Tag: technology

Affordable Housing Goes Green

  • Here is what a solar electric system looks like when it is mounted on a home. The panels are grid-connected and the system has backup battery. (Photo courtesy of NREL)

Often only pricey homes benefit from energy efficient and environmentally friendly technologies such as solar panels and completely non-toxic materials, but that kind of green technology is finding favor with non-profit groups that provide affordable housing.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee looks at why many non-profits are trying to do good by building green:

Transcript

Often only pricey homes benefit from energy efficient and
environmentally friendly technologies such as solar panels and
completely non-toxic materials, but that kind of green technology is
finding favor with non-profit groups that provide affordable housing.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Shawn Allee looks at why many
non-profits are trying to do good by building green:


Holly Denniston’s got a tough job. She’s the real-estate director for a
non-profit housing agency. Denniston’s got not one, but two, bottom
lines to watch. On the one hand, she’s trying to build affordable housing
for thousands of low and moderate-income families in Chicago. On the
other hand, it’s not enough to develop a cheap house and walk away.


As a nearby commuter train rolls by, Denniston explains she’s got to
make sure families can afford to stay in these homes.


“We want affordable housing in the long run. When heating costs rise, when
electricity costs rise, we don’t want our homeowners to have to move
out. We want them to live in these houses for thirty years or for as long
as they want and be able to raise a family here without spending all of
their dollars on housing.”


That means the best fit for struggling families are homes that are cheap
to buy and cheap to live in.


Denniston leads me up the stairs of a nearly-finished town home she says
fits that bill.


(Sound of steps and door)


Inside, it’s not much different from high-priced town homes sprouting up
in most cities, but Denniston says I probably missed the most notable
feature of the building: a roof made of solar shingles.


“If you would take down the ceiling from the second floor, you would
see a spider web of lines coming down, leading down to the back of the
house, and then leading to an inverter in the basement.”


The shingles and power inverter generate electricity. The system’s
simple and needs almost no intervention by the occupants, but more
importantly, it’ll save the family thousands of dollars in power
bills in the next few years, and Denniston says this isn’t even their most
efficient home.


Some of their homes consume less than three hundred dollars worth of
energy per year – even with cold Chicago winters, but building homes
like this isn’t cheap.


The solar shingle system added thousands of dollars in up-front building
costs. So, how do groups like Bethel build green while trying to keep
their own costs down?


Well, usually, they get help.


“Basically I think we can say that all of the affordable housing projects
that are doing this are doing it because they’re subsidized by either state
or utility programs.”


Edward Connelly is with New Ecology Incorporated, a group that studies
and promotes green affordable housing.


“The up-front cost is generally not in within the budget of an
affordable housing developer for photo voltaics, because they tend to be
expensive.”


Reliance on government or utility company subsidies can cause
problems. Connelly says some states make these subsidies available to
everyone, not just non-profits.


That means non-profits have to compete with traditional homebuilders
for the money to build green, and the subsidy programs sometimes
run short of demand.


“The utilities this year have run out of money for the energy star rebates
in Massachusetts because so many people took advantage of them, and
that’s not just in the affordable realm.”


Affordable, green housing faces other problems, too.


These projects sometimes move at a snail’s pace. That’s because
agencies often have to juggle several funding sources. Each government
agency or utility adds its own requirements, and managing all of them
consumes a lot of time. That means people who need affordable housing
have to wait longer, but when these groups do get the required funds, the
long-term benefits for low-to-moderate income families are impressive.


Chicago architect Susan King’s developed several green affordable
housing projects. She says non-profit projects benefit from energy
efficient technology, but their social missions push them even further.
They include features that go beyond just saving money.


“It’s an easy sell because they really do care for the life of the building,
whereas the for-profit developer just cares about that bottom line.”


She saw that attitude develop in her latest building.


It’s energy efficient and has solar power, but the non-profit also wanted
paint that wouldn’t pollute indoor air. King says, for now, housing
groups build more environmentally friendly homes than market rate
homebuilders with similar budgets, but she predicts that gap will narrow.
Average homeowners will soon demand more environmental amenities.


