Author: Sarah.chappel

Greenwire: Poor weather and fish shortages related to El Niño are the likely reason that hundreds of ill pelicans have become stranded on the Oregon and California coasts this winter, California wildlife officials said yesterday.

Disease and environmental toxins have been ruled out as likely causes of the illnesses, officials from the California Department of Fish and Game said.

The officials described the illnesses as a “cyclical event,” suggesting the struggling birds may have flown too far north during their annual migration. When those birds returned to California, weaker than usual, they encountered chilly weather and smaller-than-average populations of prey such as anchovies and sardines, the officials said.

Hundreds of the birds have been cleaned, warmed and fed at rescue centers, but about a third of them have died as have others that were not taken in by rescuers. Rescue groups continue to receive calls, though reports of ailing birds have fallen in recent weeks (Jill Leovy, Los Angeles Times, Feb. 22). – GN

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ClimateWire: Many see saving the Amazon as the cheapest and fastest way to combat greenhouse gas emissions.

Experts say stopping slash-and-burn deforestation and protecting the forests could be more effective than replacing coal-fired power plants or switching to electric cars.

Projects under the United Nations’ Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, or REDD, rules would channel money back to forest protection, offsetting the damage done by slash-and-burn deforestation, which accounts for about 15 percent of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions.

Governors representing Brazil’s nine Amazon states are pushing industrialized nations to invest in REDD projects. California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) signed on to measure carbon in the forests to sell carbon credits in the state’s cap-and-trade market starting in 2012. Money would also be sent for forest protection. And under proposed federal climate change legislation, U.S. companies could invest in forest protection if they faced carbon controls. The United States also has teamed with Australia, Britain, France, Japan and Norway to pledge $3.5 billion to preserve tropical forests.

Brazilian policies in the past have not protected the rain forest. They included a program started in the 1960s that encouraged residents to cut down trees to make land more productive. But faced with the reality that slash-and-burn deforestation is a rampant polluter, Brazil is getting tougher. The nation’s space agency tracks deforestation in real time, and the country has created forest reserves and has stopped new settlements in untouched forest areas. The South American nation is also stepping up enforcement within the forest.

“We are working hard on the topic of climate change,” said Environment Minister Carlos Minc.

Amazon trees store between 80 billion and 130 billion metric tons of carbon in their leaves and trunks. If the entire forest were burned, the output would be 50 times more carbon dioxide than the United States emits every year (Margot Roosevelt, Los Angeles Times, Feb. 21). – JP

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ClimateWire: Researchers say climate change will reduce the number of hurricanes but will also make them stronger.

A new consensus published this week in Nature Geoscience splits the middle on a years-long debate about how climate change would affect hurricane trends. The study reports the consensus reached by 10 climate scientists from the World Meteorological Organization that the number of storms would drop by 6 to 34 percent.

But most of that reduction would come from a drop-off in weak or moderate storms. The authors project overall wind speed in storms would rise by 2 to 11 percent, translating to an increase in damage of up to 60 percent. Storms would also have more rain, another damage indicator.

It’s unclear when the trend started or whether overall damage will increase, the authors said (Seth Borenstein, AP/Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Feb. 21). – JP

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Greenwire: Despite the public image of a Central Valley on the verge of becoming a dust bowl from cuts in water deliveries, crop and labor statistics for 2009 negate the idea that California’s farm economy is on the edge of collapse.

The state’s farming community has weathered the recession better than other sectors in the state, according to its employment numbers, though reduced water deliveries hurt some areas more than others.

While construction work plummeted 17.8 percent and manufacturing jobs were down nearly 8 percent in the state, the number of California farm jobs increased statewide since 2006 and only dipped slightly — less than half a percent from 2008 to 2009.

In Fresno County, the state’s top-producing agricultural county, the number of farm jobs rose slightly last year.

“People make a lot of claims, but the data you see is showing growth,” said Paul Wessen, an economist with the California Employment Development Department. “We’re just not seeing the job loss” (Bettina Boxal, Los Angeles Times, Feb. 22). – DFM

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Greenwire: Toyota Motor Corp. President Akio Toyoda will testify before Congress next week after saying for weeks that he would not appear in hearings investigating his company’s safety recalls.

Toyoda said he wanted to explain the company’s conduct “in all sincerity” before Congress. Toyoda had previously said the company’s U.S.-based executives would be more prepared to answer the questions, but reversed course after receiving a formal invitation from U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Edolphus Towns (D-N.Y.).

