In some states, there are plans for a wolf hunting season (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
Some states plan to let people hunt wolves. Rebecca Williams reports that’s happening because the US government is taking gray wolves off the federal endangered species list in two places:
Transcript
Some states plan to let people hunt wolves. Rebecca Williams reports that’s happening because the US government is taking gray wolves off the federal endangered species list in two places:
This decision means states in the western Great Lakes and several Rocky Mountain states will have control over wolves.
Some states are calling wolves a protected nongame species.
For example in Michigan, a wolf can only be killed if it’s attacking people, pets or livestock. But in other states – like Idaho and Montana – there are plans for a hunting season for wolves.
Jonathan Lovvorn is chief counsel for the Humane Society of the United States. His group and several others are planning to sue.
“Essentially what we’re worried about is that this is basically going to be a declaration of open season on animals that have been protected for decades.”
The federal decision to take wolves off the endangered species list could be overturned in court. That happened last fall.
If the decision sticks, then the Fish and Wildlife Service will be keeping an eye on wolf populations for at least the next five years.
Because of the down economy, ridership is up. But with the economy flagging, transit companies are having to cut routes and raise fares.
(Photo by Shawn Allee)
So with the government’s 787 billion dollar stimulus plan now approved, a lot of folks in state and local government are thinking about the federal dollars that’ll float their way soon. Some mayors are especially eyeing the 8.4 billion for public transit. Rene Gutel looks at who wants to spend what:
Transcript
So with the government’s 787 billion dollar stimulus plan now approved, a lot of folks in state and local government are thinking about the federal dollars that’ll float their way soon. Some mayors are especially eyeing the 8.4 billion for public transit. Rene Gutel looks at who wants to spend what:
Mayors from coast to coast see the stimulus package as one big pot of gold. Phoenix mayor Phil Gordon knows exactly how he’d like transit money spent in his city.
“First and foremost, Light rail.”
(sound of a train)
It’s all about light rail. Phoenix is notorious for its car-culture, freeways and gridlock; Residents worry it’s turning into the next L.A., but a brand new twenty-mile light rail line launched in December.
Trouble is, it’s only one line. It goes from the suburb of Mesa and ends in downtown Phoenix.
Mayor Gordon wants to use federal stimulus money to add a three-mile extension. Gordon says it’s the ultimate shovel-ready project. All planned, just add 250-million dollars and it’s ready to go.
“We could sign a contract with America, with the federal government, that we will turn dirt by March 31st, and we’ll create 7,000 new jobs.”
Those new jobs will be around long enough at least to get the rail extension built. But getting a light rail line is not the same as keeping it running.
Look at San Francisco that has a well developed transit system. They have a different kind of wish list that centers on maintaining the system they already have.
Judson True is a spokesman for the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.
“We want to repair light rail vehicles that have been damaged in collisions, we have some cable car kiosks that we’d like to replace, we have change machines we’d like to replace in our metro subway stations.”
And it keeps on going. The American Public Transportation Association has identified nearly 800 public transit projects nationwide ready-to-go within 90 days.
APTA says the projects will not only create hundreds of thousands of jobs, but reduce fuel consumption and decrease greenhouse gas emissions.
But San Francisco’s Judson True says, while he’s grateful for funding for capitol projects…
“Systems like ours in San Francisco also need help on the operating side, and you see that all over the country.”
People are calling it the transit paradox and it’s hit cities like Denver, St. Louis and New York City.
Because of the down economy, ridership is up. And yet most transit systems rely on local and state money to subsidize operations. But with the economy flagging, cities and states are struggling too – and transit companies are having to cut routes and raise fares.
“You have a catch 22, more riders and you have to make service cuts.”
That’s Aaron Golub, an assistant professor in the School of Planning at Arizona State University. Mass transit’s his specialty. He’s worried about transit systems getting gleaming new buses, and kiosks, and buildings but then not having the means to operate them.
“It would be quite ironic if, for example, Phoenix were able to afford a light rail extension while cutting back on light rail service at the same time. Or the worst case, opening a light rail extension and not being able to operate it at all.”
Golub points to studies that say you create more jobs by investing in current transit operations – not capitol projects.
