Richard Eskow - God's Stimulus? It'll Take More Than Just Money to Recover From Sandy

Hurricane Sandy was the stimulus nobody wanted. It took a terrible toll in lives, homes, and dreams. For the families who lost loved ones the tragedy will never end. And yet, in a bitter irony, this terrible storm will spur the kind of spending we should have been seeing all along. There will be jobs, at least for a while -- in construction, road work, repair, and other lines of work.

his "accidental stimulus" won't make up for the loss of life, treasure, and property. But it's a reminder that the things which nurture us as human beings - the bonds of community, a sense of social responsibility, caring for one another - are also surprisingly sound economic principles.

The economic history of our last century illustrates something important: Our nation's always prospered when we care for one another. We do best economically when we use our government as an expression of our best selves.

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/31-1

Chemistry Council trying to lobby Washington to cut off funding for research on carcinogens

Every two years, the National Toxicology Program (NTP), which operates under the banner of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), releases a congressionally-mandated report entitled the "Report on Carcinogens" (RoC) that identifies various agents, substances, mixtures, or exposures that are known to cause cancer. But the American Chemical Society (ACS), which represents many of the biggest names in the cancer-causing chemical industry, is currently trying to lobby Congress to stop the publishing of this important document.

Because the latest RoC lists formaldehyde, a chemical commonly used in both consumer and industrial products, as a definitive cause of cancer, and styrene, another common household chemical, as a suspected carcinogen, the chemical industry is up in arms about its potential profit losses. So in the spirit of Big Tobacco's approach to dealing with inconvenient science, the chemical industry is now desperately trying to muddle the scientific process by paying off Congress to not only withhold the truth about these and other deadly chemicals, but also to prevent the public from accessing this information by blocking funding for future publishings of the RoC.

"The way the free market is supposed to work is that you have information," Lynn Goldman, Dean of the School of Public Health at George Washington University (GWU), is quoted as saying by the New York Times (NYT) about the importance of the RoC report. "They're (thechemical companies) trying to squelch that information."

Similar stall tactics were used by the chemical industry back in the 1930s when the safety of asbestos was first called into question. Just like today, industry lobbyists at that time denied all the emerging science about the serious dangers of asbestos, insisting that it was all "ill-informed and exaggerated" bunk, according to the NYT. The chemical was eventually exposed and banned in the 1980s, of course, but by this point, millions of people had already been needlessly exposed to asbestos, with roughly 10,000 of them now die every year as a result of asbestos-related disease.

"The industrial chemical formaldehyde and a botanical known as aristolochic acids are listed as known human carcinogens," says a National Institutes of Health (NIH) announcement about the eight new substances added to the 2011 RoC, which the chemical industry is trying to keep under wraps. "Six other substances -- captafol, cobalt-tungsten carbide (in powder or hard metal form), certain inhalable glass wool fibers, o-nitrotoluene, riddelliine, and styrene -- are added as substances that are reasonably anticipated to be human carcinogens." (http://www.niehs.nih.gov/news/newsroom/releases/2011/june10/)

You can read the full 2011 RoC here:
http://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/?objectid=03C9AF75-E1BF-FF40-DBA9EC0928DF8B15

http://www.naturalnews.com/037724_Chemistry_Council_lobbying_carcinogens.html

The $100 Billion Storm: 17 Things You Should Know About Hurricane Sandy

Meteorologists are warning that Hurricane Sandy could potentially be the worst storm to hit the east coast of the United States in 100 years.  Do you remember "the perfect storm" back in 1991?  That storm was so bad that Hollywood made a blockbuster movie starring George Clooney about it.  Well, this storm is going to be much worse.  When I first heard about Hurricane Sandy, I didn't make that much of it.  I figured that the east coast would get some wind and some rain and that they would whine about it a bit but that everything would be just fine.  But then I started looking into this storm a bit more.  It turns out that this storm is even larger than Hurricane Katrina was.  The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has categorized the destructive potential of this storm to be 5.8 on a scale that goes from 0 to 6.  So don't be fooled when you hear that this is only a "category 1 storm" or that the maximum winds will only be around 80 MPH.  It is the unprecedented size of this storm and the mind boggling storm surges that it is producing that truly make it dangerous.  It is being reported that Hurricane Sandy is more than 1,000 miles across from one end to the other.  Meteorologists have never seen anything quite like this before, and we are most definitely in unprecedented territory.  One meteorologist is already projecting that this megastorm could cause 100 billion dollars in damage, but the true amount of devastation will likely not be fully known for weeks.  If you live in the northeast part of the United States, you definitely want to buckle up because you are about to get absolutely hammered.

The following are 17 things that you should know about Hurricane Sandy...

#1 Hurricane Sandy has been dubbed "the Frankenstorm" and many believe that this could be the worst storm to hit the east coast in 100 years.

#2 This is an absolutely massive megastorm.  It is being reported that tropical storm-force winds can be felt 520 miles away from the center of the storm.

#3 It is being reported that the sheer size of this storm is absolutely unprecedented...

Since records of storm size began in 1988, no tropical storm or hurricane has been larger, reports meteorologist Jeff Masters of the Weather Underground.

#4 Hurricane Sandy has already forced the cancellation of over 5,000 flights.

#5 Mayor Bloomberg has announced a mandatory evacuation for all New York City residents that are living in "Zone A".

#6 It is being projected that the storm surge from Hurricane Sandy could be up to 15 feet above sea level in some areas of New York City.

#7 New York City could potentially experience wind speeds of 80 MPH or higher.

