure out how trees will react to the higher levels of ozone and carbon dioxide scientists expect in the future.
(sound of beeping fence gate)
The first thing you notice at Aspen Free Air Carbon Dioxide Enrichment Project – Aspen FACE for short – is two huge tanks inside the fenced in enclosure. Each one is bigger than an 18-wheel tanker truck. They’re full of carbon dioxide… CO2. So much CO2 is used in this experiment, the tanks are filled twice a day.
(sound of filling tanks)
If you looked at the site from an airplane, you’d see 12 circular tree stands surrounded by 30 foot high pipes. Those pipes pour CO2 or ozone gases or both into the air surrounding birch, sugar maple, and aspen trees. The scientists know that greenhouse gases in the earth’s atmosphere have been increasing. They believe two centuries of industrial pollution has contributed to the problem. And they expect the CO2 and ozone levels to double by the end of this century. They’re raising the level of greenhouse gasses in different mixes to see what the predicted levels will do to forests.
This open air project is different than previous experiments. David Karnosky is with Michigan Tech. He’s the Project Manager for Aspen FACE. He says before these kinds of projects, they just tested trees inside places like greenhouses.
“We needed to get out of those chambers. We needed to have a more realistic, real world sort of situation where we had multiple trees. We wanted real intact forest communities. We didn’t want to have just a small number of trees inside of a chamber.”
The United States Department of Energy launched this experiment in Wisconsin’s northwoods seven years ago. Karnosky says they’re learning how the trees react to the higher CO2 levels, and that could shape the future of the world’s timber industry.
“Who will be the winners? Who will be the losers? Will aspen or birch or sugar maple? In northern Wisconsin here we’ve got probably 40 million acres of those species mixes. What’s going to happen under elevated CO2 in the next 100 years? Will these forests remain as they are?”
(sound of driving on gravel)
Driving to one of the experimental circles, we pull up to a ring of trees. Mark Kubiske is one of the two full-time on-site researchers.
“Now this particular ring is an elevated CO2 plot. CO2 is delivered through this copper pipe. It runs to that fan, there’s a large fan right on the end of that gray building.”
The scientists have found that trees in the CO2 circles grow 30 percent faster than trees without the gas.
“The trees are larger in diameter, they’re straight, they have lots of leaf area, they just look very healthy. That is just in tremendous contrast to the ozone ring. We’ll go up around the corner and look at one.”
Nearby another circle of trees is not doing nearly as well. The trees are skinny, twisted not as tall as the other sites. Higher ozone levels are hurting the trees.
At the sites where pipes emit both ozone and CO2, the tree growth seems normal – except for some stunted maple trees. The leaves of the aspen and birch take in much of the CO2, convert it to sugar which goes to its roots, eventually becoming a natural part of the soil. That suggests forests may help alleviate gases that cause global warming. The Project Director, David Karnosky says CO2 and ozone appear to cancel each other out. But he says it’s too early to draw any firm conclusions. Ultimately, he says governments will be able to look at this glimpse into the future and try to come up with emissions policies that help.
“The whole issue of the Kyoto protocol, our government not signing off on that. There’s been some relaxing of the feelings from what I’ve seen from the President’s report now that they’re beginning to realize that elevated CO2 is having an impact on global warming and could be impacting our plant communities.”
Karnosky says it’s possible that besides reducing emissions, governments might determine that planting more trees might be very helpful in reducing greenhouse gasses worldwide.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mike Simonson.
Attorneys general from eight states have filed a lawsuit against several major U.S. power companies. They say the utilities need to cut down on the amount of heat trapping gasses they release. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
Attorneys general from eight states have filed a lawsuit against
several major U.S. power companies. They say the utilities need to cut
down on the amount of heat trapping gasses they release. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:
New York, Iowa and Wisconsin are among the states suing five large
utilities that emit about ten percent of the nation’s total carbon
dioxide pollution. The states say many scientists believe the CO2
emissions contribute to global warming.
Peg Lautenschlager is Wisconsin’s Attorney General. She says a rise in
global temperatures would harm the Great Lakes region.
“We are looking at lowering Great Lake water levels… which will not
just impact the Great Lakes and the fish and wildlife that are therein,
but will also have severe economic impact.”
Lautenschlager says the Midwest would also see changes in crop cycles
and weather patterns. The lawsuit does not seek monetary damages…
but aims to have the utilities cut their carbon dioxide pollution.
Midwest environmental groups praise the legal action. But some
utilties say they already have plans to reduce CO2… and consider the
new lawsuit frivolous.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.
Satellite imaging shows that spring thaws in the northern latitudes are happening almost a day earlier each year. Environmental scientists worry that faster melts could accelerate global warming. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Corbin Sullivan explains:
Transcript
Satellite imaging shows that spring thaws in the northern latitudes are
happening almost a day earlier each year. Environmental scientists worry
that faster melts could accelerate global warming. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Corbin Sullivan explains:
The satellite readings show that the spring thaw in
the Alaskan tundra and northern forests is coming
more than a week earlier than it did in 1988.
