EPA’s Report on PBDEs

  • The EPA report says the findings of many studies raise particular concerns about the health risks to children. (Photo courtesy of Stephen Cummings)

A new report from the Environmental Protection Agency links health problems to flame retardants. Lester Graham reports the EPA finds children are most at risk.

Transcript

A new report from the Environmental Protection Agency links health problems to flame retardants. Lester Graham reports the EPA finds children are most at risk.

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers, or PBDEs, are flame retardant chemicals used in all kinds of household consumer products. Sofas, computers, babies’ funiture. The report finds kids are getting a higher dose of PBDEs. That’s bad because the chemicals have been linked to many different developmental and reproductive health problems.

Arlene Blum is a chemist at the University of California Berkeley. She says the report notes PBDEs migrate from foams and plastics into household dust.

“Eighty to ninety percent of the human dose is from dust. So, toddlers, you know, they crawl in the dust, put their hands in their mouths. So, that’s why toddlers have such a high level at such a vulnerable time.”

The EPA report says the findings of many studies raise particular concerns about the health risks to children.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

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EPA Coal Ash Plan Criticized

  • The new coal ash clean-up project will take four years and cost 268-million dollars. (Photo courtesy of Brian Stansberry)

More than a year ago – when an earthen wall broke at a power plant in Tennessee, 500-million gallons of toxic coal ash and water were spilled. If you compare it to other environmental tragedies – it was 50 times bigger than the Exxon Valdez spill. Half of the coal ash spill’s been cleaned up, but crews are still working to get the rest of it. And as Tanya Ott reports there are concerns about a new plan to deal with the ash:

Transcript

More than a year ago – when an earthen wall broke at a power plant in Tennessee – 500-million gallons of toxic coal ash and water were spilled. If you compare it to other environmental tragedies – it was 50 times bigger than the Exxon Valdez spill. Half of the coal ash spill’s been cleaned up, but crews are still working to get the rest of it. And as Tanya Ott reports there are concerns about a new plan to deal with the ash:

The plan comes from the US Environmental Protection Agency. Clean-up crews would scoop up the ash and put it in the same pit it came from… but the pit’s been reinforced with concrete. What the plan doesn’t call for, though, is a liner to make sure no metals leach into groundwater. Tennessee law and even the EPA’s new proposed coal ash rules require liners.

Craig Zeller is the project manager for the EPA. He says because this pit isn’t new – or expanding – it doesn’t have to comply with the rules. Plus, he says, water testing in the area shows there’s no problem with leaching.

“If, in the future it does show that we need to add a groundwater mediation piece to this, we will!”

Adding a liner after-the-fact could be difficult and expensive. The new clean-up project will take four years and cost 268-million dollars.

For The Environment Report, I’m Tanya Ott.

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Oil Spill Worse by the Day

  • The gulf region is the world's largest producer of oysters and shrimp(Photo courtesy of the NOAA)

When an oil rig off the coast of Louisiana exploded last week, gulf coast officials knew they had a problem on their hands. But as Tanya Ott reports from Alabama, everyday they find it’s worse than they originally thought.

Transcript

When an oil rig off the coast of Louisiana exploded last week, gulf coast officials knew they had a problem on their hands. But as Tanya Ott reports from Alabama, everyday they find it’s worse than they originally thought.

It’s estimated more than 200-thousand gallons of oil are spewing out of the well each day. Cleaning up using chemicals causes problems because it might make it easier for marine animals to eat the oil. Burning the oil on the water is not great either. Casi Callaway is with the environmental group Mobile Baykeeper.

“The air quality impacts from it and therefore the health impacts from it are great – and frankly unknown.”

It’s not just an environmental crisis. It’s an economic crisis. This area is the world’s largest producer of oysters and shrimp. And the pristine gulf coast beaches fuel a tourism industry worth 20-billion dollars a year.

For the Environment Report, I’m Tanya Ott.