“I think the not-for-profits are setting an example that the for-profits are
going to follow, but they’re not going to follow it because they’re shamed into it.
I think they’re going to follow it because in the end, it’s going to make economic sense.”


Back at the energy efficient and environmentally friendly town-home,
Holly Denniston says some day, most of the features here will be
standard in the home industry, but she says non-profits will keep adding
additional value to homes even if that means spending more money up
front.


“To non-profits, that’s alright; we’re not looking for the highest return,
we’re looking at sustainable community.”


So, Denniston says a project like this shows affordable housing isn’t
about cheap housing. It’s about building homes where people can afford
to live.


For the GLRC, I’m Shawn Allee.

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Indoor Shrimp Farming: A New Market?

  • Russ Allen breeds and grows thousands of shrimp in a barn in his backyard. The entire process is contained. There's no water coming in or going out, and there's no waste leaving his farm. (Photo by Corbin Sullivan)

Recently, shrimp surpassed tuna as the most-consumed seafood in the United States. Most of the shrimp Americans eat is produced in Southeast Asia, India, Mexico and Brazil. Russ Allen wants to change that. He’s opened one of the world’s few indoor shrimp farms in the Midwest. Allen says his operation meets an obvious market demand, is good for the environment, and presents a new economic opportunity for the country. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:

Transcript

Recently, shrimp surpassed tuna as the most-consumed seafood in the
United States. Most of the shrimp Americans eat is produced in
Southeast Asia, India, Mexico and Brazil. Russ Allen wants to change
that. He’s opened one of the world’s few indoor shrimp farms in the
Midwest. Allen says his operation meets an obvious market demand, is
good for the environment, and presents a new economic opportunity for
the country. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:


In a big blue barn in Russ Allen’s backyard, there are thousands of
shrimp… beady-eyed, bacteria-munching, bottom-feeders.


Here, the life cycle of the shrimp starts in the breeding center, where
two big tanks of water mimic a place 150 feet deep off the shore of the
ocean where the water quality and temperature are stable. Allen says
it’s the perfect environment for shrimp to mate.


“Like in just about all animals the male chases the female, and they do a
little courtship dance, and then the male will deposit a spermatophore on
the female and when she spawns, the eggs pass through the
spermatophore, are fertilized and then go out into the water.”


A few months later, the shrimp end up in the production room where all
they do is eat, and sometimes, if they get excited or spooked, they jump
right out of their tanks.


“They don’t like light…”


“Oh (laughing)! Do you ever have them hit you as you’re standing
here?”


“Oh yeah, that’s why we have the nets up so they don’t jump.”


Russ Allen has been farming shrimp for three decades. He started in
Ecuador, and then went to Belize, where he started the country’s first
shrimp farms.


Allen and his wife moved back to Michigan in 1990, when he started
designing his indoor shrimp farm. It finally opened for business about a
year ago, and now, he’s selling all the shrimp he produces.


(Sound of shrimp market)


Allen says his indoor shrimp farm is one of the first of its kind in the
world. There’s no waste leaving his farm, so pollution’s not an issue,
and because there’s no water coming in or going out, there’s no danger
of introducing diseases into his system.


Allen says an indoor farm also moves shrimp farming away from fragile
coastal ecosystems. That’s where most of the industry has developed
around the world.


“In a place like the United States with all the development on the
coastline and land costs, you can’t really do it anywhere near the ocean
anyway. So, if you’re going to have a viable shrimp farming system in
the United States, you need to move it away from – you know – these coastal areas.”


But indoor farms haven’t always been a viable option, either.


In the 1980s, a handful of them opened in the U.S., including a big one in
Chicago. They all failed because the technology didn’t work quite right,
and because the cost of production made them unable to compete with
outdoor farms.


Bill More is a shrimp farming consultant and vice president of the
Aquaculture Certification Council. He says now, indoor shrimp farmers
have a better chance of making a go of it.