John Kimball co-authored a study of the NASA
images. He says the greenhouse effect is responsible
for earlier melting. And he warns that faster thaws
could lead to more greenhouse gases in the
atmosphere.
“The potential here is that this warming will
actually reinforce that greenhouse related warming
trend that we’re seeing. That would occur at a much
faster rate.”
Kimball says microorganisms in the arctic soil are
the reason for the increase in heat-trapping gases.
He says the organisms become active when the soil
thaws, breaking down carbon in the soil and
releasing methane and carbon dioxide.
Kimball says an earlier thaw means more
greenhouse gases will be produced each year. That’s
in addition to the gases produced by human sources
like automobiles and power plants.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Corbin
Sullivan.
A Midwest company is producing a generator it says will revolutionize the way large electric consumers get power. While the company is hailing the generator as the next big thing, it is getting mixed reviews from industry analysts and environmentalists. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jonathan Ahl reports:
Transcript
A Midwest Company is producing a generator it says will revolutionize the way large electric
consumers get power. While the company is hailing the generator as the next big thing, it is getting
mixed reviews from industry analysts and environmentalists. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Jonathan Ahl reports:
(sound OF the fuel cell)
Engineer Steve Brown is showing off a generator that can be the primary power source for an entire
hospital, prison, factory complex, or any other multi building facility. It’s a 250-kilowatt fuel cell
generator that’s as big as a one-car garage. It’s currently running at Caterpillar’s Research Center
just outside of Peoria, Illinois. The generator works by extracting the hydrogen from natural gas
and converting it into electricity. Brown says the only emissions from the unit are heat, water, and
carbon dioxide. He says the unit can also use that heat for other purposes, making a generator that
is up to ninety percent efficient:
“That means ninety percent of the heat, the potential heat in the natural gas has been converted into
useful energy and only ten percent is exhausted to the atmosphere. That’s sexy. It is, compared to
the typical internal combustion engine is in the high teens. And all the rest goes to waste and just
heats up the atmosphere.”
Brown says this unit can eliminate large electric consumers’ need to be hooked up to the power
grid. Peoria, Illinois based Caterpillar and Danbury, Connecticut based Fuel Cell Energy
Incorporated are manufacturing the generators. They say there is a growing market for reliable
power. They also say the generators are better for the environment than coal or oil fired power
plants. John Leitman is the president of Fuel Cell Energy:
“The fuel cell here generates electricity just like a large battery, except with a fuel cell, you can keep
feeding it fuel and air and it will keep generating electricity, very cleanly.”
Leitman says the generator will also be easily convertible to a pure hydrogen power generation unit
if that technology becomes available. But some environmentalists are not as excited about the
generators potential. Chris Johnson is a spokesman for the Illinois Public Interest Research Group,
a public policy advocacy group that focuses on the environment. He says fuel cell power
generators are a step in the right direction. But he says since this generator uses natural gas instead
of pure hydrogen to create electricity, it’s not a long-term answer to the nation’s energy problems:
“In other words, we’re sort of losing energy. It’s becoming less efficient, and in that sense we are
also having more CO-2 emissions in the long run. Also with natural gas emitting heat and CO-2,
Carbon dioxide is a huge cause of global warming.”
Johnson does concede that fuel cells are better for the environment than coal- and oil-based power
plants. But he also says fuel cells will not reach their full potential until they run off more basic
forms of hydrogen. The generators are also meeting some skepticism from the power generation
industry.
“I think fuel cells are everyone’s Holy Grail of engine power.”
Mike Osenga is the publisher of Diesel Progress Magazine, an engine and power generation trade
publication. He says such generators show promise, but also have a lot to prove:
“There hasn’t been long term testing, a lot of the engineering still needs to be done, and it’s still a
technology that has to prove itself, but it certainly seems to have some potential compared to some
of the other technologies people are considering.”
Osenga says the other issue is money. Using such a generator costs at least three cents more per
kilowatt-hour than taking the power from the local utility company. But Caterpillar and Fuel Cell
Energy are hoping customers will think the cost is worth it to have a more reliable power source.
Rich Thompson is a group president at Caterpillar. He says in light of the major blackout this past
summer, the industry is moving toward what he calls distributed power generation.
“A term you are going to hear more and more frequently, because distributed generation is the key
answer and the rapid answer to strengthening our national grid. And that is going to happen
following the northeast blackout.”
Thompson also says Caterpillar is lobbying Congress to give the company tax subsidies that other
cleaner power providers receive. That could make the fuel cell generators almost even in cost with
traditional utility power.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Jonathan Ahl.