But many mayors across the nation feel light rail and other mass transit is an investment in their future. They’re ready to take on those shovel ready projects now with the hope that it’ll kick start the economy now and by the time the routes are finished, we’ll be out of the recession.
Countries are getting bad grades because there’s a lot of over-fishing going
on.
(Photo by Stephen Ausmus, courtesy of the USDA)
A new study out in the journal Nature grades countries on their ocean
fishing practices. Rebecca Williams reports even the top countries are not
getting a passing grade:
Transcript
A new study out in the journal Nature grades countries on their ocean
fishing practices. Rebecca Williams reports even the top countries are not
getting a passing grade:
The US, Canada, and Norway are some of the countries doing the best job.
That means they’re fishing in a responsible way.
But they all come in at 60%. That’d be a D, maybe a D-plus.
Tony Pitcher is the main author of the study.
“Wasn’t very encouraging actually that even the top scoring countries were
not really that good. So it wasn’t anything to write home about – we were
at the top but it wasn’t a great field. At the bottom end some countries
were just disastrous. More than half the countries didn’t even pass the
40%.”
Countries are getting bad grades because there’s a lot of over-fishing going
on. There’s illegal fishing. And there’s a big problem with nets and traps
getting lost. They can snare marine mammals, birds and fish.
Tony Pitcher says it’s not always easy to know where your fish came from.
But he says you can look for a blue and white label when you’re shopping.
It’ll say Marine Stewardship Council on it.
Obama delivering the American Recovery and Reinvestment speech on Thursday, January 8, 2009 (Photo courtesy of the Obama Transition Team)
One group wants part of the economic stimulus package to plug up some leaks. It says old toilets and leaky water pipes below city streets are wasting water. Chuck Quirmbach reports:
Transcript
One group wants part of the economic stimulus package to plug up some leaks. It says old toilets and leaky water pipes below city streets are wasting water. Chuck Quirmbach reports:
The group is called the Alliance for Water Efficiency. It’s made up of plumbing manufacturers, contractors, city water systems, and enviromental groups.
They want about ten billion dollars of the economic stimulus package to go to shovel-ready projects that conserve water.
Alliance board member Susan Stratton says the work could include everything from century-old city water pipes to replacing many older, water-wasting toilets in private homes.
“This requires the skills of a plumber and it requires retailers and wholesalers to deliver products. These are things we know how to do. There are people in the work environment who have these skills and can ramp up pretty quickly.”
Stratton says cutting water use would also save energy by reducing power use at water utilities.
The partnering states want to reduce the amount greenhouse gases coming from car tailpipes. (Photo by Ben VonWaggoner)
Eleven Northeastern states are working together to create a new fuel standard that will mean lower greenhouse gases.
Julie Grant reports that means, when you fill up your car in those states, the gas won’t be quite as bad for the environment:
Transcript
Eleven Northeastern states are working together to create a new fuel standard that will mean lower greenhouse gases.
Julie Grant reports that means, when you fill up your car in those states, the gas won’t be quite as bad for the environment:
The partnering states want to reduce the amount greenhouse gases coming from car tailpipes.
Ian Bowles is Secretary of Energy with the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection.
He says the states would prefer that the federal government take the lead on this issue, but they’re doing what they can to limit carbon emissions from cars and trucks as soon as possible.
“If everyone waits and sits on their hands until there’s a global agreement, it’s going to take a long time to get anything done.”
Bowles expects the eleven-state agreement to spur investment into new types of ethanol and biofuels. And he says that will mean new jobs in science, engineering, and at fuel refineries.
“We’ll be creating a much bigger market for biofuels. Jobs will get created and greenhouse gasses will be cut.”
The states expect to have a legally binding agreement on the low carbon fuel standard by the end of the year.
Flags of member nations flying at United Nations Headquarters (UN Photo by Joao Araujo Pinto)
Delegates from 190 countries are
meeting in Poznan, Poland for the The
United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change. Lester Graham reports
the delegates are concerned about the
economic costs of reducing the greenhouse
gases that cause climate change:
Transcript
Delegates from 190 countries are
meeting in Poznan, Poland for the The
United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change. Lester Graham reports
the delegates are concerned about the
economic costs of reducing the greenhouse
gases that cause climate change:
With the world in an economic slump, it might be difficult to come to a new climate
change agreement.
