Tag: food chain

Power Company Switches to Natural Gas

The Bush administration is making it easier for coal-burning power plants to avoid upgrading to modern pollution prevention equipment. But in some cases the power companies are bowing to public pressure to reduce pollution anyway. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Alquist reports:

Transcript

The Bush administration is making it easier for coal-burning power plants to avoid upgrading to
modern pollution prevention equipment. But in some cases the power companies are bowing to
public pressure to reduce pollution anyway. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Alquist
reports:


Elizabeth Dickinson didn’t get any kind of warning about air quality in her neighborhood. She
really didn’t need one. She says couldn’t avoid noticing the pollution in the air.


“A couple years ago, there was almost a week where the air quality in my neighborhood was so
bad that you literally couldn’t sleep. There was a burning back in my throat.”


Dickinson lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota, not too far from one of the oldest coal burning plants
operated by Minnesota’s leading supplier of electricity, Xcel Energy.


She and many other people have been actively working to pressure the company to address the air
quality problems they believe are caused by Xcel’s older plants.


And in a rare move among power companies, Xcel Energy is doing something. In May 2002, the
company put forth a voluntary proposal to convert its two oldest coal burning plants to natural
gas. The oldest plant, Riverside, lies in northeast Minneapolis.


(sound of power plant)


Since it opened in 1911, the Riverside plant has changed very little when it comes to emitting
pollutants. It was grandfathered in under the Clean Air Act of 1970 – which means the plant isn’t
subject to federal environmental mandates.


It didn’t have to install modern pollution control devices unless it upgraded the plant. And now,
under the Bush administration’s new rules, even upgrading it might not trigger the threshold that
would require it to reduce emissions.


“For a little bit over two years, one of the first things I was charged with was to look at all the
emissions in and around southeast Minneapolis and Riverside plant came back as a sore thumb
because of the glaring emissions.”


Justin Eibenholtz is the environmental coordinator for a Minneapolis neighborhood improvement
group. He says that’s why Excel’s decision to convert Riverside to natural gas is such a big deal.
Once it’s converted, the old plant will cut air pollutants by 99 percent. Mercury emissions will be
completely eliminated.


Neighborhood groups such as Eibenhotz’s and big environmental groups alike are praising
Excel’s decision. The Great Lakes Program Coordinator for the Sierra Club, Emily Green, says
the reduction in emissions will mean a better quality of life for residents who live in the Great
Lakes region. That’s because the mercury and other pollutants that were emitted from the plant
often ended up in the Great Lakes through a process called air deposition. That meant pollutants
got into the food chain and contaminated fish.


“The Great Lakes are like a giant bathtub with a very, very slow drain, so that what we put into
the Great Lakes stays there.”


Green says the pollutants don’t go away. They just end up contaminating the air and the water.


“We swim in them, we drink them, you know, the fish swim around in them, and so it’s very,
very important that we recognize, despite their size, how fragile the Great Lakes are.”


Besides polluting the lakes, the air pollution drifted for hundreds of miles, causing health
problems. The effects are already apparent. An independent report commissioned from the
Environmental Protection Agency says pollution from the oldest and dirtiest power plants kills
more than thirty thousand Americans each year – almost twice the number of people killed by
drunk driving and homicide combined.


While the natural gas conversion won’t reduce the level of mercury in the Great Lakes
immediately, it will mean it won’t add to the problem. It also means a more efficient use of a
fossil fuel.


Ron Ellsner is the project manager for Xcel’s proposal.


“The new combined cycles that we’re going to install are on the order of 30 percent more
efficient than what our current coal cycle is. They do that much better a job converting that
energy into fuel into electricity.”


It comes at a cost, though. Xcel estimates converting its Minneapolis and Saint Paul plants will
amount to one billion dollars. By Xcel’s estimate, it’ll be the most expensive power plant
conversion in the history of the United States, and the cost of the conversion will be passed on to
its customers.


That’s fine by Elizabeth Dickinson. She says she, and her neighbors, were paying for it in other
ways already, such as additional healthcare costs. Dickinson says the estimated extra 15 cents a
day for her power bill will be worth it.


“You know, these are the hidden costs of coal burning and they’re huge, and you know, they’re
usually left out of these equations and we’re saying they can’t be left out any longer, they just
can’t be, because it’s too high a cost for us as a society.”


Government regulators still have to approve the plan. Minnesota’s utilities commission is
holding a final round of public hearings before voting for or against Xcel’s proposal to convert to
natural gas.


If the conversion is approved, it will likely put pressure on other power companies in the Great
Lakes region to do the same.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Ann Alquist.