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Climate Bill to Cut EPA Authority

  • Some senators say to pass any bill, they have to cut the EPA's authority, but environmental groups say this would be a mistake. (Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons GNU 1.2)

A big climate-change bill will be introduced in the U-S Senate next week.
Shawn Allee reports it’s expected to stop the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating greenhouse gases:

Transcript

A big climate-change bill will be introduced in the U-S Senate next week.

Shawn Allee reports it’s expected to stop the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating greenhouse gases.

Congress worked on climate bills for more than a year, but all that time, the US Environmental Protection Agency worked on its plans.

EPA’s got authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions on its own.

It’s doing that in case Congress waits too long or legislation’s too weak.

But some senators say to pass any, bill, they have to cut EPA’s authority.

Environmental groups say this would be a mistake.

Howard Learner is with The Environmental Law and Policy Center.

“The only justification to constrain the US EPA’s ability to do it’s job and do it well under the Clean Air Act is if Congress steps up in a comprehensive, thorough, durable, way to protect our public health and protect our environment.”

Lerner says we don’t know whether Congress’ approach to climate change will work, so the EPA should keep some power over greenhouse gas emissions … as a kind of back-stop.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

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Rainwater Toilets Caught in Red Tape

  • Jill Stites shows off a cistern that collects water from the roof of a welcome center for the Lake County Forest Preserve District of Illinois. An underground cistern collects water for fire protection and, come summer, toilets.(Photo courtesy of Shawn Allee)

Sometimes we hear complaints that environmental regulations stop us from doing what we want with our property.
Environmentalists say there’s one issue where doing the green thing can attract a bunch of red tape.
Shawn Allee reports it’s about using rain water to flush our toilets.

Transcript

Sometimes we hear complaints that environmental regulations stop us from doing what we want with our property.
Environmentalists say there’s one issue where doing the green thing can attract a bunch of red tape.

Shawn Allee reports it’s about using rain water to flush our toilets.

This story starts at a forest preserve in Lake County, Illinois, north of Chicago.

Jill Stites is here to show off the forest preserve’s custom-built welcome center.

Stites: This building was built for people to come out and see what people could do in their own homes.

In other words, the idea was, we could do it, it didn’t break the bank entirely, here’s something you might want to try, that sort of thing?
Stites: yes, you can really do green building in a responsible way.

Stites shows me how the building collects rain water from the roof.
That keeps rain out of sewers.
That way, the local waste-water treatment plant doesn’t waste chemicals and electricity to purify rainwater.
After all, rainwater’s already clean and you can store it in cisterns, like this one.

Stites: It collects water off of the roof and goes directly in there. and there’s a spout on the bottom of the cistern that you can hook up a hose to and water your flowers with.

But Stites’ building wanted bigger bragging rights.
They wanted to prove people can collect rain water for more than just flowers.
You can use it for something more urgent: flushing your toilet.

Stites: you don’t need drinking water to flush your toilet. you’re saving the water from going to the storm sewers to be treated to come back as drinking water when that’s not necessary.

There was trouble, though.
The forest preserve district couldn’t get a permit to use rain water in the toilets.

It wanted a connection to city water, as a kind of backup.

But the state worried untreated rain water might somehow contaminate the city’s drinking water.

It took years to get special permission.

Stites: We’re bragging about it. It’s been in the paper about the possibility of it happening and we’re hoping by summer that it’s going to be a fact.

Well, the Lake County Forest Preserve District got its permit, but it won’t let the issue die.
It wants average homeowners to have an easier time, so do environmental groups.

Ellis: It’s a time-consuming process. If we’re going to have more individuals and business doing this, it’s just going to become a bureacratice mess if they have to get variances every time.

This is Josh Ellis.
He’s with the Metropolitan Planning Council in Chicago.
He wants rain collection for toilets to go mainstream in Illinois, but state law needs an update.

Ellis: It would just be a matter of course instead of a special process just to run your toilets a little bit differently.

He says engineers and plumbers have proven rain water collection can work for toilets, safely.