#8 Subway service in New York City is being shut down at 7 PM on Sunday evening.  There is a very real possibility that the New York City subway system could be severely flooded by this storm.  That could be quite crippling, because about 4.3 million people ride the subway in New York every single day.

#9 It has been announced that all public schools in New York City will be closed on Monday.

#10 Schools in Boston will be shut down on Monday as well.

#11 The trading floor of the New York Stock Exchange will be closed on Monday.

#12 50,000 people living along the coast in Delaware have been ordered to evacuate.

#13 Some parts of Kentucky, West Virginia and North Carolina could get up to 2 feet of snow.

#14 It is being estimated that 10 million people living along the east coast could lose power thanks to Hurricane Sandy.

#15 A state of emergency has already been declared in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia.

#16 Approximately 50 million people live in the areas that will be directly affected by this storm.

#17 Meteorologist Mike Smith of AccuWeather Enterprise Solutions is projecting that Hurricane Sandy could potentially cause a total of 100 billion dollars in damage to the U.S. economy.  That would make it a far more costly disaster than Hurricane Katrina.

Many meteorologists are calling this storm a "worst case scenario".  If you live along the east coast, please take the warnings that you are getting from public officials very seriously.  According to NPR, conditions are absolutely perfect for this slow moving giant storm, and it is going to take quite a few days for it to exit the region...

In this case, seas will be amped up by giant waves and full-moon-powered high tides. That will combine with drenching rains, triggering inland flooding as the hurricane merges with a winter storm system that will worsen it and hold it in place for days.

Louis Uccellini, environmental prediction chief for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told The Associated Press that given Sandy's due east-to-west track into New Jersey, that puts the worst of the storm surge just north in New York City, Long Island and northern New Jersey. "Yes, this is the worst case scenario," he said.

Please do not underestimate this storm.  This is unlike anything that any of us have ever seen before.

If you live in a part of the country that is being affected by this storm, please feel free to leave a comment and let us know what you are seeing in your area.  It is going to be a crazy couple of days.

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/the-100-billion-storm-17-things-you-should-know-about-hurricane-sandy

Space Weather Anomalies, Power Grid Collapse And Nuclear Safety

“More than half the gross national product of the earth, representing the accumulated wealth of our planet, depends in some way on the electromagnetic force.” -Michio Kaku

Summary

Severe space weather that involves transfer of massive amount of energy and matter from the Sun to the Earth is a one in hundred years event, that can cause collapse of power grid on a global scale. Recovery may take months and years. As the last event happened in 1921, there is high probability of a recurrance during the next few decades. Prolonged non-availability of electricity will cause meltdowns and explosions in nuclear reactors and spent fuel pools. Regulators in USA are considering to harden their nuclear assets against this. India and other nuclear nations have yet to spell out their action plan to prevent a radiological catastrophe.

Introduction

The largest power outage in history happened in India on 30th and 31st Jul 2012, affecting 320 million people. An estimated 32,000 MW(e) was taken offline and the restoration was rather quick. There are a hundred reasons for the grids to fail and a hundred plus one reasons to celeberate it. However, a prolonged outage is a serious affair with catastrophic consequences like meltdown and explosions of nuclear reactors . The possibility of global scale grid failures lasting for months and years due to space weather events has been under scrutiny by scientists and governments for over a decade.

Space Weather

The Sun's role as the donor of abandunt energy in the form of visible light and ultraviolet radiations is well known. Besides these, the Sun and other stars continuously bombard the Earth with other forms of energy and matter most of which are blocked or deflected by the Earth’s magnetosphere. Still, an estimated one million tons of particles arrive the Earth in a normal year. Known as cosmic radiation, this particle shower causes cloud formation and also generates geomagnetically induced current (GIC) of about one ampere on the Earth surface. This cosmic shower also causes ionization that accounts for about a third of the natural background radiation experienced on Earth's surface, ensuring one hit to one-third of all cells in our body every year. Occassionally there will be violent transfers of matter and energy known as 'space weather' and its main drivers are (a) solar flares, (b) solar proton events (SPE) and (c) coronal mass ejections (CME).

1. Solar Flares are magnetically driven explosions on the surface of the sun. These are powerful burst of electromagnetic radiation in the form of X-ray, extreme ultraviolet (UV) rays, gamma rays and radio burst that travel at the speed of light. These heat up the upper atmosphere and strip electrons from the atoms in the ionosphere.

2. Solar Proton Events (SPEs) are high-energy protons and ions, whch take around an hour to reach Earth, though an event of Jan 2005 had an arrival time of 15 minutes. SPEs produce auroras visible to the human eye, when they collide with Earth’s atmosphere. They also cause oxidization of atmospheric nitrogen. The nitrates from large SPEs during the past have been detected and measured in the ice cores drilled from the Antarctica and Greenland.

3. Coronal Mass Ejections (CME) are vast clouds of gas, charged plasma with imbedded magnetic field. CMEs may contain as much as 10 billion tons or or more of coronal material travelling at speeds as high as 3000 km/second. A CME strike can cause disturbance of Earth’s magnetic field called a geomagnetic storm and induce GIC of upto 100 amperes on the Earth surface.

While the above events normally happen in isolation a major eruption will involve all the three components. In September 1859, there was a big solar eruption, known as the Carrington event after Richard Carrington, a British astronomer who recorded it. It is estimated that this event transferred 10 billion tons of matter to the Earth in a few days. That is equivalent to about 200 grams per each square meter area of the planet. Telegraph lines were disrupted for days on in all continents. The only instrumental record of this event available today is from the the Geomagnetic Observatory at Alibag, Colaba, Mumbai. The next big event happened in 1921 and a smaller one with lower energy struck the Earth in March 1989, known as the Quebec event.

