Courtesy of Yahoo.com

Commuters Inhale Heavy Dose of Pollution

By LiveScience Staff

posted: 30 October 2007 04:46 pm ET

Driving is more hazardous than anyone knew: A heavy commuter inhales more pollution while driving than in the entire rest of the day, a new study finds.

The research was done in Los Angeles, where the average driver spends 1.5 hours behind the wheel. That time in traffic accounts for 33 to 45 percent of total exposure to diesel and ultrafine particles (UFP), the study showed.

On freeways, diesel-fueled trucks are the source of the highest concentrations of harmful pollutants.

"If you have otherwise healthy habits and don't smoke, driving to work is probably the most unhealthy part of your day," said Scott Fruin, assistant professor of environmental health at the Keck School of Medicine of University of Southern California. "Urban dwellers with long commutes are probably getting most of their UFP exposure while driving."

Ultrafine particles are of particular concern because, unlike larger particles, they can penetrate cell walls and disperse throughout the body, Fruin said. Particulate matter has been linked to cardiovascular disease, but the ultrafine fraction on roadways appears to be more toxic than larger sizes.

Previous research found children on school buses breathe more pollution. And a study in London found people in taxis, buses, and cars all inhale substantially more pollution than cyclists and pedestrians.

In the new study, researchers measured exposure by outfitting an electric vehicle with air pollution instruments. A video recorded surrounding traffic and driving conditions on freeways and arterial roads throughout the Los Angeles region. Measurements were collected during a three-month period from February to April 2003, and four typical days were selected for a second-by-second video and statistical analysis.

"This study was the first to look at the effect of driving and traffic conditions at this level of detail and to demonstrate the specific factors leading to the highest pollutant exposures for drivers," Fruin says. "The extent that a specific type of vehicle—diesel trucks—dominated the highest concentration conditions on freeways was unexpected."

Driving with the windows closed and using recirculating air settings can modestly reduce the particle pollution exposures but does not reduce most gaseous pollutants, the researchers concluded.

"Shortening your commute and spending less time in the car will significantly reduce your total body burden of harmful pollutants," Fruin said.

The study was supported by the California Air Resources Board.

Sep 16, 2007 7:39 pm US/Mountain

Union Pacific Wants Service From Greeley To Denver

By Bill Jackson, Greeley Tribune

(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. )

The Des Moines Register

Richardson: 'Fixation' on highways has to stop

Government must plan for more efficient transportation,

says the presidential candidate.

By WILLIAM PETROSKI
REGISTER STAFF WRITER 

September 5, 2007

Creston, Ia. - The United States' transportation system is "fixated on highways" and should include more emphasis on energy-efficient modes of travel with planning to ensure preservation of open spaces, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Tuesday.

Richardson told a crowd of about 80 people at Creston's historic railroad depot that he's been struck by the massive traffic jams and congestion he's encountered while visiting as many as three states per day while seeking the Democratic presidential nomination.

The problem, he said, has been caused by poor planning and by policymakers' inability to look forward toward providing alternatives to driving automobiles.

"What I am seeing right now is all across the country ... individuals in cities are asking for a more active federal role in not just funding bills to create new highways, but also light rail transportation, commuter rail and open spaces," said Richardson, whose campaign talk was interrupted several times by the rumble of freight trains and a Chicago-bound Amtrak passenger train that rolled past the depot.

Federal transportation policy should include cooperation with state and local governments to find ways to repair the nation's infrastructure to avoid situations such as the collapse of the Interstate Highway 35W bridge in Minneapolis, he added. These improvements should include upgrading the nation's electric grid, he added.

Richardson, a former congressman and energy secretary, also visited Osceola Tuesday, ending a two-day Iowa trip. He generally got good marks from members of the Creston audience.

Keith Daniels, a retired farmer who lives in Creston, said Richardson can count on his backing. "He's a good man. I think he has a lot of experience, and he knows how to handle things," Daniels said.