Ellis: We just need to upgrade the plumbing code and I think it will be smooth sailing from there.

Maybe smooth sailing … if you have the cash.
I ask an industry leader for specifics.
His name’s Joe Wheeler, and he’s with the American Rainwater Catchment Systems Association.
The U-S Environmental Protection Agency estimates, each year the average household spends just 200 dollars on water.
Wheeler says, for a rain water collection system …

Wheeler: You could do a really good job for about 4500 to 15,000 dollars. Every house is different. We’re not talking McDonald’s Big Macs here, we’re talking every one of them is a unique situation.

Wheeler says overseas, using rainwater for toilets is common and cheap.
Take Germany, for example.

Wheeler: Basically when you go into a home, you don’t know … you can’t tell the difference.

But Wheeler says German homes and businesses get pushed toward rain harvesting.

Wheeler: People would actually get a rebate on their waste water and that gave the whole market in Germany a critical mass.

It doesn’t work like that here, so in the U-S, rain harvesting for toilets is nowhere near critical mass.

For The Environment Report, I’m Shawn Allee.

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Energy Star Approval Gets Tougher

  • This week the EPA and the Department of Energy started requiring complete lab reports to review before approving products for Energy Star labels.(Photo courtesy of Energy Star)

The agencies in charge of the Energy Star Program are making it less vulnerable to fraud. Lester Graham reports, a covert investigation revealed corporate self-reporting could be faked.

Transcript

The agencies in charge of the Energy Star Program are making it less vulnerable to fraud. Lester Graham reports, a covert investigation revealed corporate self-reporting could be faked.

The Energy Star Program certifies whether appliances and other products lower energy costs. But, it was based on the honor system. If the company said its product qualified, it got the Energy Star label.

The Government Accountability Office submitted fake products to the Energy Star program. Jonathan Meyer was one of the investigators.

Meyer: We initiated our work by submitting fairly common products and those made it through the certification process without any real scrutiny, so we increased the level of, you know, ODD products toward the end of our investigation to see if there’s any type of information that would raise red flags.

Even a phony gas-powered alarm clock was certified as Energy Star compliant.

This week the EPA and the Department of Energy started requiring complete lab reports to review before approving products for Energy Star labels.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

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Shell Walks Away From Oil Shale

  • Shell says that even though it's no longer pursing water rights on the Yampa River right now, it's in no way backing off its larger ambitions for oil shale. (Photo courtesy of the US DOE)

Extracting oil from oil shale takes a lot of water. Most of the oil shale in the U.S. is in areas where there’s not a lot of water. Conrad Wilson reports, one big oil company seems to be walking away from oil shale for that reason. But not everyone thinks that’s the case.

Transcript

Extracting oil from oil shale takes a lot of water. Most of the oil shale in the U.S. is in areas where there’s not a lot of water. Conrad Wilson reports, one big oil company seems to be walking away from oil shale for that reason. But not everyone thinks that’s the case.

In the Western US, some energy companies are betting big on oil shale. That’s a process of basically heating up a shale rock into a liquid that’s eventually refined into oil. But the global recession and the threat of climate change might be giving those companies second thoughts. Add to that a increasingly limited water supply, and oil shale looks like a risky investment.

The process of creating oil shale is energy intensive and uses a lot of water. That’s a problem in the arid West. As the population grows, the value of water is increasing.

Royal Dutch Shell has the most invested in developing an oil shale technology that works. So earlier this year when the company announced it was pulling away from water rights, it sent shock waves through the industry.

“I read that decision as Shell’s acknowledgment that oil shale is a long way off and that this was a really controversial filing and that in a sense it’s not worth it.”

That’s Claire Bastable of the Western Energy Project. It’s an environmental group that keeps on eye on energy issues in the West. Shell had been pursuing water rights on the Yampa River, in the Northwest portion Colorado.

“Shell’s decision was a big deal. We’re talking about 15 billion gallons of water. … It would have basically taken the Yampa River, which is one of the the last free flowing rivers in the West and diverted a huge proportion of it to Shell for potential oil shale development.”

