Leading voices in environmental justice, science, and other academic areas have joined together in finding common ground on concerns of the health impacts of climate change. In a letter to Congressional and Administration leaders, signers urge Congress to address issues of EPA [...]]]> The following is being issued by the Environmental Justice and Science Initiative today :

Leading voices in environmental justice, science, and other academic areas have joined together in finding common ground on concerns of the health impacts of climate change. In a letter to Congressional and Administration leaders, signers urge Congress to address issues of EPA regulation and co-pollutants in any climate or energy legislation.

On the eve of a disapproval resolution vote in the Senate that could strip the EPA of its authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions for health reasons (an authority recognized by the Supreme court in 2007), the letter points out that greenhouse gases are driving a global threat that could have potentially devastating health consequences for the population of our nation and the world.

“The EPA based this ruling on findings that climate change has direct and indirect consequences for human health,” said Paul Epstein, Associate Director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School. “The science is clear: global climate change is hazardous to our health and well-being.”

At the same time, the letter urges action on airborne particles and gases, typically called “co-pollutants” that are frequently released with greenhouse gases. Greenhouse gases and these other air pollutants are often emitted by the same sources; attempting to reduce emissions simultaneously is logical.

“The fight against global warming presents us with at least one significant opportunity to improve the current state of public health in our country, if we use climate change policy to help reduce emissions of other air pollutants, such as particulate matter and its precursors, in addition to greenhouse gases,” said Peggy Shepard, executive director, WE ACT For Environmental Justice.

Tens of thousands of Americans are affected each year by co-pollutants, as the letter describes. Exposure to particulate matter is linked with all causes of premature mortality, cardiovascular and cardiopulmonary mortality, and respiratory illnesses, hospitalizations, reduced lung function and school absences. Particle pollution, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide emitted by U.S. power plants alone, which are typically coal-fired, kill as many as 24,000 people each year, including 2,800 from lung cancer. The emissions are also responsible for 38,200 non-fatal heart attacks and tens of thousands of emergency room visits, hospitalizations and lost workdays.

To save lives, improve health and welfare, and provide a cleaner, safer environment, signatories urge Congressional and Administration officials to protect EPA’s authority to regulate greenhouse gases, and address the emission of co-pollutants in any climate or energy legislation.

Source: PRNewswire and the Environmental Justice and Science Initiative

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The intersection between corn and climate change can be a tough place.

The White House on Monday signed off on final EPA rules to implement a huge expansion of the national biofuels mandate required under a 2007 energy law.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) handed a victory to ethanol producers Wednesday by issuing final regulations [...]]]>

Photo: www.reallynatural.com

The intersection between corn and climate change can be a tough place.

The White House on Monday signed off on final EPA rules to implement a huge expansion of the national biofuels mandate required under a 2007 energy law.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) handed a victory to ethanol producers Wednesday by issuing final regulations that conclude corn-based fuels will meet greenhouse gas standards imposed under a 2007 energy law.

The release of the final regulations follows a fierce campaign by ethanol companies that alleged 2009 draft rules unfairly found that large volumes of ethanol production would not meet targets in the statute for reducing greenhouse gases. 

The regulations are a great relief to farm state lawmakers from both parties who feared EPA’s interpretation of the law’s first-time greenhouse gas standards for ethanol and biodiesel.

Lawmakers such as Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and John Thune (R-S.D.) – backed by ethanol producers – had been battling EPA’s consideration of something called “international indirect land use changes” when measuring ethanol’s carbon footprint.

The phrase refers to emissions from, say, forest clearing to create cropland, in other countries to compensate for increasing use of U.S. corn and soybeans for making fuels. It’s important because the 2007 law – which requires use of 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels in the U.S. by 2022 – demands that ethanol and other biofuels have lower “lifecycle” emissions than gasoline and diesel.

The ethanol industry has campaigned vigorously in recent years against such measurements – they argue the science behind connecting the U.S. industry to deforestation in places like Brazil and Indonesia is immature and shoddy.