State Rep. Clel Baudler, a Greenfield Republican, said he was heavily leaning toward supporting Republican Fred Thompson for president, but he's interested in learning more about the New Mexico governor's stance on issues.

"I am open to supporting the best person," Baudler said.

Baudler previously met Richardson at a National Rifle Association event in New Mexico, and he said he subsequently went elk hunting there and people spoke highly of him. On Tuesday, Baudler said he liked Richardson's pledge to uphold the U.S. Constitution, and a plan to help people pay off student loans through national community service or military service. But he said he was disappointed with Richardson's stance on some social issues.

Reporter William Petroski can be reached at (515) 284-8547 or bpetroski@dmreg.com

Boston Globe

August 31, 2007

I-93 widening in N.H. set back

By James Vaznis, Globe Staff

The widening of Interstate 93 in southern New Hampshire will be delayed again, after a federal district court judge ordered state and federal highway officials yesterday to further study the environmental consequences of the project.

US District Judge Paul Barbadoro said the highway departments used out-dated population projections in their federal environmental impact report to evaluate the effect of a wider highway on air and secondary roads. The agencies failed to include the estimated 35,000 people who are expected to move to New Hampshire because of the wider highway, Barbadoro said.

The $750 million project, on and off the drawing board for nearly two decades, would double the number of lanes to four on each side of a 20-mile stretch between Salem and Manchester, a popular corridor for New Hampshire residents who work in Massachusetts and Bay State residents who vacation in the White Mountains.

More than 110,000 vehicles travel the highway each day, more than twice the volume the highway was designed to carry when it was built in the early 1960s.

New Hampshire highway officials had hoped to begin construction next summer, but now do not know how long the additional study could delay the project.

"We're still trying to digest what it all means," said Bill Boynton, New Hampshire Transportation Department spokesman. "On one hand, we are encouraged that some elements in the case have been dismissed, but on the other hand, we need to go back and do some work."

The Conservation Law Foundation, which filed the lawsuit in February 2006, applauded the decision, although it will continue pushing for a commuter rail as part of the project.

Barbadoro agreed with highway officials that building a commuter rail line from Manchester to Massachusetts would not reduce traffic flow on I-93 enough to scale back the project to three lanes. Adding commuter rail would have added a whole other round of regulatory approvals with Massachusetts.

The ruling pointed out that the most heavily traveled section of the road, at the New Hampshire-Massachusetts state line, will experience severe congestion by 2020, even with the four lanes.

"Our hope is in the end this additional review will show that widening to four lanes is not a wise investment of public dollars and we need a more balanced approach to address traffic along this corridor that includes rail," said Tom Irwin, a staff attorney in the Conservation Law Foundation's New Hampshire office.

The delay comes as New Hampshire grapples with a serious shortfall of transportation project dollars. The state Transportation Department recently announced that its 10-year list of priority projects will take 35 years to complete, and putting off a ground-breaking for the I-93 widening project will only add to the costs. In the last five years, the project's price tag has nearly doubled.

Highway officials say there is an urgent need to address the heavy traffic, which causes miles of back-ups and frequent fender-benders for commuters and weekend travelers.

Also, 18 of the 47 bridges in that area are structurally deficient. The project received the federal go-ahead in 2005.

But many environmentalists and residents worry that the wider highway might further expedite growth in southern New Hampshire, where acres of farmlands and woodlands have been transformed into subdivisions.

The anticipated residential growth is expected to stretch much farther north than Manchester, with even the state's capital, Concord, feeling the effects.

© Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

Global Meltdown

By Andrew Revkin, July & August 2007

It’s becoming a legacy issue for older Americans: what type of planet are we leaving our children? One of the nation’s top reporters on the environment reveals the latest science behind climate change.