“Coming from third-world countries, there’s been a lot of issues with
illegal antibiotics being found in shrimp. There’s been environmental
and social issues that environmentalists have come down hard upon. It’s
sort of prompted the opportunity for a good indoor system where
you could manage those and you didn’t challenge the environment.”


But More says creating and maintaining a clean, organic indoor shrimp
farm is still very expensive, and it seems an even bigger problem now
that the price of shrimp is the lowest it’s been in a decade.


Shrimp farmer Russ Allen says he’s invested several million dollars in
his business. He’s the only guy in the game right now, which he
admits is good for business, but he doesn’t want it that way. He says
he’d like to see the industry grow in Michigan, and throughout the
country.


“In order to do that the government has got to be a partner in this, and
that has been the challenge… that when you don’t have an industry, you
don’t have lobbyists and nobody listens to you and you can’t get an
industry until they do listen to you. So, that’s been our real challenge
right now.”


Allen says he wants the government to offer tax breaks and other
financial assistance to the aquaculture industry like it does to other
sectors of the economy, but he says he can’t even get some local elected
officials to come and see his shrimp farm. He says with so many
companies moving jobs and factories overseas, he thinks government
leaders should be looking for ways to help new and perhaps
unconventional industries like his, grow.


For the GLRC, I’m Erin Toner.

Related Links

Powering a Town With Manure

Large-scale livestock farms struggle with ways to dispose of their animal waste. Now, efforts are under way to make an Indiana town the first in the nation to get its power entirely from hog manure, but as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman reports, this venture has a long way to go before it becomes a reality:

Transcript

Large scale livestock farms struggle with ways to dispose of their
animal waste. Now, efforts are under way to make an Indiana town the first
in the nation to get its power entirely from hog manure, but as the Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman reports, this venture has a long way
to go before it becomes a reality:


Indiana Agriculture Department officials have unofficially renamed the
village of Reynolds as Bio-Town USA. They hope to supply the town’s power
needs with energy produced from animal waste. The technology to convert the
so-called biomass into usable power is in its infancy.


Agriculture Department spokeswoman, Deb Abbott, admits the project is venturing
into some uncharted territory.


“We don’t have all the answers. We’re gonna look for the answers and we
don’t have an exact time frame.”


Abbott says Reynolds was chosen because it’s a typical mid-west small town.
It also has easy access to manure. The state estimates more than
150-thousand hogs are within a 15-mile radius of the town.


For the GLRC, I’m Chris Lehman.

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Ten Threats: Hidden Costs of Invasives

  • Foreign ships like this one from Cypress are known as "Salties" around the Great Lakes. These ships are responsible for bringing aquatic invasive species into the Lakes, and we're all paying a price. (Photo by Mark Brush)

In looking at these threats to the Great Lakes, almost everyone we surveyed agreed the worst threat was alien invasive species. Shipping goods in and out of the Great Lakes has helped build the major cities on the Lakes. But shipping from foreign ports has brought in unwanted pests. Zebra mussels are probably the most infamous, but there are more than 160 aquatic species that have invaded the Lakes and changed them, almost always for the worse. So why can’t we keep them out?

Transcript

Today we begin an extensive series called “Ten Threats to the Great Lakes.” The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham is our guide through this series:


In looking at these threats to the Great Lakes, almost everyone we surveyed agreed the worst threat was alien invasive species. Shipping goods in and out of the Great Lakes has helped build the major cities on the Lakes. But shipping from foreign ports has brought in unwanted pests. Zebra mussels are probably the most infamous, but there are more than 160 aquatic species that have invaded the Lakes and changed them, almost always for the worse. So why can’t we keep them out?


Well, let’s say I import widgets.


(Sound of widgets dropping into a cup)


I’ve been getting widgets from somewhere in Asia, but I found out I could get widgets from an eastern European company for a dollar-a-widget cheaper. The factory there can ship them directly to my warehouse in Great Lakes City, USA by ship across the Atlantic and into the Great Lakes.


Pretty good deal. I get good widgets, the shipping costs are cheaper, my profits go up, and it means cheaper widgets at the retail level. Everybody wins, right?