But environmentalists say failure to account for these emissions could allow support for renewable fuels that ironically worsen climate change.

EPA, in a draft of the rules last year, found that current-generation ethanol might not provide the 20 percent emissions improvement over gasoline that the 2007 law requires, and could even lead to more emissions in some cases. (Next-wave fuels like cellulosic ethanol would have to fare much better, providing a 50-60 percent reduction compared to gasoline.)

But the EPA, under heavy lobbying pressure, provided a friendlier analysis in the final regulation.

Most current ethanol production is exempted from the emissions requirements anyway. But the industry has positioned itself as part of the solution to both climate change and oil import reliance. Lobbyists feared a bad report card on emissions would be a black eye for ethanol and even hinder development of the next generation of biofuels.  Do you believe the EPA “sold out” or came to a reasonable compromise position?

For more information on the EPA ruling, please visit http://www.epa.gov/otaq/renewablefuels/420f09024.htm

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Shi Lishan, deputy director of new energy at the National Energy Administration, says the country’s wind power capacity [...]]]> A Chinese government official said the country will become the world’s third-largest producer of electricity from wind by the end of the year as it taps more renewable sources of energy and reduces the use of polluting coal.

Shi Lishan, deputy director of new energy at the National Energy Administration, says the country’s wind power capacity will reach 20,000 megawatts this year. In 2004, the capacity was 764 megawatts, according to RedOrbit.

The world’s largest polluting nation burns coal to produce about 80 percent of its power and wants at least 15 percent of its energy to come from renewable sources by 2020.

China is the world’s largest emitter of the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.

Gordon Kwan, head of energy research at Mirae Asset Securities, says,

“In the longer term, if China has the commitment, then wind power can be quite viable. The outlook for the industry would be very, very bright because the government appears to be behind it.”

The United States had 25.2 gigawatts in installed capacity of wind power in 2008, or 20.8 percent of the world’s total, compared with China‘s capacity of 12.2 gigawatts, figures from the Global Wind Energy Council showed.

At the end of last year, Spain had 16.8 gigawatts of installed wind power, the council said.

According to the World Wind Energy Report 2008, Global wind power capacity reached 121,188 megawatts last year.

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 The work, coordinated by the UN’s Environmental Management Group (EMG), has covered emissions arising [...]]]> Copenhagen, December 2009 United Nations Environment Program – After one of the most wide-ranging and painstaking exercises ever undertaken across the United Nations system, the organization today announced its greenhouse gas footprint as part of a first step to manage these emissions downwards.

 The work, coordinated by the UN’s Environmental Management Group (EMG), has covered emissions arising from the various UN agencies and its headquarters as well as field operations and peacekeeping missions in Africa and beyond.

 The report, compiled in response to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s determination to make the UN system a climate-friendly body, indicates that the biggest international body is emitting the equivalent of 1.7 million tonnes of carbon dioxide annually, of which approximately 1 million tonnes comes from peacekeeping operations.

 The total figure represents an emissions profile equal to 3.3 per cent of that produced by New York City-the UN’s host metropolis. Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme and Chair of the EMG, said:

“It is incumbent on every country and every organization including the UN to first measure, and then to measure down, its environmental impact”.

 ”The UN, under the leadership of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, is determined to be part of the solution. This first ever inventory is just a stepping stone towards supporting the kind of goals that scientists deem necessary to combat climate change while realizing a low carbon UN as part of a transition to a 21st century resource efficient international body,” he added.

The report, launched during the UN climate convention meeting in Copenhagen, is entitled “Moving Towards a Climate Neutral UN: The UN system’s footprint and efforts to reduce it”.

 It includes greenhouse gas inventory data from UN headquarters and major centres, down to its peacekeeping and field office operations. It covers the full range of the institutions that make up the UN system, from the Secretariat and its regional economic commissions, to the specialized agencies, funds and programmes.

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