The climate-change debunkers include Richard S. Lindzen, 67, a meteorologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who claims that human-caused warming is inconsequential, and Michael Crichton, 64, the novelist and moviemaker. Crichton stirred the climate debate with a 2004 novel, State of Fear, in which the bad guys were radical environmentalists trying to scare the world about global warming in order to line their pockets. Opposed are three climate scientists: one from NASA, one from a leading university, and one from a private group called the Union of Concerned Scientists. Most of the night focuses on their differences, mainly concerning the value of quick, aggressive cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.

Richard C.J. Somerville, 66, a veteran University of California, San Diego, climatologist, attacks the “not a crisis” position. “[A crisis] does not mean catastrophe or alarmism,” he says. “It means a crucial or decisive moment, a turning point, a state of affairs in which a decisive change for better or worse is imminent. Our task tonight is to persuade you that global warming is indeed a crisis in exactly that sense. The science warns us that continuing to fuel the world using present technology will bring dangerous and possibly surprising climate changes by the end of this century, if not sooner.”

But Crichton insists that pressing real-time problems trump an iffy, long-term one. “Every day 30,000 people on this planet die of the diseases of poverty,” he tells the crowd. “A third of the planet doesn’t have electricity. We have a billion people with no clean water. We have half a billion people going to bed hungry every night. Do we care about this? It seems that we don’t. It seems that we would rather look a hundred years into the future than pay attention to what’s going on now.”

What’s largely lost in the sparring—Crichton’s team prevails in an audience vote—is that the debate has not been about whether humans are contributing to rising temperatures. Crichton and Lindzen, both of whom consider former vice president Al Gore and his allies alarmists, readily agree that human-generated greenhouse gases warm the earth. Indeed, the list of people accepting the need to cut these gases includes former foes of environmentalists. One convert is evangelist Pat Robertson, who said on his 700 Club TV program last year that “it is getting hotter and the ice caps are melting and there is a buildup of carbon dioxide in the air.… We really need to do something on fossil fuels.” Another conservative taking warming seriously is former speaker of the House Newt Gingrich. “The evidence is sufficient,” he said in April, “that we should move toward the most effective possible steps to reduce carbon loading of the atmosphere.”

What’s driving the change in attitudes is a steadily growing body of scientific evidence on human activities and warming. A report released earlier this year by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change—made up of hundreds of the world’s leading climate experts—said with 90 percent certainty that most of the warming since 1950 has been driven by the buildup of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The report concluded with “high confidence” that human-caused climate change was already affecting regional conditions from the poles to the Tropics, and that hundreds of millions of people could be harmed by coastal flooding, dwindling water supplies, and shifting weather patterns within a few decades. The changes could also drive many species toward extinction, particularly those with rapidly shrinking habitats, such as polar bears. Warming in this century, by many estimates, could be between three and eight times the warming in the 20th century, when the planet’s average temperature rose just over one degree Fahrenheit in all. The United States was among 113 countries that endorsed the report.

The new report also predicts a mix of consequences, not all bad. More rainfall and longer growing seasons will likely benefit higher latitudes for decades, while less rainfall and harsher droughts are likely in some of the world’s poorest places—most notably, Africa. An open-water Arctic Ocean in summers, while posing a threat to polar bears, could create new intercontinental shipping lanes thousands of miles shorter than existing ones.

What the debate comes down to is not whether changes are coming but when they’ll occur—and how severe they’ll be. There is serious scientific disagreement about such vital questions as how fast and far temperatures, seas, and storm strength could rise. Warmer waters, for example, could lead to more Katrina-strength hurricanes. Yet new studies find that hurricanes might be torn apart by wind conditions associated with, yes, rising temperatures. This uncertainty is not humanity’s friend, experts say, especially as the global population crests in coming decades, putting ever more people at risk of flooding, famine, and other climate-driven threats.

“We’re altering the environment far faster than we can possibly predict the consequences,” says Stephen H. Schneider, 62, a Stanford University climatologist who has been working on the puzzle of humans and climate for more than half his life.