Bastable says the 15 billion gallons Shell was seeking is about three times the amount the city of Boulder, Colorado uses in a year.

But, Shell knows a lot of oil can be extracted from the oil shale. It’s estimated that there are 800 billion barrels of usable oil in the shale – in Wyoming, Colorado and Utah.

Dr. Jeremy Boak researches oil shale development at the Colorado School of Mines. He says Shell could be simply postponing extracting that oil. Boak believes oil shale has a future, but it’s still decades away.

“With all of the comments they’ve made about what the time scale for oil shale, Shell has been pretty comfortable that this is going to take time.”

Shell says that even though it’s no longer pursing water rights on the Yampa River right now, it’s in no way backing off its larger ambitions for oil shale.

The company wouldn’t provide someone to comment for this story, but in a statement the company said:

The “ultimate goal is to create a commercial oil shale recovery operation that is economically viable, environmentally responsible and socially sustainable.”

That statement adds timing depends on government regulation and the market. The company could be waiting to see what the government does about climate change and how that affects fossil fuel costs. Shell could also be waiting for oil prices go up before deciding whether oil shale worth the effort.

Eric Kuhn heads up water management for the Colorado River District. He monitors much of the state’s water West of the Continental Divide. Kuhn says there’s probably enough water for oil shale development right now, but it’s hard to say for how long.

“I don’t think they’re dropping the filing changes anything. I think those companies are dedicated to and still have a plan to develop the oil shale resource if they can find a technology that is economically productive or if they can produce the oil shale at a competitive price, I think they will do it.”

Environmentalists in the region hope they won’t. They say Shell’s decision not to pursue the water right now should be a signal to others… oil shale just might not be worth the effort.

For The Environment Report, I’m Conrad Wilson.

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Drilling for Climate Change

  • President Obama lifted the moratorium on offshore drilling last week, against the wishes of environmental groups. (Photo Courtesy of the US Minerals Management Service, Lee Tilton)

There’s been lots of speculation about why President Obama is allowing expanded gas and oil drilling offshore. Many environmentalists don’t like it. Lester Graham reports the move might be part of a larger strategy to get a climate bill passed in the Senate.

Transcript

There’s been lots of speculation about why President Obama is allowing expanded gas and oil drilling offshore. Many environmentalists don’t like it. Lester Graham reports the move might be part of a larger strategy to get a climate bill passed in the Senate.

President Obama never ruled out expanding drilling offshore, but it still caught a lot of people off-guard last week when he lifted the moratorium. John Prandato thinks he knows why he did. Prandato writes for the Partnership for a Secure America. In a recent article he argues it’s about the climate change and energy bill being pieced together by Senators John Kerry, Joesph Lieberman and Lindsey Graham. Senator Graham has said a carbon cap-and-trade scheme such as the one in the House climate bill… is dead in the Senate. But maybe not… now…

“Graham has been a proponent of offshore drilling and he has said any climate change and energy bill would have to include expanded offshore drilling, which Obama has now made that concession. So, with any luck, this concession could revive cap-and-trade in the Senate. But, we’ll just have to see.”

Senator Graham says offshore drilling should be expanded further. The White House says the President is not “horse trading” to get a climate bill out of the Senate.

For The Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

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Decision Coming on Cape Wind

  • Bill Eddy of East Falmouth, Massachusetts, built his own schooner, and would one day soon like to sail through the proposed wind farm known as Cape Wind. (Photo by Curt Nickisch)

A decade-long fight over a proposed wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts could be over soon. It’s called Cape Wind. U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says he will make a decision by the end of April. What would be the nation’s first offshore wind farm is bigger than a simple “not in my backyard” issue. It has divided communities and even neighbors. Curt Nickisch met two people, who’ve come down on opposite sides – both for environmental reasons.

Transcript

A decade-long fight over a proposed wind farm off the coast of Massachusetts could be over soon. It’s called Cape Wind. U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says he will make a decision by the end of April.