Well, the ship that brought the widgets also brought an alien invasive species that stowed away in the ship’s ballast. A critter that’s native to eastern European waters is now wreaking havoc on the Great Lakes ecosystem.


Aquatic alien invasive species that have invaded the Great Lakes now cost the economy an estimated five billion dollars a year. Five billion dollars of what’s considered biological pollution.


So, who’s paying the price?


Cameron Davis is with the environmental group Alliance for the Great Lakes.


“Unfortunately, in most instances, who pays for those hiddens costs are you and me. We pay for our water agencies to have to clean zebra mussels out of their pipes, we pay our agencies through taxes to have to keep Asian Carp out of the Chicago River, we pay through our taxes in any number of ways to try to fight these invaders.”


So right now, taxpayers and utility ratepayers – even those who never bought a widget and never will – are paying the price. Davis says that’s just not right.


“One of the things we need to do is make sure that those ships are paying full cost for everything that they bring, not just the widgets, but the stowaways like the zebra mussels, things like that that they have on board.”


So, why target the ships?


Dennis Schornack chairs the U.S. Sector of the International Joint Commission. The IJC is a bi-national agency that monitors a water quality agreement between the U.S. and Canada. Schornack says that’s the way it usually works: the polluters pay.


“The cost of the impact of these unwanted creatures is something that’s not baked into the price charged for the widgets. So, somewhere that external cost needs to be captured back into the price. The ship owners themselves are the likely target to pay for this through a permitting fee which, of course, they will pass on to their customers, the people who made the widgets.”


So all of us who buy widgets end up paying a little more, but paying permits and fees could cost shippers more than they can afford. George Kuper is with the Council of Great Lakes Industries. Kuper says he understands the first impulse is to make the shippers pay.


“The problem with that, of course, is the shippers were already close to non-economic as a method of transportation, which puts us right up against an environmental challenge because shipping is by far the most environmentally un-intrusive method of moving large amounts of materials.”


Kuper says using other methods of transportation such as trains or trucks to move that cargo from East Coast ports might burn more fuel and cause more pollution.


But of all the shipping on the Great Lakes, only six percent of the tonnage is carried on ocean-going vessels. The rest is transported on Great Lakes carriers that never leave the lakes and don’t bring in new invasives. So, the question is this: is that six percent of cargo worth the damage that aquatic invasive species cost each year.


Many experts say there is a fairly simple answer to all of this. Technology is available for cargo ships to eliminate invasives from their ballast tanks. Requiring those ships to use that technology would likely add some to the cost of every widget, but supporters of the idea say it would greatly reduce the environmental cost to the Lakes.


For the GLRC, this is Lester Graham.

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Id Chips for All Livestock

  • These ear tags are becoming a thing of the past as states try out high-tech identification chips. (Photo courtesy of the USDA)

The federal government is phasing in a national identification tracking system for livestock to help trace and curb threats, such as Mad Cow disease and even bio-terrorism. One state is even advancing what it calls micro-chip, injectable social security numbers for livestock. But many farmers worry that Big Brother may be moving into the barn. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Joyce Kryszak reports:

Transcript

The federal government is phasing in a national identification tracking system for livestock to help trace and curb threats, such as Mad Cow disease and even bio-terrorism. One state is even advancing, what it calls micro-chip, injectable social security numbers for livestock. But many farmers worry that Big Brother may be moving into the barn. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Joyce Kryszak reports:


The Gingerich Farm isn’t hard to find. Its fields are speckled with hundreds of black and white Holsteins. Dairy farmer Earl Gingerich Jr. takes us inside one of the barns for a closer look at some of his babies.


“These are a little noisy over here since we just moved ’em. Some of them tend to bellow…”


Gingerich is rather fond of the five hundred cows on his Western New York farm, and he doesn’t mind the hard work that goes along with them. Seven days a week, in good weather and bad. For him, Gingerich says it’s all about the cows.


“When you get up and you see the animals that are in the background and they’re waiting for you to take care of them and they need you, it’s like having a pet around, and taking that animal and yougrow her up to be a full-size, adult animal, you know why you’re doing it.”