Schneider has long believed that responding to the greenhouse challenge is as much about hedging against uncertain risks as it is about dealing with what is clearly known. And the risks, as he sees it, are clear: there is a real chance things could be much worse than the midrange projections of a few degrees of warming in this century—and any thought that more science will magically clarify what lies ahead is probably wishful thinking.

When he lectures about global warming these days, Schneider often asks listeners about a more familiar risk. “How many of you have had a serious fire in your home?” he begins. In a crowd of 300 or so, usually three or four hands rise.

His next question: “How many of you buy fire insurance?”

Hundreds of hands go up.

For Schneider that pattern shows how well people deal with uncertain but potentially calamitous risks in their daily lives. The trick lies in transferring that same behavior to dealing with a risk facing our common home—the planet itself.

PASADENA, CALIFORNIA

I’m standing in a cramped lab at the California Institute of Technology, squinting at a blinding light. It’s visible through a small glass port in the side of a metal furnace where scientists are cooking up a new kind of device for turning sunlight into electricity. Inside, atoms of metals are being deposited onto minute rods in ways that could someday boost the efficiency of solar panels.

Solar power is widely seen as the sole alternative energy source that is abundant enough—and someday could be cheap enough—to eventually supplant fossil fuels. Windmills, while effective in certain conditions, face problems at large scale. In Texas, for example, the hottest days—which prompt the biggest surge in power use—tend to be the least windy. Nuclear power, while producing few emissions, has its own problem of scale. Princeton experts recently estimated that the world would need nearly 900 new nuclear power plants in the next 45 years just to reduce the expected carbon dioxide release by 10 percent in that time.

And so research sites like this one in Pasadena are the critical, yet largely overlooked, battlefronts in the global warming war. In the mist-draped hills of New Haven, West Virginia, engineers and scientists have drilled more than 9,000 feet beneath one of the country’s giant coal-fired power plants to see whether layers of rock can provide a repository for vast amounts of CO₂ released as the coal burns. In the “biology building” at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory outside Denver, special strains of algae slosh like pea soup in racks of beakers under bright lights. In certain conditions these algae can generate bubbles of hydrogen, a tantalizing substitute for fossil fuels if it can be produced cheaply and cleanly. So far, the gas has been produced in teacup amounts.

The gulf between such embryonic efforts and what’s needed to avoid a buildup of greenhouse gases remains wide, despite statements by politicians of both parties about solving U.S. energy and climate problems. Funding for such research peaked in the United States and abroad during the oil shocks of the 1970s, then dwindled. It has never grown since—only Japan has sustained investment in such research. Scientists at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory were heartened when $34 million of new money was included in their latest science budget last year. But Arthur J. Nozik, 71, a chemical physicist there, notes that this is roughly the cost of one F-18 jetfighter. In the end, only $8 million was authorized by Congress in 2007.

The challenge of shifting to new energy options is made vastly more difficult because the world’s existing energy system—85 percent based on coal, oil, and other fossil fuels—is so integrated into modern life. “We already have electricity coming out of everybody’s wall socket,” says Nathan S. Lewis, 51, a chemistry professor who codirects the Powering the Planet project at Caltech. “This is not a new function we’re seeking. It’s a substitution. It’s not like NASA sending a man to the moon. It’s like finding a new way to send a man to the moon when Southwest Airlines is already flying there every hour handing out peanuts.”

Numerous experts say the only way to propel such a change is with taxes on fuels that produce the most greenhouse gases, or new emission-reduction treaties, such as the Kyoto Protocol (which the United States did not ratify), or bills—like many being discussed on Capitol Hill—that require emissions reductions. But there are major political impediments, both globally and domestically. And do Americans have the stomach for higher taxes and heating bills? Perhaps, says Peter Schwartz, 61, who analyzes risks for corporations and the government, if we see global warming as a security threat—one that could create calamities ranging from large-scale migrations to conflicts over food and water.