But, Yvo de Boer, who’s the Executive Secretary for the convention says, you think
this is bad, wait ‘til you see what happens if nothing is done about global warming.
“This result in an economic failure on the scale of two world wars and the great
depression combined.”
Most countries are looking to see what the U.S. will do.
Angela Anderson is with the Pew Charitable Trusts Environment Group and a
speaker at the climate change convention. She says there’s talk about what the
Obama administration might do.
“There has been a discussion of the ‘Obama Buzz’ as it’s being called here in
Poznan. And you do hear lots of people in the corridors speculating on what the
negotiations will be like next year.”
This time next year is the deadline for an agreement to replace the expiring Kyoto
protocol.
For The Environment Report, this is Lester Graham.
Governors in New England are up in arms about some changes the Bush administrations
wants to make that would allow older power plants to add on but avoid buying new
pollution control equipment. Mark Brush has more:
Transcript
Governors in New England are up in arms about some changes the Bush administrations
wants to make that would allow older power plants to add on but avoid buying new
pollution control equipment. Mark Brush has more:
The proposed rule change would change how air pollution is measured from power plants
that expand their operations.
Right now, the air pollution is capped at a certain amount
per year. The new rule would cap the amount of air pollution allowed by the hour.
That
means a power plant could put out a lot more air pollution over the course of a year.
John Walke is a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council. He says
this little change in the rule could have a big impact.
“So as soon as these utility companies began to expand their plants and to pump out more
smog and soot pollution. People in surrounding communities would see their air quality
worsen.”
Six northeastern states are urging the EPA not to go forward with the rule change. In a
recent letter sent to the EPA they say the rule change – quote “threatens the quality of our
states’ air and the health of our citizens.”
Farmed
fish, such as salmon, eat a lot of wild fish that happen to
swim into their pens. And that means they could be eating
over-fished species.
(Photo courtesy of the US Fish & Wildlife Service)
To be labeled organic, animals
have to be fed all organic food. But
under the new proposal that won’t be
the case for fish. Julie Grant reports
that in the recommendations for organic
fish, the standard is much lower:
Transcript
To be labeled organic, animals
have to be fed all organic food. But
under the new proposal that won’t be
the case for fish. Julie Grant reports
that in the recommendations for organic
fish, the standard is much lower:
Some fish is raised in huge net-pens in the ocean. Farmed
fish, such as salmon, eat a lot of wild fish that happen to
swim into their pens. And that means they could be eating
over-fished species.
New recommendations by the National Organic Standards
Board would go ahead and allow farmed fish to eat up to
25% wild food – as long as it’s not from endangered species.
George Leonard is director of aqua-culture with the Ocean
Conservancy. He says these standards would weaken the
organic label.
“You don’t change the organic standard to be consistent with
current practices, you hold the organic standard steady and
you allow or you incentive the industry to change their
practices to reach that standard.”
The new “organic fish” recommendations still need final
approval from the USDA.
The 2008 Nature of America issuance, Great Lakes Dunes, is the
tenth stamp pane in an educational series that features the beauty and
complexity of major plant and animal communities in the United States. A description of the dunes and a numbered key to the artwork appear on the
back of the stamp pane, along with a corresponding list of common and
scientific names for 27 selected species. (Photo courtesy of the USPS)
The Great Lakes are getting a stamp of
approval from the Postal Service. Heidi Chang
reports there’s a new sheet of postal stamps
that celebrate the region:
Transcript
The Great Lakes are getting a stamp of
approval from the Postal Service. Heidi Chang
reports there’s a new sheet of postal stamps
that celebrate the region:
The new sheet of stamps is the latest in the Postal Service’s “Nature
in America” series.
John Dawson created the painting depicted on the sheet of stamps. It
features 27 different kinds of plants and animals found in the Great
Lakes Dunes.
Dawson says he hopes the stamps will make people more aware of the
beauty of the dunes, and the need to save the whole environment.
