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newsclips -- ARB Newsclips for August 20, 2012.
Posted: 20 Aug 2012 16:20:03
ARB Newsclips for August 20, 2012. This is a service of the California Air Resources Board’s Office of Communications. You may need to sign in or register with individual websites to view some of the following news articles. AIR POLLUTION Merits of a Power Line From Quebec Are Debated. On paper, the proposal looks fairly straightforward: a 330-mile underground power line that would carry electricity generated by hydropower in Quebec, one of the cheapest power markets in North America, to New York City, one of the most expensive. The transmission line would help cut air pollution in the city, by reducing the need to burn natural gas locally, proponents say. And the metropolitan region would be less reliant on the Indian Point nuclear plant, which Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat, wants to close. Posted. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/nyregion/merits-of-power-line-from-quebec-to-new-york-city-are-debated.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all&pagewanted=print Why L.A. is ahead on gauging air quality. Air regulators in the Los Angeles basin appear to be better prepared to gather information quickly about refinery fires than regulators in the Bay Area. That, both agencies say, is partly because the air pollution in the Los Angeles area is consistently so much worse than in the Bay Area. The South Coast Air Quality Management District has an array of portable devices that can be deployed during a refinery fire or similar event, district officials said. Posted. http://www.sfgate.com/science/article/Why-L-A-is-ahead-on-gauging-air-quality-3800056.php#ixzz246OEkD99 Refinery smoke blew past air monitors. Smoke and soot from the fire at Chevron's refinery in Richmond spread across a densely populated area, sickening thousands. But while the material found its way into lungs and bloodstreams, it did not find an air quality system that could measure it in a meaningful way. The network of air monitors run by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District is designed to track everyday levels of pollutants like ozone and carbon monoxide, part of an effort to meet government health standards. Posted. http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Refinery-smoke-blew-past-air-monitors-3800068.php#ixzz246RkFUmS Study puts Ohio among most toxic states. A newspaper reports that a new survey puts Ohio near the top of the country's top 20 toxic states. The Dayton Daily News (http://bit.ly/NyTOfe ) reports that The Buckeye State was No. 2 on a list of 20 states that are responsible for a disproportionate share of toxic emissions from the U.S. electric sector. That's according to a report released earlier this month by the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group. Kentucky was No. 1 on the list. The report said the emissions include key power plant pollutants such as mercury, hydrochloric acid, sulfuric acid, ammonia and others. Posted. http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Study-puts-Ohio-among-most-toxic-states-3800590.php#ixzz246Xdg9IE Vitamin C Might Protect Lungs On High-Pollution Days: Study. An antioxidant-rich diet could do your lungs a favor when exposed to air pollution, according to a small new study. Researchers from Imperial College London found that asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients were more likely to be admitted to the hospital on days when there were high particulate matter levels outside, Environmental Health News reported. Particulate matter is a pollutant that causes oxidative stress in the body (raising the risk of health problems like heart attack). Posted. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/19/vitamin-c-pollution-lungs-antioxidants-particulate-matter_n_1797797.html SMOG: Unhealthful air grips the region. The 2012 smog season is shaping up to be worst in years for Inland residents. From July 18 through Thursday, Aug. 17, ozone levels were in the unhealthful range every day. Forecasters said the weeks ahead likely will bring more of the same. What’s making the situation more punishing is triple-digit heat with high humidity — the result of monsoon conditions that funnel moist air from the Gulf of Mexico. Posted. http://www.pe.com/local-news/topics/topics-environment-headlines/20120818-smog-unhealthful-air-grips-the-region.ece Officials issue air warning for Valley. Worried that back-to-school traffic and hot temperatures will create a brew of toxic pollution over the San Joaquin Valley, air quality officials have called an "Air Alert" for Monday and Tuesday. It's already too late to eliminate a $29 million air pollution penalty after 2013, as officials had hoped. But keeping ozone levels down the rest of this summer and over the next two years could end the penalty after 2014, said Anthony Presto, a spokesman for the Valley Air Pollution Control District. Posted. http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120818/A_NEWS/208180318 Valley air quality expected to suffer as school starts. Smog levels in the Valley typically spike when kids return to school. Next week's increase in traffic prompted the air pollution district to issue the season's first air alert. The Air Pollution Control District is asking people not to idle their cars while dropping off and picking up students. That may be tough for some parents waiting in 100-degree heat. The high heat only adds to the Valley's poor air quality, and with cars full of kids ready to line up for the start of school the Valley Air Pollution Control District has issued an air alert for Monday and Tuesday. Posted. http://abclocal.go.com/kfsn/story?section=news/local&id=8776681 Air alert on for Monday, Tuesday. The San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District