With or without new laws or taxes, the need for technological advances is vital, says Martin I. Hoffert, 69, a physics professor at New York University. Hoffert has testified repeatedly before Congress about the lack of investment in energy research—efforts that could help avoid oil wars, lower energy costs, and help poorer countries advance without overheating the planet.

“Technology evolution is like biological evolution,” he says. “Most mutations, like most innovative technologies, don’t survive. But without mutations, evolution stops. It only takes one transistor to change the world.” And it won’t necessarily cost a fortune: John Holdren, 63, an energy and climate expert at Harvard, says that a rise in the federal gas tax of 2.5 cents a gallon would triple the federal energy-research budget.

Meanwhile, the demand for energy worldwide is increasing, and not only in such countries as India and China. Two billion people still cook meals on firewood or dried dung, and more than 1.5 million of those—mainly women and children—die young from breathing clouds of indoor smoke. In a world heading toward 9 billion or more people by 2042 who either are born into—or dream of—our plugged-in, air-conditioned, frequent-flier lifestyle, revolutionary new energy sources are needed.

It may be that what we face is less a climate crisis than an energy challenge. Many experts believe the key to limiting climate risks and solving a host of momentous problems—including the end of abundant oil—is to begin an ambitious quest for new ways to conserve, harvest, and store energy without creating pollution.

Harnessing the power of the sun remains the Holy Grail of most energy experts. But research on solar technologies remains tiny in scale, though the potential has been clear for decades.

Consider this incredibly prescient quote: “I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.”

The year? 1931. The speaker? Thomas Edison.

“The biggest challenge is how to get people to wake up and realize this is a one-shot deal,” says Caltech’s solar guru, Lewis. “If we fail, we are witting participants in the biggest experiment that humans have ever done: moving CO₂ levels to more than twice their value in the past 670,000 years and hoping it turns out okay for generations to come.”

Andrew Revkin is a reporter with The New York Times and the author of The North Pole Was Here: Puzzles and Perils at the Top of the World (Houghton Mifflin, 2006), the first book on global climate change written for both children and adults. His stories on global warming can be found at www.nytimes.com/revkin. 

IEA sees oil supply crunch looming

By Alex Lawler Mon Jul 9, 2007  

LONDON (Reuters) - World oil demand will rise faster than expected to 2012 while production lags, leading to a supply crunch, the International Energy Agency said on Monday.

In its Medium-Term Oil Market Report, the adviser to 26 industrialized countries said demand will rise by an average 2.2 percent a year between 2007 and 2012, up from a previous medium-term forecast of 2 percent.

The outlook, which updates an IEA forecast last issued in February, coincides with a jump in oil prices to more than $75 a barrel, closing in on a record high near $79, on concerns of a tightening market.

"Despite four years of high oil prices, this report sees increasing market tightness beyond 2010," the IEA said.

"It is possible that the supply crunch could be deferred -- but not by much."

The IEA's previous Medium-Term report called for world demand growth of 2 percent a year between 2006 and 2011.

It now expects global demand to reach 95.8 million barrels per day (bpd) from 86.1 million bpd in

2007. The forecast assumes average global GDP growth of 4.5 percent annually.

"The results of our analysis are quite strong," said Lawrence Eagles, head of the IEA's Oil Industry and Markets Division. "Something needs to happen."

"Either we need to have more supplies coming on stream or we need to have lower demand growth."

The Paris-based IEA also said additional global refining capacity over the next five years will lag earlier expectations as rising costs and a shortage of engineers delay construction.

It said world production of biofuels would reach 1.75 million bpd by 2012, more than double 2006 levels, but the fuel will remain marginal as economics hobble further growth.

LOWER OPEC CAPACITY

Oil prices pared an earlier loss after the report was released. Brent crude was unchanged at $75.62 a barrel as of 1247 GMT.

The report points to a greater reliance on the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, source of more than a third of the world's oil.