The investigations stem from the automaker’s recall of more than 6 million U.S. vehicles after consumers reported problems with gas pedals and sudden acceleration. The massive recalls have prompted serious concerns about the company’s safety record.

Toyoda also is scheduled to meet with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, who has threatened the company with civil penalties for its slow response to the complaints.

Separately, the Oversight panel issued a subpoena for all Toyota safety documents belonging to former Toyota lawyer Dimitrios Biller. Biller has sued Toyota under federal racketeering laws, alleging that the company conspired to “unlawfully withhold and conceal evidence from plaintiffs and obstruct justice in lawsuits against Toyota throughout the United States.” Biller has accused Toyota of hiding evidence of safety problems from regulators and consumers. Toyota has filed an independent suit against Biller (Josh Mitchell, Wall Street Journal [subscription required], Feb. 19). – JP

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Greenwire: After neighbors complained about noxious fumes from a 16.5-acre lagoon filled with chicken waste, local air pollution regulators in Northern California have issued a series of violations against the egg farm that has pumped the feces and urine into the pond.

The waste comes from Olivera Egg Ranch, which has the capacity to hold more than 700,000 chickens. Residents of French Camp, about 80 miles east of San Francisco, say the pond’s foul-smelling fumes give them headaches and nausea.

“My husband and I farmed from sunrise to sunset; we’re out there exposed to the smell and whatever else was out there coming from the Olivera farm,” said Lita Galicinao, who moved into her home near the farm after immigrating from the Philippines in 1954. “It was really hard to work in the heat, plus with the smell, a lot of times you feel nauseated, but that’s our livelihood. We have to go out there and work.”

The San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District found the farm responsible for six violations after multiple complaints from neighbors about the fumes from the lagoon. The most recent petition was filed last month by the Humane Society of the United States, which also sued the egg farm on behalf of 10 local residents.

Edward Olivera, the owner of the egg farm, said he didn’t think the lawsuit had “any solid basis.” He declined to comment on the violations alleged by the air pollution district (AP/MSNBC.com, Feb. 19). – GN

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Greenwire: Fish and Wildlife Service Director Sam Hamilton died Saturday in Colorado after experiencing chest pains at Keystone Resort, where he was vacationing with friends.

His death was confirmed by the Summit County coroner’s office, which issued a press release noting that Hamilton’s cause of death was consistent with an underlying heart condition.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, in a statement, said the department had “suffered a great loss,” and he praised Hamilton as a visionary leader “whose years of service and passionate dedication to his work have left an indelible mark on the lands and wildlife we cherish.”

The 54-year-old Georgia native had been FWS director just five and a half months, during which time the agency made several major policy shifts, including developing a comprehensive response to threats faced by plants and animals from climate change.

Among the major initiatives undertaken since Hamilton’s appointment were last September’s proposal to designate 200,000 square miles of Alaska as critical habitat for the threatened polar bear, whose glacial habitat is at risk from warming climate, as well as a more recent decision to deny federal protection to the American pika, a small mammal that lives in California’s Sierra Nevada.

Hamilton had also pledged to make reforms to the 1973 Endangered Species Act, including provisions dealing with critical habitat and the role of interagency consultation in protecting species.

“No matter which way you turn, somebody is not going to be happy,” Hamilton told E&E last December (Greenwire, Dec. 24, 2009). “Our focus is on trying to recover endangered species; our goal is to try to get them off the list. So as long as we keep our eye on that goal and work on definitions and work on policy to further that goal, we’ll be in good shape.”

Hamilton is survived by his wife, Becky, two sons, and a grandson.

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Greenwire: Arizona’s Fort Verde Historic State Park will close next month, even though estimates indicate that it will cost taxpayers about $46,000 more to shutter it than it would cost to keep the park open for another year.

The State Parks Board last month decided to close 13 of Arizona’s less profitable parks to help mitigate a budget shortfall. Lawmakers have cut parks funding by 61 percent since July. By June, the state will have closed more of its parks than any other state in the nation.

Closing the 13 parks will cost about $1.4 million, compared with about $3.6 million to keep them open for a year.

Still, parks officials say the funds that would keep the parks open come from a different pot of money by law. Dollars that would be spent on the closings may be used only for capital projects, not operating expenses, so they could not be directed to help keep the parks open, they say.