The Known Impacts of Space Weather

Severe space weather events have occurred at regular intervals in the past. Yet there is no mention of it in our history books or folklores because such events do not have any visible impacts on the human beings and other life forms. However, space weather is not neutral to our technological infra-structure. The main known impacts are listed below:

1. Grid failure due to geomagnetically induced electricity

A big CME causes a geomagnetic storm as it punctures the planet’s magnetosphere, leading to a surge in the earth’s current up-to 100 amperes. When this is communicated to the power grid (as a semi DC current), the transformers get burnt. The Quebec event of March 1989 destroyed several transformers in North America rendering more than five million people 'power-less' for nine hours in Ontario, Canada. In US, a transformer at the Salem nuclear plant in New Jersey was also burnt out and had to be replaced. The damage of two of National Grid’s transformers in the UK was considered the worst incident of its kind. Smaller, localized damages have been reported from several other places during the past three decades.

2. Damage to satellites

There are about 1000 human-made satellites above the earth, which are central to our communication , entertainment, business, military and science research. The satellites may lose their orientation or get destroyed and fall down. The outage in January 1994 of two Canadian telecommunications satellites was the first reported event.

3 Damage to Electronics

All the electronic gadgets we use will also suffer damage in a space weather event. There are suggestions to keep them in Faraday cages, but since they are part of almost all the machines we use, this is not practical.

4. Radiofrequency anomalies and the effects of Global Positiong System (GPS)

In Jan 2005, 26 flights involving polar routes had to be diverted to non-polar routes during several days due high frequency radio black- outs in USA alone. Disabling of the Federal Aviation Administration’s GPS-based Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) for 30 hours during October-November 2003 was another major event.

Scientific Studies and deliberations

1. US National Academy of Sciences, 2008

Space science places like NASA, European Space Agency and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have been tracking the Sun with the aid of more than two dozen satellites for over two decades. The ACE satellite located at L1 point, 1.5 million km above the Earth is the one that is the closest to the Sun. In 2008 the United States National Academy of Sciences (US NAS) published the deliberations of an expert committee consisting of scientists from NASA, NOAA, the military and the utilities (National Research Council, 2008) One of the conclusions is that a 1921 or 1859 type event can cause widespread, serious damage to the electricity grid throughout the Earth. (National Research Council, 2008)

Solar eruptions occur more frequently and most of them may not be earth-directed as this alert on 31st August 2012 shows: “a magnetic filament on the sun erupted in spectacular fashion, producing a long-duration solar flare, a coronal mass ejection (CME) and one of the most beautiful movies of an explosion ever recorded by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory.  The CME propelled by the blast might deliver a glancing blow to Earth's magnetic field in the days ahead.”  http://spaceweather.com, 2012). Advanced Composition Exoeiment (ACE) satellite stationed at L1 point, 1.5 million km from earth alone can tell us in advance if a particular burst is earth-directed. The lead time may be an hour so. Not enough time to take any preventive step at a naional or global level.

2. US Department of Energy (DOE)

US DOE and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) jointly sponsored a workshop in November, 2009. The attendees at the closed session included representatives from the Congressional Staff, Department of Defense (DOD), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), EMP Commission, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and representatives from the electric industry’s major sectors. The report of the meeting concedes that the North American power grids have significant reliability issues in regard events such as severe space weather. “The design of transformers also acts to further compound the impacts of GIC flows in the high voltage portion of the power grid...These transformers generally cannot be repaired in the field, and if damaged in this manner, need to be replaced with new units, which have manufacture lead times of 12–24 months or more in the world market.” (NERC-US DOE, 2010) The government in USA or for that matter any goverment has probably never been so nervous and helpless as the report underlines that “in the affected area, the supply of food, water, and fuel would degrade within days. The facile communication of information to the general population would be greatly complicated by the loss of cell phones, internet access, and television. The economy would virtually shut down as electronic transactions could no longer be processed. After several days, widespread social unrest and confusion would ensue.”

3. Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)

In October 2010, in a series of technical reports sponsored by DOE and DHS, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) estimated that “major geomagnetic storms, such as those that occurred in 1859 and 1921 occur approximately once every one hundred years. Storms of this type are global events that can last for days and will likely have an effect on electrical networks world wide. Should a storm of this magnitude strike today, it could interrupt power to as many as 130 million people in the United States alone, requiring several years to recover.”(ORNL, 2010) Many space weather experts believe that this one-in-hundred-years event can happen during the 24th solar cycle which began in 2009 and will end in 2021/22, with peak activities in 2012/13. The storm can happen any time during the cycle, but there is higher risk during the solar peak.