What would be the nation’s first offshore wind farm is bigger than a simple “not in my backyard” issue. It has divided communities and even neighbors. Curt Nickisch met two people, who’ve come down on opposite sides – both for environmental reasons.

At 63-years-old, Bill Eddy has old-man-and-the-sea white hair. He’s been sailing all his life, including the waters where the 130 wind turbines would go up more than five miles offshore. He knows the wind’s power. And he’s willing to give up part of the horizon he loves for clean energy.

“I have a firm, firm belief. We may have to for one generation be willing to sacrifice a very small portion of a coastal sea off the coast of Massachusetts. To launch this new future.”

Cape Wind would generate three-quarters of the electricity used by Cape Cod and the islands of Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard. Bill says it’s time for residents here to share in the sacrifice for the energy that drives modern life.

“Consider for just a moment the sacrifice that’s already being made by the thousands of our fellow American citizens who live where their mountains are being removed for coal. Or what about the thousands of American men and women who are serving overseas to protect the places where the oil is that we import? To be honest with you, the 130 turbines of the wind farm, I’d prefer any one of them to one more marker in Arlington National Cemetery.”

“It’s not going to make any difference, this one wind farm.”

Martha Powers is just as passionate about Cape Wind, but she’s against it. She lives by the water, too.

“So this was a summer cottage, my Dad bought it in 1958.”

As a kid, Martha spent summers here. Now she’s a librarian with graying hair. She keeps binoculars by the back porch for birdwatching.

“This project would tear a big hole in that whole web of life there that could never be repaired. It would tear a hole that big under the ocean, all of the animals that live in the ocean beneath that water, and that fly above that water, it would be horrific. I can almost see it, like a bomb, to me, it feels.”

Mainly, Martha’s worried about the birds that will be killed by the spinning blades of the wind turbines. Her Christmas card this year was a photo of a chickadee perched on her finger.

“When you feel those little feet on your hand, trusting. It’s an amazing experience. So to kill them is just such a horrible thought. That’s the hardest thing for me to accept about this project.”

A few miles away, Cape Wind supporter Bill Eddy says it would be hard for him to accept the project not going forward.

“I know, I just know that, in a year or so, I’ll be able to go out to the wind farm. The wind in my sails and the winds in the blades of the turbine, that something very old and something very new is bringing about a most wondrous evolution.”

Whether that evolution starts off of Cape Cod will be up to someone in Washington. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says the nation will move ahead with wind farms off the East Coast. But since people like Bill Eddy and Martha Powers can’t agree, Salazar will decide whether Nantucket Sound is the right place to start.

For The Environment Report, I’m Curt Nickisch.

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New Gas Mileage Rules for Cars and Trucks

  • Automakers will have to get into the electric and hybrid vehicle business to meet the new requirements. (Photo courtesy of the Natural Renewable Energy Laboratory, Warren Gretz)

The Obama administration has set new rules requiring cars and trucks to get better gas mileage. Tracy Samilton reports that
will make vehicles both greener and more expensive.

Transcript

The Obama administration has set new rules requiring cars
and trucks to get better gas mileage. Tracy Samilton reports that
will make vehicles both greener and more expensive.

In ten years, automakers will have to reach an average 35 and a half
miles per gallon for their combined car and truck fleet. To get
there, most will get into the electric and hybrid vehicle business, if
they’re not there already. But that technology is expensive. So
they’ll also make regular internal combustion engines more efficient.

Even that isn’t cheap. So who will end up paying for it all? You
guessed it. You and me.

Michael Omotoso is an industry analyst with J.D. Power and Associates.

“If we say we want a cleaner environment, and reduce our
dependence on foreign oil, one way or the other, it’s going to cost us.
Everyone has an opinion about how much more we’ll pay for vehicles
because of the rules.”

The Obama administration and environmentalists say about a grand. Analysts like Omotoso say it could be more like five grand.

For The Environment Report, I’m Tracy Samilton.

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