Plus, the closures will bring operating expenses down, which will help keep the remaining parks open.

“Our problem is our operating budget,” said Renee Bahl, parks director. “We don’t have the operating budget to keep these parks open in the future.”

Some of the closures are expected to begin Monday, when the state fences off the Homolovi Ruins and Lyman Lake state parks.

Still, park officials have not given up. A proposed agreement with Camp Verde to take over control of Fort Verde is “very promising,” for example, said Bahl. The Parks Board is also lobbying for legislation that would shore up funds by asking voters to pay a $9 surcharge on vehicle registrations to help fund state parks. The bill, which has garnered bipartisan support, is scheduled for a House committee hearing on Monday (Casey Newton, Arizona Republic, Feb 18). – DFM

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Greenwire: The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the U.S. Agency for International Development will help pay for Pioneer Hi-Bred International Inc. to bring biotech seeds to African farmers.

The move follows a similar initiative from rival company Monsanto Co. The companies say the seeds could help increase food production by 50 percent in Africa.

Dry weather, poor soil and lack of high-quality farming materials have hurt the continent’s corn production, but Pioneer says its modified seeds could increase crop yields by 50 percent. Company representatives would work with scientists in Africa to refine the seeds and maximize crops while also reducing the reliance on nitrogen fertilizer.

Critics say the programs are just a public relations move to gain more acceptance for the seeds. But representatives of both companies say they are hoping to increase crop yields in Africa and give people there the same access to corn as American farmers.

The seeds would be available to African farmers without royalties. Monsanto and Pioneer will also research drought-resistant corn in Africa (Philip Brasher, Des Moines Register, Feb. 18). – JP

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Greenwire: Virginia’s Appalachia region, once a Democratic stronghold, is a prime battleground in this year’s congressional elections as voters reject key parts of the Democratic agenda.

Area residents are fearful of a government takeover of health care, terrified that proposed emission limits would cripple their coal industry and angry that Congress has spent billions in stimulus funds while their local economy continues to decline.

After beginning to turn away from Democrats over the past few decades, the region’s voters shunned President Obama in 2008 in a seismic shift that Republicans hope to capitalize on in November.

Four of the region’s remaining Democratic lawmakers already have announced their retirements. Even Rep. Rick Boucher (D-Va.), a 14-term incumbent, is in danger. He has switched into campaign mode months earlier than usual and before Republicans have even put forth a challenger.

Boucher’s record of supporting the coal industry and his efforts to modernize the local economy make him the Democrats’ best chance to hold a seat they can’t afford to lose. His race will test whether voters’ anti-Washington anger outweighs their support for popular long-term incumbents.

Boucher will try to focus the race on what he has accomplished for his district in his years in Congress. Republicans will try to nationalize the race and cast him as just another Democratic vote for a liberal agenda (Amy Gardner, Washington Post, Feb. 18). – TL

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Science Daily: Monkey populations in threatened forests are far more sensitive to damage to their habitat than previously thought, according to new research.

An analysis of monkeys living in Tanzania’s Udzungwa Mountains suggests that the impact of external factors, such as human activity, on species numbers is felt in forests as large as 40 square kilometres.

Researchers also found that the health of monkey populations is closely related to the type of habitat found between forest fragments, rather than the distance that separates them.

The findings have broader implications for conservationists as the number of monkeys and the variety of species is a visible indicator of the underlying health of their habitat.

Read more >>

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Science Daily: A five-year research project has come up with a way of generating green energy from a humble everyday grass.

Researchers at Teesside University’s Contaminated Land and Water Centre began the project in 2004 to see which plants could best be grown on brownfield sites as a way of improving unsightly blots on the landscape.

Now, the research by the BioReGen (Biomass, Remediation, re-Generation) project team has revealed that reed canary grass can be turned into an excellent fuel for biomass power stations and, on a smaller scale, boilers in buildings like schools.

The native British grass is turned into bricks and pellets. These not only burn well but also don’t add to greenhouse gases or contribute to global warming.

The team experimented with four types of plant, willow trees, the current favourite for biomass power stations, and the miscanthus, reed canary and switch grasses.

Read more >>

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Science Daily: Every moment of every day the brain is forced to process thousands of separate odorants from the world around us.

Through a new study of honeybees, scientists at UQ’s Queensland Brain Institute have discovered the brain has an advanced ability to isolate specific odours and recollect smells.