So, Gingerich says anything he can do to protect his herd is a good idea. He takes part in the state’s voluntary vaccination program. Bright orange tags, each bearing a bold black number, are evidence of that. They dangle from the cows’ ears as they flick away barn flies while chewing the newest cut of hay.


(Sound of mooing)


But these tags will soon be obsolete. By 2009, the Department of Agriculture’s national animal identification program will require a standardized tracking system for every livestock animal in the United States.


Bruce Akey is an Assistant Veterinarian for New York state. He says the system will be able to trace the movements of animals backwards and forwards.


“Whether they’re sold to someone else on an individual basis, or they go to livestock markets, or go to slaughter plants, or anything like that, those movements can be recorded at those points at which they pass into commerce, and those movements can also be recorded in a national database.”


It’s the integrity of that database that is one major concern for many farmers and their advocates. They say animal rights extremists or terrorists could also get access to the information on the database about farms.


Farmers worry they could learn about chemicals and medicines used at the farm, and use it against them. Dairy farmer Earl Gingerich knows first-hand what can happen. Someone used a batch of antibiotics to contaminate ten thousand pounds of milk on his farm.


“We did have on a recording, which we couldn’t trace, and it said something to the effect of, ‘This should teach you a lesson now.'”


One microchip ID method being advanced in New York and other states is heightening bio-security concerns. The radio frequency chips can are embedded in ear tags or injected under the animals’ skin.


The stored data is read by large panel scanners at auction barns or hand held models, available to anyone. The cost is also still a big question. Maybe a few dollars for each chip and about five thousand dollars for large readers.


Peter Gregg is spokesman for the state’s Farm Bureau. He says they support a national tracking system, but Gregg says the government will have to make it secure – and pay for it.


“You know, we are operating on too slim of margins as it is to be able to pick up the tab for a program like this, and the other aspect is that we would have to make sure that there is protection of private rights.”


State veteranarian Bruce Akey says the government is listening to those concerns. He says they’re working to make the program cost-neutral or at least share costs with farmers. And Akey says Congress is hearing arguments that a private entity, such as a cooperative, should be allowed to manage the database. Advocates say they prefer that to the government being in charge of private information. But Akey says either way, there has to be a dependable way to track animals.


“It may seem a little like 1984, but it’s the state of technology, it’s the state of the marketplace – on both a national and an international scope,” said Akey. “That along with the fact that we now have diseases like Mad Cow disease and other food safety issues that more and more consumers are demanding that we be able to trace these animals and address the source of the problem.”


For now, states are rushing to comply with the first phase of the national ID program. By March of next year, every livestock and poultry farm in the country must be located and assigned a premises identification number. Then, each and every farm creature – be it cow or horse, elk or fish – will get its very own animal social security number.


For the GLRC, I’m Joyce Kryszak.

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Us and Canada Partner to Reduce Fuel Waste

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has joined up with Natural Resources Canada. The two agencies are forming an initiative to help truckers save fuel. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jerome Vaughn has
more:

Transcript

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has joined up with Natural
Resources Canada. The two agencies are forming an initiative to help truckers save fuel.
The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jerome Vaughn has more:


Officials from both sides of the border gathered near the Ambassador
Bridge in Detroit to sign a memorandum of understanding.


The new partnership brings together fuel-saving technologies developed in the EPA’s Smart Way Transport Program with driver education and training programs from Natural Resources Canada.


EPA officials say the voluntary program could save up to 440 million gallons of fuel each year in addition to eliminating 5 million tons of carbon dioxide. Suzanne Rudzinski is with the EPA.


“What we’re really trying to do is something that I think is a
win-win for both business and the environment. By adopting the
programs, we’re trying to reduce fuel usage. Idling alone can
save a billion gallons a year in diesel, just from idling trucks.”


The EPA estimates there are thirteen million truck border crossings between
the U.S. and Canada each year.


For the GLRC, I’m Jerome Vaughn in Detroit.