One of the gases that figures prominently in the global climate debate is carbon dioxide. Scientists believe CO2 emissions can be reduced if carbon in the atmosphere is “stored.” Economists want to incorporate carbon storage into a market-driven solution to regulate emissions. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Murray has this story about climate change, forests, and the emergence of a carbon trading market:
Transcript
One of the gases that figures prominently in the global climate debate is carbon
dioxide.
Scientists believe CO2 emissions can be reduced if carbon in the atmosphere is
“stored.”
Economists want to incorporate carbon storage into a market driven solution to
regulate
emissions. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Ann Murray has this story about climate change, forests, and the
emergence of a
carbon trading market:
Climate experts say the earth’s temperature started to change about 150 years ago.
That’s when
people began to burn coal and gas and oil to run factories and generate electricity.
These fossil
fuels release carbon dioxide into the air. CO2, a “greenhouse gas,” traps the
sun’s heat.
Climatologists warn that unless carbon dioxide emissions are curbed, the planet will
continue to
heat up. Scientists are now looking to nature to counteract this human influx of
carbon.
Coeli Hoover with the U.S. Forest Service is among these scientists.
“There’s a plot over there.”
For the past three summers, Hoover and technicians from the Forestry Sciences Lab in
Warren
County, Pennsylvania have traveled to hardwood forests in the northeastern United
States.
“What we’re doing is trying to get a basic handle on how much carbon is stored in
these different
forests and how management might change that.”
Today, Hoover is in the Monongahela National Forest in West Virginia. She and her
team gather
their equipment from their van. As they head to a stand of cherry, maple and beech
trees, Hoover
explains some basic biology about carbon storage and trees.
“They pull carbon dioxide out of the air to make sugars, carbohydrates for trees to
live on. And in
the process that carbon gets stored as wood. And carbon also get stored in the soil.”
Hoover’s study is the first to examine carbon stored in forest floors and soils.
The regional study
looks at uncut forests and those that have been thinned. Hoover wants to see if
different forest
management practices affect the amount and type of stored carbon.
(knife cutting around forest floor)
This morning, Hoover and a technician use a knife and template to cut small sections
of the forest
floor, the layer of organic material above the soil. After the forest floor samples
are labeled and
bagged, the crew takes samples of the soil.
(sound of slide hammer core)
They dig 12 holes per plot with a slide hammer core. That’s a metal cylinder with a
cutting tip on
the edge and brass core sleeves inside.
“This method allows us to get these really nice depths without having any doubt of
what we’re
getting.”
Hoover says the whole point of her study is to eliminate the carbon guessing game.
Because
there’s little information about belowground carbon, it’s been hard to establish
how much carbon
is stored in forests. Scientists call this a “carbon budget.” The big picture,
says Hoover, is
important because of the emergence of a domestic carbon trading market. A market
where
foresters can grow trees, store carbon and make money.
“Right now carbon dioxide isn’t regulated as a pollutant. There are people who
think that it
probably will be. There’s voluntary reporting where companies can report their C02
emissions
and their uptake for different projects. So there’s a lot of experimental work
going on.”
An experimental program in Chicago is working to give industry a reason to reduce
carbon
dioxide output. The Chicago Climate Exchange will begin trading carbon credits. If
a company
reduces its CO2 output by installing new technologies, that difference can be sold
on the
exchange. Companies will buy credits that represent storage of carbon in either
trees or soil. Dr.
Richard Sandor is the founder of the Climate Exchange.
“We are going to have projects which would have to be monitored and verified and
approved by
our offset and forestry committees where people would agree to reforest. If a
particular project
that absorbs 100,000 tons of carbon in the aboveground biomass can be measured, then
people
sell those on the exchange.
Sandor says this isn’t the first time that pollution credits have been traded in the
United States.
He points to the success of the sulfur dioxide market. Sulfur dioxide is the main
component in
acid rain. The U.S. EPA estimates that this market driven program has cut sulfur
dioxide output in
half and saved $50 billion a year in health and environmental costs.
Not everyone sees such a sunny future for carbon trading. Some critics believe that
CO2
emissions must be regulated by the government or through the international
greenhouse gas
agreement called the Kyoto Protocol.
Others worry that foresters or landowners will resort to single age, single species
tree plantations
to quickly fulfill contracts.
(forest sounds)
Back in the Monongahela National
Forest, Coeli
Hoover says biodiversity need not suffer.
“I don’t think that you have to manage for carbon or sustainable timber production.
I think you
can do both and manage for wildlife. I don’t think there are a lot of tradeoffs
there.”
We probably won’t know the success of carbon trading in the United States for
another five or ten
years. The Bush administration has refused federal regulation of carbon dioxide and
for now, has
left the solution to the markets.
For The Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Ann Murray.
A surplus of carbon dioxide is created during big events like the Superbowl. To counteract this, the NFL has plans to plant trees in Detroit. (Photo by Sarah Lawrence)