The Nuclear Risk

Even though almost all of our modern ventures need electricty. Loss of electricity will not cause any major accident in any of them. Hoowever, nuclear reactors and their spent fuel pools (SFP) require electicity for their safety related pumps. The reactor cores and SFPs need to be cooled even when the plants are offline. For nuclear campuses offsite electric power is the designed default power source and it is required to be supplied in a high-reliability, dual-circuit configuration to run the safety related coolant pumps. They do have diesel generators and batteries as backup just in case offsite power is not available. The reserve of diesel is generally for less than a week. When there is no offsite power and the generators are unavailable- a condition known as station blackout- the reactors and SFPs will experience meltdowns and explosions. All major nuclear events happened because of loss of coolant.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Grid failure

Seventy-one out of 104 nuclear reactors in US are within the areas of probable power system collapse listed in the ORNL study. Few days before the Fukushim nuclear disaster of March 2011, Thomas Popik of the Resilient Societies petitioned the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to provide nuclear campuses with permanent backup power for running the safety related pumps. (Popik Thomas, 2011) The petitioner assumes that as the supply chain breaks down the campuses will be deserted. Pumps using renewable sources of energy, about 10 to 20 KWe, that does not required regular input of fuel or human presence can prevent the disasters. Each reactor may require of electricity to run its safety related pumps and equipments. Popik substantiates that setting up of alternative power sources are economically and ecologically viable. Rarely does US NRC accept a petition for rule-making from private sources. However, this petition is under its consideration and a fierce debate on this issue is happening at an NRC blog. From a recent post from this blog: “if the NRC grossly ignores its duty, as it has been doing in this case for years, and does nothing to harden plants against long term grid disruption the US will be destroyed FOREVER, any people who survive will not be able to live on the land or drink the water!”(Levi Thomas, 2011)

The Indian situation

The situation in India is slightly better off as the number of power plants, total electricity generated and the volume of spent fuel in the pools is far less than that in North America or Europe. Almost all of India's aged spent fuel, except that of Tarapur, has been reprocessed and hence the volume of wastes in the pool is much smaller. We are also blessed with an abundant supply of solar and wind energy sources. Above all, there is a National Disaster Management Authority in Delhi and its affiiates at State Capitals. We still have problems as four of our reactor campuses are dangerously close to the cities, Mumbai, Chennai, Delhi and Thiruvananthapuram. The last one houses the nation's strategic command. Kudamkulam and also the proposed plant at Jaitapur will have an additional risk as their freshwater sources are desalination plants that also require electricity from the grid. The water crisis at Kudankulam has been reported earlier.(Padmanabhan V T et al, 2012) When this generic safety issue of space weather caused grid failure on nuclear campuses in India was raised, a Government of India Expert Group brushed it aside by a saying that “this situation is totally imaginary and technically/ scientifically not correct.” (Muthunagam AE et al, 2011) The science behind the space weather and its impacts has evolved in the same laboratories and institutuions that developed our modern technological infrastructure including nuclear power plants.

Solutions

Availability of fresh water in the campus and an energy source to pump water are the only requirements for safety of the campus in a shut down mode. Most of the nuclear campuses in India are dependent on offsite water. In the offline mode, the water requirement will be between 10 to 20% of the online mode. This can be harnessed with rain water harvesting. A combintion of wind and solar generators can take care o the enegy needs of pumping. This will not be a dead investment and will only increase the self-reliance of the campus. SFP of Tarapur 1 and 2 reactors are as over-crowded as those in USA. Steps should be taken to reprocess the aged fuel, so as to reduce the water requirement and risks of contamination in case of SFP fire.

Radiological contamination from nuclear disasters is a global problem. Governments of US, Canada and UK are acting on the issue. India and other nuclear nations appear to be in a denial mode. Besides hardening her nuclear assets against the grid failure, India must also bring this issue in the United Nations and other global forums.

Conclusion

The return period for a severe space weather event is 100 years and if a CME strikes the planet during this decade there is nothing that the humanity can do to prevent the conseqences listed above. There will be problems during the initial days of the disaster, but the societies will be able to overcome them. Thomas Levi wrote on the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) blog “in the event of a power outage lasting more than a month, possibly years, there will be massive causalities, this is unavoidable should this situation come to pass. But just like with any other natural disaster the people will eventually come back and they may be a little smarter than before.” We have survived several such disasters in the past and similarly we will overcome the impending one as well. However, life will be more painful and difficult in a radiocontaminated land. Surely, this is not a partisan issue concerning a certain class, political party or interest group. In a way, we are all in it. Timely action on the vulnerable sites can greatly reduce the impacst. As the saying goes disaster happens when hazrads meet vulnerability.

Based on a paper presented at a National Seminar in Kuvempu University on 10 Nov 2011.

We fondly remember the advisory support from Dr Rosalie Bertel, who left for her heavenly abode on 16 June, 2012.

Dr. V. Pugazhenthi is acclaimed for his rigorous and credible studies on health impact of radiation around Kalpakkam nuclear site. He is an activist belonging to the Doctors for Safer Environment

Dr. R. Ramesh a medical practitioner, who has written books on the geology of Kudankulam

VT Padmanabhan is a researcher in health effects of radiation. He has led epidemiological investigations among people exposed to high radiation in Kerala. He has also studied the occupational radiation hazards among workers of Indian Rare Earths, genetic effects of children exposed to MIC gases in Bhopal, health hazards to workers in a viscose rayon unit in Madhyapradesh and reduction of birth weight of babies near a beverage bottling plant in Kerala. He has visited several contaminated sites in Belarus and Japan and had extensive interactions with the survivors.His papers have been published in International Journal of Health Services, Journal of American Medical Association, International Perspectives in Public Health, the Lancet and Economic and Political Weekly. He is a member of the European Commission on Radiation Risk, an independent body of experts appointed by the Green MEPs in Europe. He can be reached at vtpadman@gmail.com

References

Levi Thomas, 2011 The NRC: We’re Ready to Respond, 
http://public-blog.nrc-gateway.gov/2011/04/22/the-nrc-were-ready-to-respond/