is ushering in the back-to-school season with an air alert effective Monday and Tuesday. Air alerts aim to remind residents to curb pollution, said Jaime Holt, chief communications officer for the district. The goal is to avoid violations of the Environmental Protection Agency's one-hour ozone standard, which measures ozone levels in one-hour snapshots at monitors throughout the valley. If levels are above 125 parts per billion, that's a violation and more than three violations at the same monitor in one year means a big fine, Holt said. Posted. http://www.bakersfieldcalifornian.com/local/x290597846/Air-alert-on-for-Monday-Tuesday?utm_source=widget_63&utm_medium=latest_entries_widget&utm_campaign=synapse Cold, allergies -- or ozone? Valley catches air pollution. In the 1990s, it seemed concern for the ozone layer was everywhere, leading to plenty of studies on skin cancer and environmental worries. Now, it seems every week an ozone warning is issued by the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality. And with the warnings come sneezing, headaches, and coughs. So what is ozone -- and how is it affecting our health? Ozone is a type of oxygen molecule. While the type of oxygen molecule used to breathe is two oxygen atoms bonded together, ozone has three. Posted. http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/local/health/article_d90482b6-ea7f-11e1-a632-001a4bcf887a.html CLIMATE CHANGE CLIMATE CHANGE California suspends CO2 market rule on electricity imports. California's air regulator said on Thursday it would delay by 18 months a controversial part of its carbon market rules addressing imported electricity after coming under pressure from a Washington official who warned it threatened to disrupt western U.S. power supply. Mary Nichols, chair of the California Air Resources Board (ARB), wrote in a letter to Philip Moeller, a commissioner at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), that the state needs more time to define "resource shuffling" in the rules governing its carbon cap-and-trade program, which begins next year. Posted. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/20/us-california-carbon-idUSBRE87J06B20120820 California's carbon price rollout. Australia is certainly not going it alone on a carbon price – the latest cab off the rank will be California, which begins its cap-and-trade scheme in January 2013. Erwin Jackson from The Climate Institute talks to George Peridas from the US Natural Resources Defense Council on how the scheme will work, and how similar it is to Australia’s carbon laws …Posted. http://www.climatespectator.com.au/commentary/californias-carbon-price-rollout GREEN ENERGY In Calif. desert, the future is now for solar plant. Turn a power plant boiler inside out. Stick it on top of a 450-foot tower, and point 50,000 pairs of mirrors at it. In a matter of months, that setup -- under construction here in the Mojave Desert -- will begin sending electricity to consumers in Southern California when the first phase of the world's largest concentrating solar plant begins operating. By the end of next year, another 120,000-plus mirror pairs are expected to be online, tracking the sun's movements to power two additional towers as the 392-megawatt Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating Station enters full operation. Posted. http://www.eenews.net/Greenwire/print/2012/08/20/2 BY SUBSCRIPTON ONLY MISCELLANEOUS SCE&G, environmental group settle lawsuit. An environmental group says it has settled a lawsuit accusing South Carolina Electric & Gas of illegally discharging arsenic and other contaminants into a river near Columbia. Attorneys for the Catawba Riverkeeper Foundation said Monday that a settlement includes an agreement to remove all of the coal ash now being stored at the Wateree Station near Eastover. Posted. http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/SCE-G-environmental-group-settle-lawsuit-3800899.php#ixzz246OtLOUN New program allows transfer of pollution credits. A new program being tested in Ohio and two other states would allow farmers who cut polluted storm water runoff to sell the reductions to power companies as credits to help them meet government requirements. The Columbus Dispatch (http://bit.ly/NAziqh) reports the Electric Power Research Institute came up with the idea and helped persuade state and federal officials to support it. The "water quality trading" test program was recently announced by environmental regulators in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky. Posted. http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/New-program-allows-transfer-of-pollution-credits-3800556.php#ixzz246PK5q60 OPINIONS Programs to Reduce Carbon Emissions. “Carbon Credits Gone Awry Raise Output of Harmful Gas” (“Chilling Effect” series, front page, Aug. 9), about the effect of the United Nations’ carbon credit program in driving increased production of a coolant with a harmful waste gas byproduct, illustrates the key drawbacks of carbon credit programs, cap and trade, and related schemes. These programs often lead to perverse incentives that produce no net reduction in greenhouse gas emissions or, worse, can even increase emissions. Cap-and-trade programs, like the European Union’s, allow offsets that are too easily manipulated. Posted. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/18/opinion/programs-to-reduce-carbon-emissions.html?_r=1 Dan Morain: Will jobs be lost with cap and trade? Extraordinarily smart people at the California Air Resources Board have taken to using the term "leakage" as they go about devising the experimental cap and trade system for reducing greenhouse gases. Homer Perez, head boiler mechanic at Pacific Coast Producers' tomato cannery off East Main Street in Woodland, might use a word that is more familiar to the rest of us: "layoff." The cannery has been operating under one owner or another since the 1920s.. Posted. http://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/19/4736585/dan-morain-will-jobs-be-lost-with.html http://www.modbee.com/2012/08/19/2336710/dan-morain-will-jobs-be-lost-with.html#storylink=misearch California's cap-and-trade must stand firm for our future. This July was the hottest on record for the United States. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the average July temperature clocked in at 77.6 degrees, breaking the record set in the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s. By now, everyone can see the looming consequences of global warming. This year’s drought has devastated the nation’s crops. The corn harvest is expected to drop by 13 percent from last year, and the soybean harvest is expected to drop by 12 percent. Posted. http://www.sfexaminer.com/opinion/editorials/2012/08/californias-cap-and-trade-must-stand-firm-our-future Editorial: Oil giant Tesoro OK with a certain kind of California 'green'. The folks at Tesoro Corp. decided to stick around a little longer, after all. The Texas-based oil refiner doubled down on its California investment last week by buying a BP refinery in Carson near Los Angeles and 800 gas stations for $2.5 billion. The company bought the BP property for the most basic of business reasons: It got a good deal. Not two years ago, Tesoro was one of the Texas companies that poured $10.4 million into Proposition 23…Posted. http://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/20/4740011/editorial-oil-giant-tesoro-ok.html Calif. Gov. Brown's eco-propaganda. In a cynical and desperate scheme to wring the last dime out of the myopic, elite green voters of California, Gov. Brown is spending California taxpayer dollars to convince you that global warming should be a firm basis for his fanciful green-leveraged spending on high-speed rail and taxing under California’s go-it-alone 2013 carbon cap-and trade climate regulations. Gov. Brown’s new propaganda campaign includes his Office of Planning and Research website that attempts to demonize global warming skeptics, scientists and energy companies on the unsettled side of the climate change issue. Posted. http://www.examiner.com/article/calif-gov-brown-s-eco-propaganda McEwen: Diesel truckers should pay for bad air. It's a shared Fresno experience. You're returning from Los Angeles, Pismo Beach, Lake Tahoe or even our local Sierra. Hanging above the great Valley floor is a woven blanket of ozone and particulates, and you think, "I breathe that filthy stuff." Yes, we do. The San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District has been with us 26 years. Businesses have spent $40 billion meeting regulations and buying emissions credits since its formation. More of us use electric lawn mowers and ride bikes. More of us drive hybrids or new, clean-burning gas vehicles. Posted. http://www.fresnobee.com/2012/08/18/2957324/mcewen-diesel-truckers-should.html Theory Meets Reality on California’s Carbon Cap-and-Trade Program. Theory met reality on Tuesday at a Senate informational hearing on California’s carbon cap-and-trade program that is set to start with an auction in November 2012. Craig Anderson from Solar Turbines, an industrial gas turbine manufacturer with 4,000 employees in San Diego, testified that the soon-to-be-fully-implemented cap-and-trade program is the most significant threat to his company’s growth. “I can say without hesitation that AB 32 is viewed by our company leaders as not only the most significant environmental regulation we have faced in California, but also the greatest threat to the growth of our business in California,” said Anderson. Posted. http://www.foxandhoundsdaily.com/2012/08/theory-meets-reality-on-californias-carbon-cap-and-trade-program/ BLOGS Can natural gas really help tackle global warming? A primer. Over the winter, the United States reached a striking milestone. Carbon-dioxide emissions from the energy sector sank to their lowest levels in 20 years. At a glance, the country seems to be making major progress in tackling climate change. And many analysts give credit to the recent flood of cheap natural gas, which is shoving aside coal as America’s top source of electricity. Yet some environmentalists have argued that the accolades for natural gas are too premature. True, the shale gas boom has led to lower carbon pollution from the country’s power plants. Posted. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/08/20/can-natural-gas-really-help-tackle-global-warming-heres-everything-you-need-to-know/ Sustainable Innovation: Reducing Fashion’s Carbon Footprint. The colorful world of fashion has its dark sides, not least of which is its potential impact on the environment. First, there are the negative effects cause in the making, dying and distributing of most clothes, coverings and other fabrics. Then, there is what happens to all these textiles after consumers are done with them. Cheap clothing has become a disposable product in our society and most people in Europe recycle or donate less than half the clothing they discard — and they discard a lot — with the rest going into landfills. Posted. http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/20/sustainable-innovation-reducing-fashions-carbon-footprint/ Infiniti sets 2014 due date for all-electric LE with wireless charging. Infiniti has re-confirmed it will sell the production version of the LE, and it has now given us a year: 2014. This makes it likely that Nissan's upscale arm will be the first OEM to sell a production inductive charging vehicle. USA Today reports that Infiniti officials made the announcement in California alongside the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance this past weekend. Posted. http://green.autoblog.com/2012/08/20/infiniti-sets-2014-due-date-for-all-electric-le-with-wireless-ch/