While foreseeing higher demand, the IEA expects less supply to come from producers outside OPEC and the agency also trimmed a forecast for the 12-member group's unused production capacity.

"A stronger demand outlook, together with project slippage and geopolitical problems has led to downward revisions of OPEC spare capacity by 2 million bpd in 2009," said the report.

The forecast assumes no net expansion of capacity from Iran, Iraq and Venezuela and that the 500,000 bpd of Nigerian production that has been shut for a year will not reopen during the next five years.

Ten OPEC members began cutting production last year to stem a drop in prices. The IEA in its Monthly Oil Market Report has for the past four months urged OPEC to open the taps to avoid over-tightening the market.

Some analysts say the agency is being alarmist and that its warnings about supplies are actually leading to higher prices.

"The International Energy Agency has put such a fear premium in the market that crude futures remain bought no matter what," said Olivier Jakob of Petromatrix.

The IEA said fundamentals of supply and demand are prompting price gains.

"The simple thing is we are there to project the market as we see it," Eagles said. "The price response is due to fundamentals. We are simply pointing out the fundamentals. That's our job."

PLATEAU OIL

The IEA trimmed its forecast for supply from non-OPEC producers by 800,000 bpd in 2011, partly because of project delays, and touched on the thorny subject that oil supplies are nearing a peak.

"Certainly our forecast suggests that the non-OPEC, conventional crude component of global production appears, for now, to have reached an effective plateau, rather than a peak," the report said.

Falling output at ageing fields and setbacks such as 2005's hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico have slowed growth in non-OPEC output in recent years.

Lower supply from non-OPEC countries and rising demand will boost the requirement for OPEC oil.

The IEA said demand for OPEC crude, or the call on OPEC, will rise to 34.7 million bpd in 2011, up 1.3 million bpd from the previous projection. 

Rail service group votes to oust chief

Authority gave ex-lawmaker a contract in June

By Kevin Flynn, Rocky Mountain News
July 7, 2007

The group working to bring high-speed commuter rail service to Colorado on Friday ousted the leader who organized the effort nearly three years ago.

The board of the Rocky Mountain Rail Authority, which only last month approved a contract with former state Rep. Bob Briggs to be its executive director, voted 8-4 to terminate Briggs' contract.

Board Chairman Harry Dale said the move is about Briggs' promotion of specific projects and activities without board approval.

Dale says that could create a conflict of interest for the authority since it is supposed to be approaching an upcoming feasibility study with an unbiased position.

Briggs says it's about Dale wanting to run the authority and put more emphasis on a rail transit system to serve the Interstate 70 mountain corridor than the I-25 Front Range urban corridor. Dale is a Clear Creek County commissioner who has advocated an electrified high-speed train between Denver and the mountain communities where he lives.

The authority is made up of 30 cities, counties and transit agencies around the state - 10 of them admitted as members at the same Friday meeting.

Twelve voting board members terminated Briggs' contract by an 8-4 vote. The nays came from metro Denver members Arapahoe County, Thornton, Weld County and RTD.

Dale said even thought he board had approved Briggs' contract last month, it felt he had continued to compromise the authority's need to be neutral while entering into a contract with the Colorado Department of Transportation for a feasibility study that would determine whether a rail system could work.

"There've just been some problems and we hoped they would be addressed," Dale said. But he said Briggs continued to set up activities with the political group. "This kind of thing hurts our credibility," Dale said.

Briggs and Bernie Zimmer, president of the Colorado Rail Association, denied there was any mixing of their missions. Zimmer's group would be the entity that would advocate for rail in any future statewide election over funding, while the authority cannot engage in political activity.

"Bernie Zimmer and I talk on a regular basis," Briggs said. "But we both understand the difference between the two organizations."

Briggs started the commuter rail effort in November 2004, after Denver area voters approved the FasTracks transit measure, to try to link a statewide commuter rail network to the metro system.