Muthunayagam AE et al , 2011, Safety of Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant and Impact of its Operation on the Surroundings -Report by Expert Group Constituted by Govt. of India, December 2011, www.barc.ernet.in/egreport.pdf

National Research Council of the National Academies of Sciences, 2008, Severe Space Weather Events—Understanding Societal and Economic Impacts, Committee on the Societal and Economic Impacts of Severe Space Weather Events.http://www.nap.edu/catalog/12507.html

NERC-US DOE (North American Electric Reliability Corporation and the U.S. Department of Energy) 2010 "High- Impact, Low-Frequency Event Risk to the North American Bulk Power System," www.nerc.com/files/HILF.pdf

ORNL, 2010 (Oak Ridge National Laboratory), “Electromagnetic Pulse: Effects on the U.S. Power Grid”www.ornl.gov/sci/ees/etsd/pes/pubs/ferc_Executive_Summary.pdf

Padmanabhan, V T, R Ramesh and V Pugazhendi, 2012, , Koodankulam's Reserve Water RequirementsEconomic and Political Weekly, Vol - XLVII No. 18, May 05, 2012, http://www.epw.in/commentary/koodankulams-reserve- water-requirements.html

Popik Thomas , 2011, Petition To Nuclear Regulatory Commission To Require Installation Of New Back-Up Safety Systems,www.resilientsocieties.org

Further Readings

Severe Space Weather--Social and Economic Impacts- NASA ScienceSpace Weather Anomalies, Power Grid Collapse And Nuclear Safety

Scientists Surprised To Find Significant Adverse Effects Of CO2 On Human Decision-Making Performance

Overturning decades of conventional wisdom, researchers at the Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have found that moderately high indoor concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) can significantly impair people's decision-making performance. The results were unexpected and may have particular implications for schools and other spaces with high occupant density. 

"In our field we have always had a dogma that CO2 itself, at the levels we find in buildings, is just not important and doesn't have any direct impacts on people," said Berkeley Lab scientist William Fisk, a co-author of the study, which was published in Environmental Health Perspectives online last month. "So these results, which were quite unambiguous, were surprising." The study was conducted with researchers from State University of New York (SUNY) Upstate Medical University. 

On nine scales of decision-making performance, test subjects showed significant reductions on six of the scales at CO2 levels of 1,000 parts per million (ppm) and large reductions on seven of the scales at 2,500 ppm. The most dramatic declines in performance, in which subjects were rated as "dysfunctional," were for taking initiative and thinking strategically. "Previous studies have looked at 10,000 ppm, 20,000 ppm; that's the level at which scientists thought effects started," said Berkeley Lab scientist Mark Mendell, also a co-author of the study. "That's why these findings are so startling." 

While the results need to be replicated in a larger study, they point to possible economic consequences of pursuing energy efficient buildings without regard to occupants. "As there's a drive for increasing energy efficiency, there's a push for making buildings tighter and less expensive to run," said Mendell. "There's some risk that, in that process, adverse effects on occupants will be ignored. One way to make sure occupants get the attention they deserve is to point out adverse economic impacts of poor indoor air quality. If people can't think or perform as well, that could obviously have adverse economic impacts." 

The primary source of indoor CO2 is humans. While typical outdoor concentrations are around 380 ppm, indoor concentrations can go up to several thousand ppm. Higher indoor CO2 concentrations relative to outdoors are due to low rates of ventilation, which are often driven by the need to reduce energy consumption. In the real world, CO2 concentrations in office buildings normally don't exceed 1,000 ppm, except in meeting rooms, when groups of people gather for extended periods of time. 

In classrooms, concentrations frequently exceed 1,000 ppm and occasionally exceed 3,000 ppm. CO2 at these levels has been assumed to indicate poor ventilation, with increased exposure to other indoor pollutants of potential concern, but the CO2 itself at these levels has not been a source of concern. Federal guidelines set a maximum occupational exposure limit at 5,000 ppm as a time-weighted average for an eight-hour workday. 

Fisk decided to test the conventional wisdom on indoor CO2 after coming across two small Hungarian studies reporting that exposures between 2,000 and 5,000 ppm may have adverse impacts on some human activities. 

Fisk, Mendell, and their colleagues, including Usha Satish at SUNY Upstate Medical University, assessed CO2 exposure at three concentrations: 600, 1,000 and 2,500 ppm. They recruited 24 participants, mostly college students, who were studied in groups of four in a small office-like chamber for 2.5 hours for each of the three conditions. Ultrapure CO2 was injected into the air supply and mixing was ensured, while all other factors, such as temperature, humidity, and ventilation rate, were kept constant. The sessions for each person took place on a single day, with one-hour breaks between sessions. 

Although the sample size was small, the results were unmistakable. "The stronger the effect you have, the fewer subjects you need to see it," Fisk said. "Our effect was so big, even with a small number of people, it was a very clear effect." 

Another novel aspect of this study was the test used to assess decision-making performance, the Strategic Management Simulation (SMS) test, developed by SUNY. In most studies of how indoor air quality affects people, test subjects are given simple tasks to perform, such as adding a column of numbers or proofreading text. "It's hard to know how those indicators translate in the real world," said Fisk. "The SMS measures a higher level of cognitive performance, so I wanted to get that into our field of research." 