“There’s a lot of information coming into the brain whenever a scent is detected and it would be difficult to process it all,” lead researcher Dr Judith Reinhard said.

“We’ve found that honeybees pick only a handful of so-called ‘key odorants’ out of every complex aroma that they really learn. They may remember just two or three odorants from a couple of hundred, the rest are ignored.”

Colleague Dr Charles Claudianos said if you had to learn the hundreds of compounds your brain would be overwhelmed with information.

Read more >>

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Greenwire: A decrease in the amount of summer fog shrouding California’s coastal redwoods could make the famed forests more vulnerable to droughts and hinder their future growth, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

Over the past century, the number of foggy days has decreased by about a third, the researchers found. They did not suggest a possible cause of the decrease.

“The redwoods along our coast are highly dependent on fog as a source of water during the summer when water in the ground is scarce,” said Todd Dawson, a co-author of the study. “Foggy nights are needed to rehydrate the trees that can’t tolerate long droughts.”

The article was published online today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

While the reduced fog would be unlikely to kill off mature redwoods, it could prevent seeds from sprouting and saplings from growing to maturity, Dawson said. It could also affect species living underneath the trees — such as salamanders, worms and sword ferns — that get some of their water from “fog drip” (David Perlman, San Francisco Chronicle, Feb. 16). – GN

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Greenwire: South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford (R) has asked the state’s attorney general to “pursue every legal action possible” to stop the Obama administration’s planned shutdown of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in Nevada.

Sanford and two members of South Carolina’s congressional delegation are scheduled to hold a news conference today to voice their displeasure with the White House plan.

Sanford will call for President Obama “to recommit to Yucca Mountain” but will not announce any specific legal action today, said spokesman Ben Fox.

South Carolina’s options are unclear. But the governor’s reaction reflects the confusion, anger and resignation surrounding the planned Yucca termination among some of the 38 states where radioactive fuel likely will remain stored at reactor sites for decades longer while the government devises alternatives to the Nevada storage facility.

South Carolina houses an estimated 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste from seven commercial nuclear reactors and defense nuclear waste stored at the Savannah River processing center (Steve Tetreault, Las Vegas Review-Journal, Feb. 16). – TL

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Greenwire: Developer NextEra Energy Resources LLC has struck a deal with the California Energy Commission that will allow it to move forward with stalled plans for a proposed solar plant in California City.

The proposed 250-megawatt Beacon Solar Energy Project had been mired in a war over water needed to cool the plant for the past year.

Residents in the arid region east of Bakersfield were concerned that the solar farm would drain their aquifer, but NextEra’s latest plans involve cutting down hundreds of local water-hungry tamarisk trees to pave the way for the solar power plant’s initial water needs.

The plan may provide a roadmap for resolving similar environmental disputes over dozens of other proposed solar farms in the desert.

“The water that normally would go into the tamarisk will go down into the basin — it’s a big environmental win,” said Michael Bevins, California City’s public works director. An acre of invasive tamarisks can consume 1 million gallons of water each year, said Tim Carlson, research and policy director for the Tamarisk Coalition, a Grand Junction, Colo., nonprofit group working to eradicate the trees.

The Beacon proposal is still in the planning stages, and it is still unclear how many trees would be removed and just how much water would be saved.

NextEra expects to eventually cool the plant using treated wastewater but would need to draw freshwater in its early stages (Todd Woody, Los Angeles Times, Feb. 16). – DFM

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Climatewire: British Airways PLC has reached an agreement to become the exclusive buyer for a proposed plant that could eventually produce 16 million gallons of jet fuel per year from landfill waste.

The facility, being developed in London by Washington, D.C.-based Solena Group Inc., would be the first plant in Europe to turn waste into jet fuel.

Requiring about 500,000 tons of waste per year, the plant could reduce the amount of garbage sent to landfills while providing enough fuel for about 2 percent of flights originating at London Heathrow Airport.

The biofuel that would be produced by the plant is not yet certified for use in the United Kingdom, but British Airways says it believes it could secure that certification by 2014, when the plant is expected to begin producing fuel (Richard Scott, BBC News, Feb. 15). – GN

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Greenwire: Eight days after a meeting between chemical industry lobbyists and Obama administration officials, federal regulators put off including bisphenol A on a list of dangerous chemicals that would be subject to stricter regulation.