“The animals, the plants, the flowers, the bugs, it’s all inter-related.
That’s what’s important about showing this stuff – that it’s important to
keep the environment intact, because there’s so many things that
depend on each other.”
Dawson has designed all ten of the Nature of America series. But this
one is special to him because he started his career living in the Great
Lakes region.
This coal fired power plant sits at the corner of the SIU campus in Carbondale, Illinois. It has sulfur scrubbers and other technology that allow it to burn Illinois coal. (Photo by Shawn Allee)
Presidential candidates John McCain
and Barack Obama are trying to sell us on a
clean energy future. And they’ve got a laundry
list of ideas, including conservation, solar
and wind power, and safer nuclear energy.
But they both want to tweak an old reliable
fuel, too. That would be American coal.
Shawn Allee looks at why McCain
and Obama are gung-ho on coal:
Transcript
Presidential candidates John McCain
and Barack Obama are trying to sell us on a
clean energy future. And they’ve got a laundry
list of ideas, including conservation, solar
and wind power, and safer nuclear energy.
But they both want to tweak an old reliable
fuel, too. That would be American coal.
Shawn Allee looks at why McCain
and Obama are gung-ho on coal:
One reason McCain and Obama tout coal is they’re convinced we have plenty of it.
And they even agree on how to make that point.
McCain first.
McCain: “Our coal reserves are larger than Saudi Arabia’s supply of oil.”
Obama: “We’re the Saudi Arabia of coal, we got more coal than just about
everybody else.”
The Saudi Arabia of Coal.
That’s a sexy political metaphor – it sounds like coal’s just waiting to be scooped up.
Where do politicians get this idea?
“It is really based on data published by the Energy Information Administration.”
That’s Mike Mellish. He crunches coal projection numbers for that agency.
Politicians cite a government figure that we have 250 years worth of coal.
Mellish calls that a very rough estimate. Mellish says we get that number by estimating
how much coal we can get out of the ground economically.
Then, analysts compare that to how much we burn in factories and power plants right
now.
“So that’s really the basis of that statement of 250 years.”
Mellish says, if we use more coal, we’d literally burn through the supply faster.
There are critics who pounce on the idea we have plenty of coal. One of them’s Richard
Heinberg.
Heinberg studies energy for the Post-Carbon Institute, a green think tank. He says
politicians should not expect cheap coal for centuries.
“It assumes we can continue extracting this stuff out of the ground at constant rates
until, one day, it all just runs out.”
Heinberg says America does have lots of coal, but the amount under the ground isn’t the
only thing that counts.
“We tend to get the cheap, easy stuff first, then the production peaks and tails off
afterward.”
Heinberg predicts companies will have to invest money to keep finding new coal, and
that will raise coal prices – not in centuries – but in a few decades.
And Heinbergs says there’s another reason Obama and McCain shouldn’t have so much
faith in coal.
Coal plants put loads of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and that makes the global
warming problem worse.
Both candidates want new technologies to put coal’s carbon emissions in the ground.
“But there are a lot of questions as to whether this is really going to work. The cost
of capturing all that carbon dioxide and moving it around and burying it will be
enormous and they will add to the cost of electricity we can make with coal.”
For Heinberg all this talk about the Saudi Arabia of coal, and that 250 year figure, it’s all
a big bet – and it could have a high cost if we’re wrong.
“If we’re going on the assumption that there’s plenty of coal out there for many
decades to come at current prices and we build infrastructure accordingly and then
a couple of decades from now, suddenly coal becomes much more expensive and
scarce we will have gotten ourselves in a very difficult place, sort of like we’d done
with oil.”
A lot of energy experts are more upbeat on coal than Heinberg.
They admit it’s not clear how much coal we have, but it’s a heck of a lot, and we know
how to get it.
They say they don’t blame Obama and McCain for giving clean coal a chance. It’s just
that we should have started testing it a decade ago.
Hmm, a decade ago?
Politicians don’t like to say we’ve missed the mark by a decade.
It’s no wonder we haven’t heard that on the campaign trail.
In some states, there are plans for a wolf hunting season (Photo courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service)