The SMS has been used most commonly to assess effects on cognitive function, such as by drugs, pharmaceuticals or brain injury, and as a training tool for executives. The test gives scenarios - for example, you're the manager of an organization when a crisis hits, what do you do? - and scores participants in nine areas. "It looks at a number of dimensions, such as how proactive you are, how focused you are, or how you search for and use information," said Fisk. "The test has been validated through other means, and they've shown that for executives it is predictive of future income and job level." 

Data from elementary school classrooms has found CO2 concentrations frequently near or above the levels in the Berkeley Lab study. Although their study tested only decision making and not learning, Fisk and Mendell say it is possible that students could be disadvantaged in poorly ventilated classrooms, or in rooms in which a large number of people are gathered to take a test. "We cannot rule out impacts on learning," their report says. 

The next step for the Berkeley Lab researchers is to reproduce and expand upon their findings. "Our first goal is to replicate this study because it's so important and would have such large implications," said Fisk. "We need a larger sample and additional tests of human work performance. We also want to include an expert who can assess what's going on physiologically." 

Until then, they say it's too early to make any recommendations for office workers or building managers. "Assuming it's replicated, it has implications for the standards we set for minimum ventilation rates for buildings," Fisk said. "People who are employers who want to get the most of their workforce would want to pay attention to this."

DOE/Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. "Scientists Surprised To Find Significant Adverse Effects Of CO2 On Human Decision-Making Performance."Medical News Today. MediLexicon, Intl., 20 Oct. 2012. Web.
21 Oct. 2012.

Why Scientists Are in Alarm Mode Over the Keystone XL Pipeline

Why are scientists in alarm mode over the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, a 1,700-mile long conduit that would transport a chemical-laden synthetic oil from the tar sands of Alberta, Canada, to refineries in Texas? Scientists across specialized fields have joined forces to make public statements, penned a formal letter to President Obama, and have even committed acts of civil disobedience in front of the White House during the national Tar Sands Action [3].

What do they know that we don’t?

I sought out these questions, traveling to the furthest southern extent of Cape Cod to the township of Woods Hole; a place of world renown for its oceanic studies and a hub of scientific exploration since the late 1800s. I had come to meet with one of the signatories of the Obama letter [4], ecologist George M. Woodwell, at the Woods Hole Research Center.

While awaiting his arrival, I walked around the facility and its grounds. WHRC, also a campus, is ensconced in eight acres of oxygen-rich forest where burnt and downed tree trunks are left alone to decompose. The carpet of detritus underfoot was so dense and varied its components were indecipherable to the naked eye. The outdoor laboratory is a sliver of what they do on a global scale: WHRC is a preeminent collector of data on forests. They track and record the health of forests worldwide in tandem with cooperators in the Amazon, the Arctic, Africa, Russia, Alaska, Canada, New England, and the Mid-Atlantic.

Taiga Biome

Once the interview was underway, Woodwell, founder and director emeritus of WHRC, did not mince words about the Keystone XL project: “The tar sands is a complete scandal; it’s totally for profit—for Canadian profit, political profit, financial profit—and not for the public good because the oil poisons the world, and the methods of getting it poisons the world in more ways than anybody is admitting.”

Woodwell believes the role of government is to protect the public welfare, and that includes protection of the environment. For those who argue for less oversight, he presented an inventory of what a loosely regulated business world has produced in the past: slavery, the effluence of smelters that killed people and vegetation, silicosis in miners, and chemical and radiation poisoning of workers. For an example of a country in ecological collapse, he pointed to Haiti. “They don’t have a functioning environment, economy, or government. All must stand together. Take one away, or make one fail, and the others fail.”

He has been accused on more than one occasion of being political. Woodwell conducted the groundbreaking research on DDT that formed the basis for its eventual nationwide ban in 1972. He has a very short answer why such accusations exist: “Environmental science gets politicized because it has economic implications.”

Woodwell, who prefers the term “climate disruption” to climate change, is clear on what must be done to stabilize the already teetering-on-the-edge biosphere. The use of fossil fuels must be reduced and “we have to stop deforestation, all of it, all over the world because the carbon pool in the vegetation of the earth is connected to forests.”

The carbon storage capacity of forests is approximately three times as large as the pool of carbon in the atmosphere. If forests are changed, reduced, or eliminated, the pool, or captured carbon, goes into the atmosphere as carbon dioxide (CO2). According to Woodwell, the carbon release from deforestation accounts for “25 to 30 percent of the four to five billion tons of carbon accumulating a year in the atmosphere from the total of all human activities.”

Listening to Woodwell explain the role of the tundra and forests in carbon sequestration, it became evident where his years of scientific research and the Keystone XL pipeline intersect. The tar sands are largely mined in northeastern Alberta in an area classified as boreal forest.

The boreal forest, or taiga, is the largest forest in the world. It is a circumpolar biome—a community of related plant and animal species fostered by a similar climate—occurring at high-altitudes across Alaska, Canada, Northern Europe, and Russia. The boreal forest exists on 14.5 percent of the earth’s surface, but contains over 30 percent of the earth’s terrestrial carbon. The forest in its natural state is considered a sink: a repository for carbon. If disrupted, it becomes a source, releasing carbon back into the atmosphere.

Mining the Tar Sands

Techniques used to extract the tar sands are more akin to mining than drilling, both in the methods employed and amount of land destruction necessary for the removal of a tarry, viscous hydrocarbon called bitumen. Two techniques are used: in situ recovery and surface mining.

In situ recovery begins with drilling wells into bitumen deposits then injecting steam into the reservoir. The steam reduces viscosity and enables the bitumen to be pumped to the surface.