Four substances were included on a U.S. EPA list of chemicals that would face stricter labeling and reporting requirements released Dec. 30, but bisphenol A, or BPA, was left off, drawing criticism from environmental groups. EPA now says it won’t develop a tougher regulatory plan for the chemical for at least two years.

The decision to drop BPA from the list is raising questions since EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has spoken on the need to protect the public from such chemicals. Critics say the meeting with chemical industry lobbyists might have been why BPA was omitted.

EPA officials will not comment on why the chemical was not included on the list.

Notes from the Dec. 22, 2009, White House meeting between the American Chemistry Council and Obama administration officials reflect that lobbyists pleaded the case for BPA to avoid stricter regulation. The lobbyists presented findings from a group of mostly industry-funded studies that downplayed the risks of the chemical and said tighter regulation would hurt their profits.

The Journal Sentinel reviewed the cited studies and found 13 of the 19 papers and presentations were paid for by the BPA industry. The funding source for the authors of two other papers could not be determined, and only one paper was written by a scientist without ties to the industry, it found.

The newspaper also scoured e-mails obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and found that government regulators have typically relied on industry scientists to give their opinions on BPA safety before their own staff had a chance to review the science.

Entire sections of the earlier version of the FDA’s ruling that BPA was safe for all use had been taken word for word from earlier industry reports, it found (Meg Kissinger, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Feb. 14). – DFM

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Greenwire: Scientists and city officials are grappling with questions about what will happen when the 30-plus inches of snow melt in the greater Washington, D.C., area.

If the snow melts too fast, the water could seep unfiltered into the Potomac and Anacostia rivers, and eventually into the Chesapeake Bay. Such fast-moving water could carry road salt and other ice-melting chemicals to the bay, which could upset ecosystems and harm fish.

Research has shown that baby salamanders and frogs do not survive as well in salty water, and salt can compromise fish immune systems, leaving them physically stressed and more susceptible to other ailments even if they are not killed outright.

Bill Dennison, a vice president at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, said the contamination is inevitable. The snow “is going to get into our waterways. It’s either going to get in in a big dose, or it’s going to trickle in slowly,” he said.

For fish and other creatures, Dennison said, if salt-filled water flows in too fast, “you don’t have a chance. You don’t have anywhere to hide, you don’t have any opportunity to adjust. So that’s the danger we’re watching for.”

There might be some positive environmental benefits to the winter’s snowier storms, Bob Beyer of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources points out. Some animals might benefits as snow-laden trees break off or stoop over and the branches could provide shelter for deer or low-hanging food for rabbits, he said.

As buried cars sit idle that also could make for decreased air pollution. “It’s actually a net benefit, because fewer people are driving,” said Dawn Stoltzfus, of the Maryland Department of the Environment, adding that tailpipe emissions provide one-third of her state’s smog and greenhouse gas emissions.

Still, officials say, drivers sitting at home trying to keep warm with the thermostat set on high might cause increased emissions from power plants and furnaces, thus potentially canceling out those savings (David A. Fahrenthold, Washington Post, Feb. 13). – DFM

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Climatewire: The recent release of hacked e-mails between climate scientists at the University of East Anglia has shed new light on the 2007 accusation that Phil Jones, director of the university’s Climatic Research Unit, helped cover up flawed data used in an article claiming to provide evidence for global warming.

The data in question came from a 1990 article written by Jones and Wei-Chyung Wang, a professor at the State University of New York, Albany. The article, published in the journal Nature, examined how much of the global warming measured recently has resulted from the spread of cities, which have higher temperatures than unpopulated areas.

Using data from meteorological stations in urbanizing China, the researchers concluded that the spread of cities had only a small effect on climate.

When pressed to reveal the locations of the study’s 84 meteorological stations, the researchers claimed not to have the information. British climate skeptic Doug Keenan accused the researchers of academic fraud when it was discovered that a majority of the weather stations were moved at some point over the course of testing, possibly undermining the data.

Some of Jones’ colleagues expressed concern about the validity of the data, the e-mails show, although the accusation was widely dismissed after its publication in Energy & Environment, a British journal largely known for publishing the work of climate change skeptics.

“I have always thought [Wang] was a rather sloppy scientist. I therefore would not be surprised if he screwed up here,” East Anglia climate professor Tom Wigley wrote to Jones in May. “Why, why, why did you and [Wang] not simply say this right at the start? Perhaps it’s not too late?” (Fred Pearce, London Guardian, Feb. 1) – GN

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