Related Links

POWER COMPANY SWITCHES TO NATURAL GAS (Short Version)

A power company in the Great Lakes region is dramatically reducing pollution at two of its power plants. The move could prompt other power companies to do the same. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Alquist reports:

Transcript

A power company in the Great Lakes region is dramatically reducing pollution at two of
its power plants. The move could prompt other power companies to do the same. The
Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Alquist reports:

Minnesota’s largest supplier of electricity, Xcel Energy, has submitted a voluntary
proposal to convert its two oldest, and dirtiest, coal burning plants to natural gas. The
cost of the conversion – one billion dollars – will be passed on to Xcel’s customers.

It will mean a 99 percent reduction in emissions – and mercury emissions will be
eliminated. The plant itself will undergo some changes, with some of the taller structures
no longer marring the skyline.

Ron Ellsner is the project manager for Xcel’s proposal.

“Cleaning up some of the older equipment that will be abandoned, we hope it has a
positive impact on the landscape for our city and for our neighbors.”

If government regulators approve the proposal, it will likely put pressure on other power
companies in the Great Lakes region to do the same.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Ann Alquist.

Related Links

States to Have More Control Over Goose Populations?

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plans to give the states more power in reducing the resident Canada geese population. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly has more:

Transcript

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plans to give the states more power in reducing the resident
Canada geese population. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly has more:


An estimated 3.2 million Canada geese have made permanent homes on lawns, farms, and airport
runways across the U.S.


Officials say the birds collide with aircraft, damage crops and pollute water supplies.


States traditionally needed a permit to get rid of geese.


But Ron Kokel, a biologist with U.S. Fish and Wildlife, says the new proposal would allow
communities to have more say in how the bird population is managed.


“It puts the decision on exactly what management technique the state or local authorities want to
use; it puts that decision more on the local level.”


The public has until October 20th to comment to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on the
proposal.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.

Related Links

Exotic Zooplankton Eggs a Threat to Lakes?

A preventative measure used by ships is supposed to stop tiny foreign aquatic animals from invading the Great Lakes. But a new study finds it doesn’t always work on their eggs. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

A preventative measure used by ships is supposed to stop tiny foreign
aquatic animals from invading the Great Lakes. But a new study finds
it doesn’t always work on their eggs. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:


Ocean-going ships from foreign ports are supposed to swap out ballast
water while at sea. The ocean’s salt water flushes out or kills many
of the tiny invertebrate animals called zooplankton. But Derrick Gray
at the University of Windsor’s Great Lakes Institute for Environmental
Research says the higher salinity does not kill many zooplankton
species’
eggs…


“This is important because although ships exchange their tanks in
mid-ocean, if this doesn’t have an effect on the eggs, that means there
could be live organisms introduced into the Great Lakes.”


Gray says the concern is that more exotic zooplankton will out-compete
native zooplankton… a major
source of food for fish. That could hurt Great Lakes fish populations.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

Mandated Emission Cuts for Power Plants?

As the U.S. government debates cutting mercury emissions from coal-burning power plants, Wisconsin may become the first state in the region to pass mandatory controls. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:

Transcript

As the U.S. government debates cutting mercury emissions from
coal-burning power plants, Wisconsin may become the first state in the
region to pass
mandatory controls. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach
reports:

Mercury released by the burning of coal often falls
into bodies of water and can be passed up through the food chain.
A proposal going before the Wisconsin Natural Resources
Board would order big Wisconsin utilities to cut mercury
emissions 40% by 2010 and 80% by 2015.


Environmentalists want faster
and deeper reductions.
Lloyd Eagan is a Wisconsin air management official. She says
her agency is taking a cautious approach
to how utilities would meet their goal.


“We did not assume that there would be improvements in
mercury control technology… which there will be, but we
based the rule on what is in existence today that we
think will work.”

Utilities still say the Wisconsin mercury plan goes too far.
They want the state to wait until approval of a federal cleanup plan.
That plan targets several different air pollutants.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chuck
Quirmbach in Milwaukee.

Birders Flock to Hawk Mountain

Each fall, thousands of hawks, eagles, and other birds of prey fly hundreds of miles in search of warmer climates. And between August and December, nearly 70-thousand people will climb to the top of a bird sanctuary called Hawk Mountain to get a closer look at those birds. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Brad Linder reports:

Transcript

Each fall, about thousands of hawks, eagles, and other birds of prey fly hundreds of miles
in search of warmer climates. And between August and December, nearly 70-thousand
people will climb to the top of a bird sanctuary called Hawk Mountain to get a closer
look at those birds. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Brad Linder reports:


“Those of you haven’t found the osprey, it’s over there at owl’s head, naked eye here to
the right.”


On a clear day, the view from atop Hawk Mountain stretches for more than fifty miles.
But on this particularly hazy Saturday afternoon, bird-watchers are pushing their
binoculars and telescopes to the limits.