Surface mining, also referred to as strip mining, entails clearing large swaths of land. The forest is first cut down, followed by the removal of carbon-rich peat (the peat is put in storage for later usage in required remediation efforts). The bitumen and surrounding soils are then gouged out by heavy equipment. The usable hydrocarbon is separated on site using a caustic hot-water process, with the resultant wastewater sent to facilities for processing. The water is eventually stored in outdoor tailing ponds.

The tailing ponds, collectively covering more than 19 square miles, contain fine particulate matter and toxic chemicals (naphthenic acid and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons). These open ponds, also a part of required reclamation, allow fine particles to settle. The estimated time for settlement varies from several decades to 150 years.

The total amount of energy used in tar sands extraction and production results in greater amounts of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than from conventional sources of oil. The amount of increased emissions remains an issue of concern and calculation, though not all studies are equal.

The Department of Energy’s National Environmental Technology Lab estimated the GHG emissions of tar sands production to be “approximately 17 percent higher than gasoline from the 2005 average mix of crude oil consumed in the U.S.,” while a study conducted by TIAX, LLC, found emissions “only 2 percent higher when compared to gasoline from Venezuelan heavy crude.”

That’s a difference of 15 percent, though both reports used a “well-to-wheels” calculation. A well-to-wheels calculation factors in GHG emissions from extraction, processing, distribution, and combustion. But what about the additional emissions as a result of deforestation and the destabilization of associated soils—what scientists refer to as “land-use change”?

From Sink to Source

To some degree, this question is addressed in a paper by Yeh et al. (2010). In tar sands surface mining, by “removing the functional vegetation layer at the surface of a peatland, the disturbed ecosystem loses its ability to sequester CO2 from the atmosphere.” When peat is put into storage for later reclamation purposes, it decomposes, releasing CO2 and CH4 (commonly known as methane, one of six identified greenhouse gases). Over time, tailing ponds also produce CH4 emissions—a gas “25 times more potent than CO2.”

GHG emissions from land-use change factors in the loss of a sink (a natural system known to capture carbon), as well as the addition of sources (gases produced from stored peat and tailing ponds). I queried the State Department on whether these emissions had been considered in their estimates. The first spokesperson responded, “off the record, no.” The question was also submitted to the Clean Energy Branch of Alberta Environment, who quickly replied, “We have supported some scientific research in this respect; that work is currently in the peer review process so we cannot report on that work at this point in time.”

The area of boreal forest to be razed as part of tar sands extraction is small. So far, about 150 square miles of Canada’s two million square miles of boreal forest have been denuded for tar sands operations. If projected GHG emissions from land-use change were available, they would most likely be a fraction of the total. However, fractions add up and the exclusion of that data in final, official reports does say something about an approach to calculation that puts human activity at the top while neglecting to weigh long-term environmental outcomes.

Woodwell cautions it is time to consider environment and economy as mutually dependent: “We’re at a stage we can’t afford to lose any more forests in the world. The building up of carbon, year after the year, is the problem. We're pulling climate out from under all life including civilization, and the consequences of that are devastating."

http://www.alternet.org/environment/why-scientists-are-alarm-mode-over-keystone-xl-pipeline

'270 Minutes of Silence': Obama and Romney 'Climate Change Silence' Deafening, say Environmental Groups

Following three nationally televised debates—two presidential and one vice presidential—environmental groups and climate campaigners are voicing indignation that none of the major two parties candidates have yet mentioned the subject of global warming or climate change.

"Corporate polluters have bought the silence of our elected leaders, so it's time for us to take the lead."—Jamie Henn, 350.org

"Not one word," wrote Jamie Henn, from the climate action group 350.org, late Wednesday. "After 270 minutes of Presidential and Vice Presidential debates, no one has mentioned climate change or global warming."

He continued: "That's after the country broke 17,000 heat records this summer, drought smothered half of the nation's corn crop, and millions of acres of the American west went up in smoke."

Following the latest debate between Obama and Romney on Tuesday, Friends of the Earth spokeperson Erich Pica noted that for all the talk about energy policy, neither candidate broached the subject of how fossil fuels contributed to global warming. “Both candidates vied to restate their commitment to more dirty oil, gas and coal production while ignoring the contradiction between an ‘all of the above’ energy program and reducing emissions of climate disrupting gases.”

The young voter's climate action group Energy Action Coalition, under the banner "Break Climate Silence," has been campaigning for Obama and Romney to address the issue, and had this video produced with hopes of applying direct pressure to the campaigns:

"After two nationally televised debates," the group said in a statement, "President Obama and Mitt Romeny remain silent on the climate crisis. This week is a critical to push this issue so that it will be brought up in the final debate next Monday."

As a report in The Hill also noted, following Tuesday's debate, Chris Hayes of MSNBC, during the network’s post-debate analysis, compared the silence on climate change during the energy portion of the debate to "discussing smoking without discussing cancer."

And Elizabeth Kolbert, at The New Yorker, adds:

Obama deserves credit for at least mentioning the need to control energy demand—rather than just supply—something that Romney never even alluded to. The President should also be commended for stressing the need to develop alternative—which is to say carbon-free—energy sources, which he called key to “the jobs of the future.” But aside from the potential for job creation, the President could never quite bring himself to discuss why it might not be a good idea to burn every gallon—or cubic foot—of fossil fuels we could conceivably bring to the earth’s surface. In the midst of what will almost certainly be the warmest year on record, climate change has become to the Obama Administration the Great Unmentionable, or, as the blogger Joe Romm has put it, The-Threat-That-Must-Not-Be Named.

The problem with the sort of energy debate we saw on Tuesday is not just that it’s fatuous, though it certainly is that. The problem is that you can’t solve a problem if you don’t even acknowledge it exists. The true challenge facing the next President is not how to bring down gas prices, which may or may not come down as a result of global trends. It’s how to move beyond the tired arguments of the past and act as if the future matters.

350.org's Henn announced his group's plan for a post-election 20-city national tour, beginning on Novemebr 7th and called the 'Do The Math' Tour, which will feature 350 co-founder Bill McKibben, author Naomi Klein, Desmond Tutu and others. The intention will be to educate on the dangers of climate change, the dominance of the fossil fuel industry on national energy policy, and to continue their efforts to build a mass climate movement in the US and internationally.

"The warning signs can’t be ignored, but our politicians have gone silent," he said. "The reason couldn’t be more obvious: the fossil fuel industry has spent over $150 million dollars on this election already, with more on the way. Corporate polluters have bought the silence of our elected leaders, so it's time for us to take the lead."

Too late to stop global warming by cutting emissions

Governments and institutions should focus on developing adaption policies to address and mitigate against the negative impact of global warming, rather than putting the emphasis on carbon trading and capping greenhouse-gas emissions, argue Johannesburg-based Wits University geoscientist Dr Jasper Knight and Dr Stephan Harrison from the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom.

"At present, governments' attempts to limit greenhouse-gas emissions through carbon cap-and-trade schemes and to promote renewable and sustainable energy sources are probably too late to arrest the inevitable trend of global warming," the scientists write in a paper published online in the scientific journal, Nature Climate Change.

The paper, entitled The Impacts of climate change on terrestrial Earth surface systems, is published in the Perspective section of Nature Climate Change and argues that much less attention is paid by policymakers to monitor, model and manage the impacts of climate change on the dynamics of Earth surface systems, including glaciers, rivers, mountains and coasts.

"This is a critical omission, as Earth surface systems provide water and soil resources, sustain ecosystem services and strongly influence biogeochemical climate feedbacks in ways that are as yet uncertain," the scientists write.

Knight and Harrison want governments to focus more on adaption policies because future impacts of global warming on land-surface stability and the sediment fluxes associated with soil erosion, river down-cutting and coastal erosion are relevant to sustainability, biodiversity and food security.

Monitoring and modelling soil erosion loss, for example, are also means by which to examine problems of carbon and nutrient fluxes, lake eutrophication, pollutant and coliform dispersal, river siltation and other issues. An Earth-systems approach can actively inform on these cognate areas of environmental policy and planning.

According to the scientists, Earth surface systems' sensitivity to climate forcing is still poorly understood. Measuring this geomorphological sensitivity will identify those systems and environments that are most vulnerable to climatic disturbance, and will enable policymakers and managers to prioritise action in these areas.

"This is particularly the case in coastal environments, where rocky and sandy coastlines will yield very different responses to climate forcing, and where coastal-zone management plans are usually based on past rather than future climatic patterns," they argue.

The recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change special report on extreme events and disasters and the forthcoming fifth assessment report, due 2013, include more explicit statements of the role of Earth surface systems in responding to and influencing climate forcing.

"However, monitoring of the response of these systems to climate forcing requires decadal-scale data sets of instrumented basins and under different climatic regimes worldwide. This will require a con-siderable international science effort as well as commitment from national governments," Knight and Harrison urge.

Tom Engelhardt - How We Gained the Ability to Create Our Own End Times

Here was the oddest thing: within weeks of the United States dropping an atomic bomb on a second Japanese city on August 9, 1945, and so obliterating it, Americans were already immersed in new scenarios of nuclear destruction.  As the late Paul Boyer so vividly described in his classic book By the Bomb’s Early Light, it took no time at all -- at a moment when no other nation had such potentially Earth-destroying weaponry -- for an America triumphant to begin to imagine itself in ruins, and for its newspapers and magazines to start drawing concentric circles of death and destruction around American cities while consigning their future country to the stewardship of the roaches. 

As early as October 1945, the military editor of Reader’s Digest would declare the first atomic bomb “dated,” and write, “It is now in the power of the atom-smashers to blot out New York with a single bomb... Such a bomb can burn up in an instant every creature, can fuse the steel buildings and smash the concrete into flying shrapnel.” 

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/17-5

Daryl Hannah - Why I'm Standing Up to TransCanada's Keystone XL Pipeline in East Texas

On 4 October 2012, in rural east Texas, a 78-year-old great-grandmother, Eleanor Fairchild, was arrested for trespassing on her own property … and I was arrested standing beside her, as we held our ground in the path of earth-moving excavators constructing TransCanada's Keystone XL pipeline.

Seems there's showdown in Texas – but, in fact, it's a battle being waged all over the United States. It's being fought by ordinary citizens of all colors, economic strata and political persuasions – against the world's wealthiest multinational corporations, misinformation and deeply embedded fears. While I'm not a fan of war terminology, in these struggles, war analogies seem to highlight both the crisis at hand and perhaps the solution we seek.

Let's face it, we are in times of great crisis: economic crisis, overpopulation crisis,< climate crisis, extinction crisis, water crisis and a humanitarian crisis on so many levels. Energy, and how we create it, is a pivotal issue for many of these crises. It has become increasingly clear that we need to move in a different direction, yet as a species, we humans are uncomfortable with, and resist, change – though we know it is the very nature of life and not only essential, but inevitable.

Read More:

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/10/17-6