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Capturing Wasted Methane From Landfills

  • A landfill is full of things people don't consider useful anymore. One group begs to differ. (Photo by Roberto Burgos S.)

The landfill is often seen as the end of the line… the burial ground of our trash. But one company says there’s still something to gain from that buried garbage. It’s planning to build a new plant to retrieve one final product from all of our trash. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kasler has the story:

Transcript

The landfill is often seen as the end of the line… the burial ground of our
trash. But one company says there’s still something to gain from that buried
garbage. It’s planning to build a new plant to retrieve one final product from
all of our trash. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kasler has the
story:


You probably don’t think of landfills as “green.” But Steve Wilburn does.
Wilburn is the president of FirmGreen. He says he knows different ways to
turn byproducts of landfills into useful energy.


First, capture the methane that’s produced when all that garbage stews
underground. Second, use it as fuel to generate electricity. Third, turn it into compressed gas for trucks. And finally, mix
it with soybean oil to make soy diesel.


Steve Wilburn says it’s an ambitious project.


“This is the first of its kind in the world. The Green Energy Center concept is
something I came up with about four years ago, and as we explored for ways to
implement it, we needed a centerpiece, a technology that was missing, and that
was to clean up the landfill gas in a very cost-effective way.”


FirmGreen is building what it calls its Green Energy Center right next to the
landfill in Columbus, Ohio. Mike Long is with the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio – SWACO for short. Long says right
now, there’s no practical use for the methane and carbon dioxide produced by the rotting garbage in the landfill.


“Currently, SWACO’s control technology is to have a flare where we burn off the
gases to keep it from getting up into the atmosphere. But the new technology,
we will take that gas and make it into energy and consumer products rather than
just simply burning it and exhausting it.”


Instead of burning those landfill gases, they’ll be redirected a small
electric generator operated by FirmGreen. The electricity will be sold back to
SWACO to power its main office and its fleet garage. That’ll start in just a
few months.


Later, FirmGreen will convert methane into compressed natural gas. That will
be used to fuel SWACO’s vehicles, which could save the waste authority an
estimated 100 thousand dollars a year.


FirmGreen’s President, Steve Wilburn says the final part of the project is the
real profit maker for his company: turning methanol into biodiesel.


“When we create
methanol, we then have the bridge to the hydrogen economy because ethanol is an
excellent hydrogen carrier. It’s also used in the manufacture and production of
biodiesel. Ohio is a large soybean producing state. So we’ll take our green
methanol and we’ll blend that with the soy oil and we’re going to create
biodiesel.”


When the FirmGreen biodiesel processing facility is up and running, it will
need 69 thousand acres of soybeans to produce 10 million gallons of biodiesel
annually. FirmGreen already has a contract with Mitsubishi Gas Chemical
Company to provide 6 million gallons of biodiesel a year. FirmGreen also hopes
to interest the growing hydrogen fuel cell industry.


“Biofuels” have their critics, who are concerned that it takes as much energy
or more energy to create biofuels than they produce. Mike Long at SWACO says
he’s heard that before, but it doesn’t apply to this project.


“The
energy is already here, and is being flared off right now at our landfill. There’s no recovery of the energy, no beneficial
use. So for those who argue that this process would be a consumer of energy, it’s not a net consumer, and right now, we’re wasting energy.”


Long and Wilburn point to statistics from the U.S. EPA. They says the data show
the Green Energy Center will have the same effect as reducing oil consumption by
more than twenty thousand barrels a year. They say that’s like taking 2,000 cars off the road.


Sam Spofforth is with the Central Ohio Clean Fuels Coalition. He says even
when factoring in the fuel used by trucks transporting the methanol to the
remote biodiesel processing facilities, the project still looks green to him.


“In terms of biodiesel, it’s about three point two energy units out for every one energy
unit in. What is even more exciting about this project – methane
gas is about twenty times as potent as a greenhouse gas as carbon dioxide. So the
fact that they’re using methane that would otherwise be vented into the air
makes the net emissions of those greenhouse gas even more positive.”