“Well, we’re making them out there, they’re coming in. It’s like you just gotta wait ’til
they get a little closer than what they typically do. They’ve been popping out of clouds
and haze all day for us.”


Doug Wood is a volunteer at Hawk Mountain in Eastern Pennsylvania. This afternoon,
he’s the official bird counter.


“We’re basically taking a lot of field information. Wind, weather, temperature, cloud
cover, wind direction. And then we’re basically monitoring the birds’ species, age, sex,
and recording it every hour.


“Look! An Osprey! And then fade to scene change.”


Researchers at Hawk Mountain have been keeping records of osprey and other migratory
raptors for more than seventy years, making it the oldest monitoring station in the world.


In the early twentieth century, hunters would shoot thousands of birds from the
mountainside each year. Today, people travel from all over the world to shoot birds with
their cameras.


Matt Wong came all the way from New Zealand to study at the sanctuary.


“Hawk Mountain is internationally renowned as a hawk watch site. And also a place
where big research actually happens. Now, not many of the locals around Pennsylvania
actually realize this, but it’s actually huge on the international scene. It’s world
recognized, and that’s one of the reasons why I came here.”


In Wong’s country, there are only two species of raptors. In America, he’s had a chance
to study dozens of varieties.


But even with so many different species populating North America, many people still
think of them as strangers or sometimes even as monsters.


“I still get, amazingly to me, a lot of people that think that these birds are out to get us.”


Volunteer Bob Owens has spent the last 20 years doing education programs at Hawk
Mountain.


“If you intrude into their territory when they have young in the nest, or something like
that, yeah, they’re probably going to chase you. As far as them killing babies and taking
them from baby carriages, this is all old wives tales. This just does not happen.”


Owens runs a small farm for a living, where he says hawks and barn owls help keep
rodents under control. But in a larger sense, Owens says there’s a lot people can learn
from these birds.


“Any three and a half pound bird that can apply four hundred pounds of pressure with its
talons is built to do what they’re doing. They are at the top of the food chain. And that’s
the other big thing that it shows us. It just opens up a door here as to all the reasons the
birds are either dropping or rising in population. What are we doing?”


Owens says in the seventy years researchers at Hawk Mountain have been counting birds,
they’ve seen populations rise and fall. Hawks and eagles are hardy birds. But even the
most successful predators can fall victim to environmental change.


Keith Bildstein is the sanctuary’s director of conservation programs. He says raptors are
like sensitive tools, telling researchers when something’s wrong with an ecosystem.


“Birds of prey are excellent biological indicators. In the middle of the last century they
told us that we were having a problem with our misuse of organochlorine pesticides,
specifically DDT. Today, they’re leading us in explorations of the spread of West Nile
Virus.”


Bildstein says because raptors are at the top of the food chain, when their numbers fall
it’s a pretty good sign that their food source is dwindling, their habitat could be
disappearing, or air quality might be suffering.


But for most of Hawk Mountain’s visitors, the birds are more than barometers of a
healthy ecosystem. According to birder Judy Higgs, they’re beautiful creatures,
especially when viewed from a great height.


“These birds are just majestic. And the other thing is that they go so far. You know,
some of these birds are going to South America!”


Higgs first climbed the mountain in 1970, when she was a student at nearby Kutztown
University. Before moving out of state, Higgs used to come to Hawk Mountain daily…
she stills visits on weekends whenever she can.


“I used to do work in the morning, come here in the afternoon, go home, and finish my
work at night so I could be here.”


By day’s end, Higgs and her fellow birdwatchers count more than 600 raptors. During
the fall season, as many as 70-thousand predatory birds, from vultures to falcons might
pass by on their way to distant points.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Brad Linder.

Small Wetlands Drowning in Development

  • Small wetlands such as the one pictured above often dry up during the summer. These 'ephemeral wetlands' are home to all kinds of frogs, salamanders, reptiles and aquatic life that depend on this specific kind of habitat for their survival. Photo by Lester Graham.