The Green Energy Center in Ohio is the first in the nation, but a second one
is planned to be built near Saint Louis, Missouri. With giant landfills venting
off methane in places around the country, if these two make money, it’s a
pretty sure bet others will be built in the near future.


For the GLRC, I’m Karen Kasler.

Related Links

New Coal Fired Power Plant on Lakeshore?

  • A new power plant on Lake Michigan has some environmentalists worried. (Photo courtesy of Wisconsin USGS)

Construction is expected to start soon on what could become one of the largest coal-fired power plants in the Midwest. Some worry that more coal plants are likely to follow. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

Construction is expected to start soon on what could become one of the largest coal-fired power plants in the Midwest. Some worry that more coal plants are likely to follow. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:


The Wisconsin Supreme Court recently overturned one of the legal challenges to a power plant expansion along Lake Michigan south of Milwaukee. The company WE Energies wants to build two new coal-fired plants producing more than twelve hundred megawatts of electricity.


Sierra Club attorney Bruce Nilles says many other coal-fired
plants are on the drawing board around the Upper Midwest. He says
regulators can either embrace old and dirty technology or
move toward a more innovative system.


“That we know is available today, whether it’s burning
coal, natural gas, or the opportunity to build new wind farms across
the Upper Midwest, those are the choices we’re facing.”


The owners of the Wisconsin power plant say they will use modern
technology to hold down certain types of air pollution and minimize
the harm to aquatic life in Lake Michigan.


Environmental groups are still challenging some of the plant’s air and water permits.


For the GLRC, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

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Wifi System to Help Save Money on Utility Bills?

  • If only your electricity meter could talk... (Photo by Kenn Kiser)

If the summer heat’s had you cranking up the a/c… you might be anxious about getting a big bill in the mail. Imagine if your house could send you an email to warn you that you’re spending a lot… before the bill arrives. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams explains:

Transcript

If the summer heat’s had you cranking up the A/C, you might be anxious about
getting a big bill in the mail. Imagine if your house could send you an
email to warn you that you’re spending a lot before the bill arrives. The
Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Rebecca Williams explains.


In the future, your electricity meter could talk to you.


You’d be able to type into your computer how much you want to spend on lighting and cooling
your house each month. Using wireless technology, your utility meter would
then send you an email when you’re going over those goals.


It’s a system created by mechanical engineering students at the University
of Michigan. Professor Steven Skerlos advises the team.


“As a recent homeowner, it was very obvious to me that even I had little
awareness of the impact that I was having and the consumption of course
until it was way too late. The bill comes a couple months later and you
can’t go back in time and turn down the thermostat or use less water.”


Skerlos says the system can also be used in water and gas meters.


But it might be several years before you can get the new system. Skerlos
says he’s had interest from the companies that make the meters, the next
step is getting utility companies to buy in.


For the GLRC, I’m Rebecca Williams.

Related Links

Poll: Americans Want to Reduce Dependence on Foreign Oil

As President Bush prods Congress to pass his Energy Bill, a new poll suggests nine out of ten Americans want to reduce the nation’s dependence on foreign oil. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Sarah Hulett reports:

Transcript

As President Bush prods Congress to pass his Energy Bill, a new poll
suggests nine out of ten Americans want to reduce the nation’s dependence on
foreign oil. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Sarah Hulett reports:


The Yale University survey suggests that anxieties in Washington over America’s reliance on foreign oil match people’s concerns at the dining room table and around the water cooler.


Dependence on imported oil was ranked highest on people’s list of concerns – above jobs and the economy, high gasoline prices, and pollution.


Dan Esty is the director of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy. He says the survey also suggests that Americans don’t want to develop more domestic fossil fuels.


“They don’t want to drill in Alaska National Wildlife Refuge. They don’t want to have more coal-based power, even though that might come from domestic sources. They really want to see a big new push for some alternative energies, and for some new technologies.”


Nine out of ten people surveyed also cited higher fuel economy standards as a good way to reduce foreign oil dependence. But lawmakers have so far rejected efforts to impose new efficiency mandates.


For the GLRC, I’m Sarah Hulett.

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