Biologists are becoming concerned about the disappearance of a habitat for wildlife that can be found in rural areas, in sprawling suburbs, and even in big cities. The Environmental Protection Agency is trying to get city planners, farmers, and developers to stop draining small marshy areas that biologists call ephemeral wetlands. The EPA says in the rush to save big areas of wetlands these small temporary wet spots have been overlooked at the expense of some unique wildlife. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham has more:

Transcript

Biologists are becoming concerned about the disappearance of a habitat for wildlife that can be found in rural areas, in sprawling suburbs, and even in big cities. The Environmental Protection Agency is trying to get city planners, farmers, and developers to stop draining small marshy areas that biologists call ephemeral wetlands. The EPA says in the rush to save big areas of wetlands these small temporary wet spots have been overlooked at the expense of some unique wildlife. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham has more:

(Frogs sound)

There’s still just a bit of ice along the edges of this little pool, but it’s a warm day, the ice will soon melt, and the frogs sound as if they’re rejoicing. In the coming weeks, this shallow little pond will become a chorus of different kinds of frogs and host a dance of mating salamanders. Many kinds of amphibians and reptiles are drawn to wet spots like this one to mate and reproduce. And. there’s a bit of a rush to their reproductive activities. More than likely by middle or late summer, this little pool will be all dried up. Actually, that’s good because it means fish can’t survive here, fish that would eat the young of many of these species. So a lot of these frogs and salamanders and other creepy-crawly things do really well here while its wet.

Ed Hammer is a biologist with the Environmental Protection Agency. He says these temporary, or ephemeral, wetlands are usually pretty small… most under two acres in size…some so small you could jump across them. But they’re really important to aquatic life such as fairy shrimp and clam shrimp, which can survive, and even need dry periods. And certain species of frogs and other amphibians who use the wetlands for breeding.

(Frogs fade out)

“They’re extremely productive. We have some of these smaller wetlands in our area in the Chicago region that in a quarter acre of size can produce hundreds and hundreds of salamanders and leopard frogs in a good year when the water holds out. They really depend on those habitats being there every few years at the very least.”

And Hammer says the productivity of the ephemeral wetlands helps other species.

“Salamanders and frogs are fed upon by a multitude of other organisms like turtles and snakes and on up the food chain and then, you know, owls will feed on them. Raccoons and skunks and fox and all up the food chain they’ll be fed on. So they’re an extremely important food source.”

The temporary wetlands are also important to many migrating birds such as pintail ducks and little green herons. Paul Zedler is a professor of environmental studies and scientist at the University of Wisconsin arboretum.

“Imagine you’re a bird, a shore bird, looking for habitat in which to forage. Then ephemeral wetlands, while they’re there, can be an excellent place for resting and feeding.”

Zedler says the ephemeral wetlands are amazing to him because of the wet then dry cycle to which so many animals have adapted.

“It’s like instant ecosystem. Like, add water and you get an ecosystem. People who, once it’s pointed out to them, invariably think it’s pretty darn neat.”

But a lot of times, the people who own the ephemeral wetlands don’t realize that area that gets swampy in wet years is a thriving habitat. Ephemeral wetlands are often drained to plant crops, or bulldozed deeper to build storm water retention basins for housing developments, or the surrounding woodlands are cut down eliminating the habitat where many of the frogs and salamanders live the rest of the year.

They’ve disappeared so quickly that some species that depend on ephemeral wetlands are in danger of disappearing too. Gary Casper is with the Milwaukee Public Museum. He’s been studying a certain turtle called Blanding’s turtle to see why its numbers have dwindled so much.

“Blandings turtles look kind of like those old German helmets from World War II and they have a really bright yellow chin and throat with a real long neck. They’re a threatened species in Wisconsin and threatened or endangered in several other states.”

Casper has been watching Blanding’s turtles to see what makes them tick, where they like to live and eat.

“And after looking at the data from seven years of radio tracking, it’s quite clear that they strongly prefer these seasonal, isolated wetlands probably because they provide much more food for them.”

And so they join a host of other critters such as gray tree frogs, marbled salamanders, fishing spiders, wood ducks and others who heavily depend on the ephemeral wetlands.

The EPA is publishing pamphlets and holding seminars to teach state and local officials and those folks interested in preserving wildlife habitat…hoping they’ll spread the word about the value of the seasonal ponds, or mud puddles so that private landowners will keep them around.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.

Related Links

  • Download a brochure on ephemeral wetlands by the Conservation Foundation. Acrobat Reader required to open file.

Break in the Great Lakes Food Web?

A major link in the food web is disappearing from the Great Lakes. Researchers are concerned that its absence will damage fish populations. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham has more:

Invasive Fish on the Move

An exotic species is making its way toward Lake
Michigan… from Lake Superior. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Mike Simonson reports that the Eurasian Ruffe (ROUGH) fish is
multiplying at a rate wildlife specialists can’t control, threatening to
spread to other Great Lakes:

Tumors Found on Zooplankton

  • Large tumors have been found on zooplankton in Lake Michigan. Scientists don't know the cause and don't know what the growths will mean to the food chain. (Photo courtesy of University of Michigan and NOAA/ Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory)

Scientists are alarmed at the discovery of tumors on tiny animals at
the base of the food chain in one of the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports… no one seems sure what this
will mean to life in the lakes: