Making Electric Vehicles Practical

Research presented this week at the annual MRS meeting promises to double battery capacity, cut costs, extend life--and finally make electric cars attractive to the masses.

By Kevin Bullis

Today's battery technology is adequate for electric vehicles with a range of more than 200 miles, but the batteries are still very expensive and require elaborate safety mechanisms. There are also concerns that they won't last long enough to be attractive to most consumers.

But current research will double energy-storage capacity while also increasing the lifetime of batteries, improving safety, and cutting costs more than enough to make electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids practical for the mass market. At least these were the predictions of researchers presenting their latest work at the Materials Research Society (MRS) meeting in Boston this week. And although many significant challenges remain, an experimental type of rechargeable battery that's like a fuel cell could increase battery storage that much more.

Stanley Whittingham, inventor of the first commercial lithium-ion battery and professor of chemistry, materials science, and engineering at the State University of New York, at Binghamton, says current research should make electric vehicles practical--with the following caveat: they'll probably be used for trips of less than 100 miles. Those who want 300-to-400-mile ranges typical of gasoline-powered vehicles will need to turn to plug-in hybrids: vehicles much like today's gas-electric hybrids, but with a much larger battery pack that makes it possible to go longer on electric power, thereby saving gas. These batteries could be partly charged by an onboard gas engine, but also by electricity from a wall socket.

Whittingham says that while he expects battery capacity to double, it's not going to get much better than that. The real advances in batteries, he says, won't be in energy capacity, but in safety, longevity, and cost. If electric vehicles are to be widespread, one of the most important goals of battery research must be to replace the cobalt now used in the lithium-ion batteries found in cell phones and laptops. "There's just not enough [cobalt] in the world," says Whittingham, who is working on mixed-metal electrodes, which require little to no cobalt.

One promising new type of battery, which actually has lower storage capacity than today's lithium-ion batteries, could nevertheless prove a boon to plug-in hybrids. Lithium iron phosphate batteries use iron, a very cheap metal, instead of cobalt, and they have an inherently safe chemistry (see "Safer Lithium-Ion Batteries"). What's more, they operate at a lower voltage that will extend the life of the electrolyte, and therefore the battery.

Yet-Ming Chiang, a MIT materials scientist, is developing even better versions of these batteries. Typically when designing batteries engineers have to choose between high-power batteries, such as those needed for power tools and hybrids, which deliver intense bursts of power, and high-energy batteries that pack less of a punch, but can deliver more total energy per charge. According to computer models created by Chiang's lab and presented at the MRS meeting, it may be possible to remove this trade-off by producing nanostructured electrodes made by combining two different types of particles in a specific arrangement in the electrode. This could as much as double energy capacity for high-power applications, without the need to develop new materials, Chiang says.

A researcher at the MRS meeting described another experimental way of creating new electrode structures--a way that could increase energy capacity over existing batteries by four times or more. Peter Bruce, professor of chemistry at the University of St. Andrews, in Scotland, is reviving interest in a type of battery that is something like a fuel cell. This battery has been widely used in the past, but making it rechargeable has proved difficult. Ordinarily, a battery contains all the materials needed to carry out its current-creating chemical reactions. But in this design, one of the reactants, oxygen, can be harvested from the air. As in a fuel cell, in which hydrogen ions combine with oxygen to form water, lithium ions in this battery combine with oxygen to form lithium peroxide. Using oxygen makes it possible to eliminate many of the materials normally included in a battery, drastically cutting its weight. Based on his experiments, Bruce says that such batteries could store as much as 600 to 700 milliamp hours per gram (more than four times that of batteries today) while maintaining the ability to be charged and discharged for many cycles.

So far, Bruce has conducted his experiments using pure oxygen. A working battery would need to be equipped with a membrane, which could be a material similar to Gore-Tex that would seal out both water and carbon dioxide, he says. It might also need a valve to shut off the supply of oxygen to keep reactions from occurring when no current is needed.

Perhaps a bigger problem is the fact that the batteries lose about half of their energy to heat as they are discharged, Whittingham says. This creates a big heat-management issue, and it cuts into the energy-saving motivation for driving hybrids or electric vehicles. "If [Bruce] can be successful, it would be great," he says. But even without such dramatic gains in energy capacity, current research could make batteries much more practical. "I expect the auto companies will be happy with two times [higher capacity] if it will last 10 years," Whittingham says.

EPA case key to Maine to be heard

By BART JANSEN, Washington D.C. Correspondent

Monday, November 27, 2006

WASHINGTON - For the second time in a month, the U.S. Supreme Court will tackle an air pollution case vital to Maine and other Northeast states.

A dozen states led by Massachusetts, along with a variety of environmental groups, contend that the Environmental Protection Agency should regulate greenhouse-gas exhaust from motor vehicles to curb global warming.

The threat is that climbing temperatures will change the climate and flood coastal states. In Maine, fears include increases in asthma and other chronic respiratory conditions, insect-borne illnesses such as Lyme disease, and algae blooms that choke inland lakes.

"This is about more than just requiring automakers to produce cleaner vehicles," said Maine Attorney General Steven Rowe. "The longer we wait to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, the more we will suffer."

But the federal government, joined by carmakers and other industries, responded that EPA holds no authority to regulate carbon dioxide, which is what people exhale. Even if the agency had the power, the groups contend that regulations wouldn't work because motor vehicles contribute just a fraction of heat-trapping gases.

The groups, including the American Forest and Paper Association, the American Chemistry Council and the National Association of Manufacturers, make the legal argument that "no matter how serious a concern global climate change may be, that concern does not justify trying to shoehorn global climate change into a regulatory structure designed and enacted by Congress to address different types of problems."

The case, to be argued Wednesday, follows another one argued Nov. 1 about when the Clean Air Act requires aging coal-fired power plants to install modern pollution-control equipment.

In combination, the cases are expected to outline the court's position on air pollution for years. Rulings are expected by June.

"The health of our people should be given higher priority than the profits of oil companies and automakers," Rowe said.

In the first case, U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement agreed with three environmental groups that 1980 regulations required pollution controls for "any physical change" that "increases the amount of air pollution."

But Duke Energy Corp. and industry groups argued that improvements shouldn't trigger expensive pollution controls if they don't increase a power plant's hourly emissions.

The latest case deals with greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and hydrofluorocarbons. The gases trap heat near the earth's surface, prompting concerns that people should generate less to avoid changing the climate.

The EPA refused to regulate vehicle emissions in 2003, and so far the courts have sided with the agency.

Massachusetts Attorney General Thomas Reilly said the Clean Air Act clearly states that any chemical matter emitted into the air is an "air pollutant" and that EPA "shall" set standards for motor vehicles when they "cause, or contribute to, air pollution."

But Clement, defending the EPA, replied that vehicle emissions represent a small fraction of greenhouse-gas emissions. EPA concluded it lacks authority to regulate the emissions amid substantial scientific uncertainties.

"There is no basis on the present administrative record for this court to overturn that considered agency judgment," Clement said. "But even assuming that the available science supports such cataclysmic predictions, that is not enough."

Four former EPA administrators said pollution must be regulated even as scientific studies continue.

"EPA's decision not to regulate greenhouse gases based on non-science-related policy considerations and residual scientific uncertainty undermines the bedrock principles that have guided the agency's implementation of the Clean Air Act for more than three decades," the former administrators said.

Washington D.C. Correspondent Bart Jansen can be contacted at 202-488-1119 or at:

bjansen@pressherald.com

An Epidemic No One Understands

NY Times
November 28, 2006

By DENISE GRADY

When our first son developed asthma as a 3-year-old, my husband and I felt pretty much blindsided. We were only a little less shocked when the same thing happened to our second son, at the same age.

The disease turned out to be tenacious, and for years both boys needed inhalers or a nebulizer machine several times a day to prevent asthma attacks that could keep them up half the night, coughing and wheezing.

Both had eczema, too, and the kind of food allergies — to nuts, peanuts and shellfish — that can lead to fatal reactions.

What caused all this? My husband and I were mystified, because neither of us had asthma or life-threatening allergies, nor did our parents or siblings. I do have hay fever and allergies to cats and dogs, but I had always considered my symptoms just a nuisance — not a bad omen for the next generation. My husband isn’t allergic to anything.

But we seem to have been caught on a rising tide that no one fully understands. Our sons were born in 1984 and 1987, and we encountered an awful lot of children their ages who had the same illnesses, far more than we remembered from our own generation.

Statistics suggest that something strange was occurring in those years. From 1980 to 2003, the prevalence of asthma in children rose to 5.8 percent from 3.6 percent, an increase of about 60 percent, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Other estimates from the disease centers show an even bigger increase in the asthmas rates for younger children: a 160 percent jump in those younger than 5 from 1980 to 1994. But changes in data collection starting in 1997 make it hard to compare the figures before and after that year. More recently, the rates seem to have leveled off in the United States and in other Western countries. In any case, about 20 million people in the United States have asthma today, including at least 6 million children, and 5,000 people a year die from it. Children in the inner cities seem to be especially hard hit, with exposure to cockroaches and diesel fumes suspected as the culprits. But the cause is not known for sure.

Worldwide, the disease has also increased. From 1985 to 2001, the prevalence rose 100 percent. About 300 million people have asthma, 255,000 die from it, and deaths could increase by 20 percent over the next 10 years, according to the World Health Organization. The problem is especially severe in developing countries, which are least able to provide the long-term intensive treatment that asthma requires.

Some of the apparent increases may not be real, but may have occurred because doctors got better at making the diagnosis. But increased reporting seems unlikely to account for all the new cases. Theories come and go, and when you come right down to it, no one really knows why some people develop asthma and others don’t.

In “The Asthma Epidemic,” an article published last week in The New England Journal of Medicine, doctors tried to sort out various theories about the causes of asthma and explain why rates have risen. But there are no clear-cut answers.

Like other chronic diseases, asthma is probably caused by multiple genes and environmental exposures, and it can have quite different causes in different people. About half the cases are thought to stem from allergies and the rest from other problems that can irritate and inflame the airways, causing them to close.

Genetic changes in the population cannot explain the increasing rates, though, because such changes occur too slowly to account for the rapid increases in asthma, the authors said, suggesting that environmental factors are more likely candidates. But what has changed enough in the environment to explain spiking asthma rates?

The authors of the article, from University Children’s Hospital in Munich, review many study findings. They report that one clear risk factor is secondhand tobacco smoke. Exposure to it does increase asthma risk in infants and small children. But how would that explain the increases, when over all, parents today smoke less than previous generations?

People frequently blame air pollution for causing asthma, but its role is not entirely clear. Pollution does makes asthma worse in people who already have the disease, but it’s not known whether pollution also makes asthma develop in the first place. And in any case, air pollution in the United States has decreased in the last few decades. Living in a place with high vehicle exhaust may make asthma worse, but the evidence is “relatively weak,” the researchers report.

Dust mites, microscopic insects that live in bedding and furniture, were long blamed for causing asthma to develop in infants and small children and have led to a booming industry of mattress covers, air filters and guilt-ridden parents tethered to dust mops and vacuum cleaners. But recent studies have questioned the connection. Once children have asthma, though, the mites and their droppings may make the symptoms worse.

Cat dander has become a complete puzzle, with some studies finding that exposure early in life leads to asthma, and others saying it protects against asthma. At this point, nobody knows which study to believe, but most experts agree that when people already have asthma, being around cats can make it worse.

Under some of the theories, I should have had the world’s worst asthma. Clearly, I had allergic tendencies, and the experts would have shuddered at my environment. I grew up in New York in a small apartment with parents who were heavy smokers, on a busy street with trucks rumbling by and a bus stop in front of the door. Buildings all around us burned coal. At times, we had a dog, a cat, parakeets and, briefly, a duck. It’s amazing that the pets survived the smoke. My mother was a decent housekeeper, but she wouldn’t have won any prizes. I never wheezed. Go figure.

Obesity and asthma have also been linked in some studies, but the link, if it exists, is not understood. Researchers say it is simply not a matter of asthmatic children growing fat because they cannot exercise. The weight gain can be first.

Nutrition is another mystery. Studies of fruits, vegetables, cereals, fatty acids, vitamins, minerals and antioxidants have been inconclusive, and little is known about the effects from what pregnant women eat. Experiments in which pregnant women avoided cow’s milk and eggs in hopes of preventing asthma in their infants did not work, and breast-feeding doesn’t prevent the disease, either.

One theory that has received attention recently is the “hygiene hypothesis,” the idea that children today are raised in homes that are too clean and that asthma is somehow caused by the lack of exposure to infections and bits of microbes early in life. Under this theory, germs are supposed to help the immune system develop normally, and without them the system may overreact to other substances in the environment, producing allergies and asthma.

There is some evidence to support the idea. Studies find that children raised on farms are less prone than others to asthma, maybe because they are exposed to plenty of microbes in barns and stables. But the connection is still not fully understood, and some viral infections clearly make asthma worse.

A related idea is that the increased use of antibiotics in recent decades contributes to asthma by changing the type of the bacteria that live in the gut. But that has not been proved. Some researchers have suggested that acetaminophen, used to treat pain and fever, may be linked to asthma. Its use increased in the 1980s, after pediatricians declared aspirin unsafe for children. But that theory has not been proved, either.

Ultimately, this new list of the usual suspects still doesn’t solve the mystery.

Gradually, my sons’ asthma diminished. Both became track and cross-country runners in high school, and now, as they have gone on to college and graduate school, the disease is rarely a problem. But it was a worry that hung over us for a long time.

As for the food allergies, we choose to assume that they last for life. The only way to find out for sure is called a “challenge,” in which you eat the risky food with doctors standing by to revive you in case it turns out that, gee, you’re still allergic to it after all. Somehow, I don’t think we’ll be signing up for that.

My sons have adrenaline kits to treat a severe reaction. Neither has ever needed it, and I know they don’t carry it around the way they’re supposed to when they go to restaurants.

Needless to say, I wish none of this had ever happened. But, based on what’s now known, could I have done anything to prevent it? Was it bad that we had cats when our children were born or that we later gave them away? Asthma transformed me and my husband from rather casual housekeepers into mop-wielding fanatics. I’m not sure it helped.

Suppose I had recognized that my own allergies meant that my children would be at risk. Would it have helped if I had then avoided eating nuts, peanuts and shellfish while I was pregnant and breast-feeding? I don’t think the answer is clear.

Similarly, I’m not convinced that it would have made a difference if I had been more cautious and methodical about introducing new foods in their first few years, though allergy groups recommend it. The only thing that seemed to do them any good was asthma medicine, and lots of it.

Because children who have even one parent with allergies and asthma have an increased risk of developing the same problems, it would be great if somebody could figure out a way to lower that risk in time to help my sons and the millions of other young people who were also caught in the asthma wave, when they decide to become parents. I am hoping, but I know it may be a problem with many solutions — or none.

Majority of Americans Want Congress to Impose 40MPG Standard

Civil Society Institute

WASHINGTON, Nov. 21 -- Will the Big 3 automakers blow it for a second time by misreading an American public that is expecting gasoline prices to start soaring again soon? As President Bush and Congress continue to huddle with Detroit vehicle manufacturers, a strong and bipartisan 78 percent of Americans want Washington to impose a 40 mile per gallon (MPG) fuel-efficiency standard for American vehicles, according to a new Opinion Research Corporation (ORC) national opinion survey to be released on November 21, 2006 by the nonprofit and nonpartisan Civil Society Institute (CSI).

Other key findings of the ORC survey include the following:

• Nine out of 10 Americans expect gas prices to go up "in the near future," with nearly half (46 percent) "definitely" expecting a resumption of higher fuel prices.

• 70 percent of Americans are not turning their back on fuel-efficiency concerns and say that they are factoring "expected future gasoline price increases into consideration in thinking about buying a new vehicle."

• Temporarily lower gasoline prices are not sending large numbers of Americans rushing back to gas-guzzling SUV and trucks. In fact, nearly half (45 percent) of Americans are now more likely to buy a "hybrid or other fuel-efficient vehicle" than they were six months ago, compared to 30 percent who are unchanged in their plans and fewer than one in four (24 percent) who are less likely to make such a vehicle purchase.

Civil Society Institute President and Founder Pam Solo said: "These findings should be a real wake-up call to any auto executive in Detroit who is hoping against hope that Americans will fall back in love with gas-hog vehicles. What Americans are saying to American carmakers is that they are ready for change. We know the technology exists for higher fuel efficiency that will save money, reduce this nation's dependence on foreign oil and diminish the pollution linked to global warming. What Detroit needs to realize is that low gas prices have not -- and will not -- lead to the demise of the now very strong and continuing demand for more fuel-efficient vehicles. If American carmakers make that wrong-headed gamble for a second time, it may just be the last losing bet they can afford to make."

Opinion Research Corporation Vice President Wayne Russum said: "It's official: Reducing America's dependence on foreign oil through tougher fuel efficiency standards is a bona fide national security issue that cuts right across political party lines. Respondents were asked: 'Given America's dependence on foreign oil, do you agree or disagree that greater fuel efficiency for cars, SUVs and trucks is in our national security interests?' Four out of five respondents agreed, including half who did so strongly. Interestingly, the national security issued resonated even more with Republicans (82 percent) than it did with Independents (77 percent) and Democrats (79 percent)."

DETAILED SURVEY FINDINGS

Other key results of the Opinion Research Corporation survey conducted for the Civil Society Institute include the following:

• Most Americans think Detroit is to blame for its current woes. Respondents were asked: "Do you agree or disagree that U.S. automakers have generally been blind to U.S. consumer needs and tastes by focusing so heavily on fuel-inefficient SUVs and trucks while European and Japanese automakers have focused their efforts on vehicle design and/or improved fuel efficiency?" More than three out of four (76 percent) agreed with the statement, compared to just 22 percent who disagreed.

• Nearly all Americans want President Bush to pressure U.S. automakers to focus more on the latest in fuel-efficiency technology. White House pressure for Detroit to take up such innovations reducing "energy consumption and related global-warming pollution" is backed by 85 percent of Americans, including 58 percent who would strongly support such pressure by President Bush. Political support for White House action on this front is strongly bipartisan: Republicans (82 percent); Independents (81 percent); and Democrats (91 percent).

• Most Americans think "President Bush and Congress could help U.S. automakers be more competitive by increasing the federal fuel-efficiency standard to 40 miles per gallon." Such a move is supported by 78 percent of Americans, including 45 percent who back it strongly. Support for a 40 mpg fuel-efficiency standard cuts across party lines: Republicans (70 percent); Independents (78 percent); and Democrats (84 percent).

• Most Americans agree that "President Bush and Congress should provide incentives -- such as helping to lower health care costs for autoworkers -- in exchange for increased investments by Detroit car makers in fuel-efficient technologies to reduce energy consumption and related global-warming pollution." Two thirds of Americans support this step, compared to less than a third (31 percent) opposing. Strong majorities of Republicans (60 percent), Independents (60 percent) and Democrats (75 percent) would back such an inducement.

• A majority of Americans see Japanese automakers ahead of U.S. car manufacturers. Respondents were asked: "Would you say that U.S. or Japanese automakers are in the lead when it comes to hybrid technology and other more highly fuel-efficient technologies to reduce energy consumption and related global-warming pollution?" Half said Japan was in the lead, compared to only 6 percent who put the U.S. in the pole position. Slightly more than a third (36 percent) see the U.S. and Japan as being roughly neck and neck. Men were more likely than woman to see Japan ahead of the U.S. by a margin of 57 percent to 44 percent, respectively.

• Almost all Americans want Detroit to start selling here at home the highly fuel-efficient vehicles that they make or sell overseas -- but not in the U.S. The survey notes that "American automakers produce or sell dozens of car models that achieve over 35 miles per gallon but are not made available to consumers here in the United States. Do you think Detroit carmakers should be encouraged to make available here at home the more fuel-efficient cars they are currently only selling abroad?" An overwhelming 90 percent of respondents said "yes," including 60 percent who said "definitely yes." Almost no difference was seen on this question across party lines: Republicans (88 percent); Independents (86 percent); and Democrats (93 percent).

• Most Americans would support federal gasoline taxes devoted to renewable energy/clean tech R&D. Respondents were asked: Do you think President Bush and the Congress should dedicate a portion of existing or increased gasoline taxes for investment in research and development of renewable energy and related clean technologies?" Nearly three out of four (74 percent) said yes, compared to just 24 percent who said no. Support was little changed on the basis of party affiliation, with Republicans (70 percent), Independents (73 percent) and Democrats (78 percent) in agreement on such a tax policy.

For full survey findings, go to http://www.civilsocietyinstitute.org on the Web.

SURVEY METHODOLOGY

Results are based on telephone interviews conducted among a sample of 1,016 adults (509 men and 507 women) age 18 and over, living in private households, in the continental United States. Interviewing by ORC was completed during the period of November 9-12, 2006. Completed interviews of the 1,016 adults were weighted by four variables: age, sex, geographic region, and race, to ensure reliable and accurate representation of the total adult population. The margin of error at a 95 percent confidence level is plus or minus 3 percentage points for the sample of 1,016 adults. Smaller sub-groups will have larger error margins.

Report cites violations by Plum Creek

Maine Today
November 16, 2006

Plum Creek Timber Co., one of Maine's largest owners of forestland, repeatedly violated environmental standards in the years before 2003, the Natural Resources Council of Maine said Wednesday.

The advocacy group, which issued a report citing state records related to the company's logging practices, also said the company continued to destroy established deer habitat until early this year.

The report, which challenges Plum Creek's corporate image as a protector of Maine's environment, noted, for example, that the company paid a $57,000 fine in June for a series of logging violations from 1995 through 2002, by far the largest such penalty ever imposed in Maine.

"This is really a systematic avoidance of Maine's environmental laws," said Cathy Johnson of the Natural Resources Council.

The group has been a leading critic of Plum Creek's plans for two resorts and about 1,000 house lots in the Moosehead Lake region. The company's logging record, Johnson said, indicates it shouldn't be trusted to develop sensitive areas in the North Woods.

Plum Creek's general manager in Maine, Jim Lehner, said the company has taken responsibility for its violations and works with the state agencies to avoid problems.

"Whenever an issue comes up, we address it immediately," he said. "We're proud of our record."

The company is certified by the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, he said. "Does it mean we don't make any mistakes? No, we do make mistakes."

The council's report focuses on improper clearcutting and other logging violations, and the destruction of crucial deer-wintering areas over the objections of state biologists.

The group also criticized the company for failing to get a permit before starting construction of a 7,500-foot-long powerline corridor near Moosehead Lake in 2003, and for altering stream beds near a logging road in 2002. The company cited a miscommunication and paid a $4,000 fine for the powerline violation, and it repaired what it said was unintentional damage to the waterway, according to the state.

The report also raises questions about how aggressively the state has regulated Plum Creek and whether state agencies have helped protect the company's image.

For example, a final news release from the Department of Conservation about the Plum Creek fine in June is missing a sentence from a draft that said the company was penalized $57,000. The final notice does not include the fine amount or otherwise indicate that the action was more than a routine technical settlement. Also, the word "clearcuts" in the draft was changed to "harvesting" and "harvests" in the final version. The action got little, if any, publicity at the time.

The leaders of several agencies that regulate forestry and land use in northern Maine said Wednesday that they have treated Plum Creek no differently than any other landowner.

"Nothing was done to accommodate or to alleviate Plum Creek's violations of the Forest Practices Act," said Conservation Commissioner Patrick McGowan. The information was available to anyone who was interested, he said.

The $57,000 fine imposed in June was in addition to a $9,000 fine the company paid in 2003 for a clearcut that violated the Forest Practices Act. The 2003 case led to a selective review of Plum Creek's logging practices back to 1995, the process that concluded in June with the $57,000 fine.

The review of the eight-year period found that Plum Creek violated the law at 48 previous harvest sites throughout its more than 900,000-acre property.

The discovery of so many past violations shows how difficult it is to monitor logging and enforce the law in a 10-million-acre forest, officials said. But it also shows that the Maine Forest Service did its job, said Director Alec Giffen.

Until June, the largest single fine imposed under the 17-year-old law was $19,500, assessed to International Paper in 1998 and Jay McLaughlin in 2001.

Lehner, the Plum Creek manager, said the violations were the result of not precisely measuring cuts as required by changes in the law in 1999.

"We were interpreting those rules incorrectly. It was a huge mistake for us," he said. The company has since retrained its foresters, he said.

State Forest Service officials say Plum Creek cooperated in the review of its lands and has not been found in violation of the law since the 2003 settlement.

Plum Creek's logging in deer-wintering areas has not violated any laws, but it did earn the company a bad reputation among some state officials last winter. The record also shows a clear disregard for protecting wildlife habitat when it interferes with profits, according to Johnson.
Deer-wintering areas are stands of mature spruce, fir and hemlock where deer can find shelter from cold, wind and deep snow. The so-called deer yards are considered critical for sustaining the species so far north.

Most deer yards are protected only through voluntary cutting limits agreed to by landowners and the state's Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife.

Biologists in the department grew frustrated last winter by Plum Creek repeatedly cutting down known deer areas. In one e-mail among staff members, a biologist said Plum Creek had a "dismal and feeble history" and probably the worst record of any major landowner in Maine. In January, another biologist warned that the cutting of deer yards had accelerated even as pressure was building for the company to stop.

Shortly after, the agency called for a meeting with Plum Creek and the two began negotiating an agreement regarding deer areas. That process is continuing, said Ken Elowe, director of resource management for Inland Fisheries & Wildlife.

"They have become more understanding to the needs of deer and more understanding that they should work with us," Elowe said. At the same time, state officials are now talking about protecting more deer habitat through formal regulation.

Lehner said the company is working to resolve the dispute and pointed out that the deer areas at issue are not legally off-limits. "This is all well above and beyond what is required by law," he said. "They asked us to stop cutting and we did."

The company is still planning to place house lots inside some deer-wintering areas, Lehner said. Those plans will be reviewed by Fisheries & Wildlife.

Johnson said some of the company's aggressive cutting has been on land it intends to develop.
Staff Writer John Richardson can be contacted at 791-6324 or at:
jrichardson@pressherald.com

Ski areas to offset electric use with wind

Portland Press Herald

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Sugarloaf/USA and Sunday River have decided to offset all of their electricity usage with energy generated from wind, the resorts announced Tuesday.

Together, the resorts are now the largest purchaser and consumer of wind power in New England, they said.

Under the new plan, the resorts are purchasing 30 million kilowatt hours of energy credits from Constellation NewEnergy, offsetting the amount of fossil-fuel generated power they use. Buying energy credits supports the generation of wind power and has the environmental impact of indirectly reducing the emissions from power plants.

The decision will effectively keep more than 41 million pounds of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, the equivalent of the emissions from 3,600 passenger cars each year.

Carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning is the primary man-made contributor to climate change, a phenomenon that is projected to reduce snowfalls and threaten the long-term viability of the ski industry. Shawnee Peak in Bridgton was the first Maine ski resort to buy wind energy credits to offset its electricity usage.

Plane speaking

John Vidal
Wednesday November 1, 2006

Guardian
Ken Livingstone, mayor of London, is these days possessed of one great idea. Climate change, and how to avert it, consumes him. It now informs all his decisions on transport. It is top of his agenda for social housing and new building developments. He reads about it in his spare time. He talks about it to anyone who will bend an ear and he will travel to the ends of the earth if necessary to cut deals with other politicians, to steal the best ideas from other cities and to communicate with anyone the urgency and scale of the problem.

Last week, Sir David Attenborough went to City Hall to talk to staff about the acceleration of change. When former US vice-president Al Gore's film on climate change, An Inconvenient Truth, was released, Livingstone hired a cinema and invited staff to watch it. He bought 20 copies of Jared Diamond's book on the ecological collapse of civilisation and gave them to colleagues; yesterday, the day after the Stern review warned of economic mayhem unless climate change is tackled, Livingstone signed up to Friends of the Earth's lobby for a law to reduce national emissions annually.

"In a practical sense, you can see climate change is now top of the London agenda and is being personally driven," says one of his colleagues, impressed at how Livingstone has linked the social and environmental agendas. "People used to see the congestion charge and public transport from the point of view of social inequality and the functioning of the city. They are all still core issues but they are not separate to climate change, they are integral to it now. He had to focus on things such as the public-private partnership [for the London Underground] in his first term. Now he has more time, the emphasis has changed. It helps having a strong Green contingent in the assembly, because there is very little disagreement."

Livingstone admits his position has changed, is changing, as information emerges. "I think what is happening is absolutely terrifying. When I first ran for mayor in 2000, the scientific consensus was that we would reach the climate change tipping point around the second half of the century. Depending on which scientific evidence you look at, it's down to between two and 10 years. There's no time for more studies or surveys.

"I just do not think that politicians understand the implications, which at the very extreme is the end of most large life forms. If we slip into irreversible climate change, it means hundreds of millions of people migrating and deaths. It means the poorest being hit the hardest."

As mayor, he has one arm tied behind his back, he says. If it were up to him, he says he would legislate against almost anything that adds to the problem. He would ban inefficient light bulbs, bang on carbon taxes, and massively increase the cost of air fares. "I think that every city is doing something quite well," he says. "We should take the best from around the world. We could take the plastic bag tax from Ireland, the packaging laws of Germany. We should put them together.

"But the one big thing that no one is tackling is aviation. Emissions are completely undermining the reductions achieved elsewhere," Livingstone says.

But there have been serious contradictions in his positions. His proposals for the London Plan, which will determine development in the city from 2008 onwards, says major airport expansion will be needed in the south-east "to meet London's economic needs". Is that not arguing that Londoners should be able to travel by air more? "I am no longer sanguine about that," he replies. "When we drafted the London Plan in 2002, we were nowhere near getting the alarming information that we are today. We have to address it. We are now preparing amendments to the plan against any further runway capacity in the south-east."

While Livingstone has no direct power over future developments at Gatwick or Stansted, observers say the significance of his withdrawal of support for the growth of these two airports - he has always been against the expansion of Heathrow - is that he is now challenging the aviation industry head on, as no other major politician has been prepared to do. His target is not business travellers, he says, who would need tickets to be massively more expensive to reduce the number of flights they take, but the frequent leisure fliers. "All tickets should reflect the impact of carbon emissions of that journey," he insists. "Instead of £12 or £15 for a ticket, it should be five or six times that. A lot of Labour party people say that the dramatic growth in air traffic is the poor getting on the plane for the first time, but it's not that at all. Half the population never gets on a plane. What's happening is that relatively few people, instead of going away once a year on holiday, are going three or four times a year to Barcelona or Prague or wherever. That's all very nice, but not at the cost of the continuation of life on planet Earth."

Targeting carbon polluters

What he can do, and intends to do more, is make it harder for carbon polluters in London and easier for people to cut back. Over the next year, Londoners will get a blizzard of new initiatives aimed at decentralising and reducing energy consumption. The city's new climate change agency has begun a commercial partnership with French energy giant EDF to roll out combined heat and power units across London; all new social housing developments will soon have to be nearly 60% more efficient than they are now; in 2008, he will introduce Britain's first low emission zone, which will ban heavy goods vehicles and cut emissions by 4% across much of central London. A new organisation will advise and oversee the greening of people's homes and lives. It will be easier for householders to install wind and photovoltaic energy systems; new congestion charges will be shortly announced that will pile more cost on to polluting cars. He is said to be delighted that Richmond council, in west London, is planning to increase parking charges for cars that are heavy polluters.

Just as US mayors and state governors have led federal government in setting targets and timetables for emission cuts, Livingstone sees one of his roles to pummel and lobby central government, and other authorities, to act. The governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger was heading for defeat, Livingstone says, before he grabbed the climate change agenda. Now he is leading the polls again.

London is the first city in Britain to set itself statutory carbon dioxide emission reduction targets. They are roughly on a par with the government's - 20% cuts by 2015, 60% by 2050. They are not as much as Livingstone would like, or thinks possible, but they are as far as he thinks they can be pushed for the time being. London's particular problem is that, unlike most local authorities, aviation represents 30% of the city's emissions. To get them down means he absolutely must tackle flying as well as transport and housing.

To do so, he has linked with leading green campaigners. Charles Secrett, former head of Friends of the Earth, advises him, and Greenpeace has worked with him on devising a plan to decentralise energy. "Livingstone understands the increased threats that climate change poses and the incredible opportunities it presents if we act fast enough," Secrett says. "He sees London's future being shaped by our response to climate change threats, and that if we decentralise energy and have non-polluting transport systems we can create jobs, have a better standard of living and show others a way forward in a climate-changed future."

Other EU cities are far ahead of London, Livingstone says, but he's chuffed at what's been done in just a few years. London is the only large city in the world, he says, that has achieved a major shift in transport from car to bus. All the predictions were that car use would increase, but traffic levels have been held for six years. Four years ago, 38% of people used their cars daily in London, it's now 19%; there has been a 72% increase in cycling over four years and there will be a 70% decrease in bus emissions as 500 buses are converted to run on hybrid electric-diesel motors; renewable targets for buildings are to be doubled; there are 20% more pedestrian crossings and 48% fewer people died on the roads last year compared with 2000; in a year the low-emission zone comes in, curtailing heavy lorries and coaches.

Meanwhile, Livingstone has been to the US to link with other world cities to share knowledge on reducing emissions, and to China to see the beginning of the world's first major eco-city. London will not get a Dongtang - a carbon neutral city for 800,000 people, powered by wind and sun - but a minuscule version of 200 carbon-neutral homes in Docklands. Every bit helps.

"That's the future," he says. "That's the way the market is going. London is going to grow by 100,000 people over the next 10 years and we don't want anything built that will add to the problem. My vision is of a city with a lot less carbon emissions, a lot more walking, more public transport, more bicycles. If you look around London, it's not a very attractive place to walk round."

But he is criticised, too. His backing of a controversial £450m motorway-scale bridge over the Thames in east London will increase traffic and emissions and - say Friends of the Earth, the Greens and locals - increase environmental injustice for some of the poorest communities.

Restraint on development

Livingstone fiercely defends the scheme, saying the green campaigners are "dangerously close" to proposing that poor people should be restrained from developing. "They have at present no option about where they cross. It's not unreasonable that they should have one bridge," he says.

The locals of Beckton, contemplating 20,000 cars an hour passing through their community, are not impressed. "He's talking rubbish," says one of the local organisers of the opposition to the bridge. "It's only for car drivers and just 25% of us near the bridge have cars."

Livingstone is on far safer ground with climate change. "I do not think there's the slightest doubt that we can get the emissions down," he insists. "In the areas I have power, a lot is being done. Individuals are already making decisions not to have that extra weekend in Barcelona or Prague. Nothing we are doing means that anyone's quality of life needs to change. It's not a massive change. It's just doing things differently."

· Any comments on this article? Write to society@guardian.co.uk

In emissions battle, US cities vie to be 'greenest'

More than 300 mayors pledge to reduce greenhouse gases.

By Ron Scherer | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
NEW YORK

Cities often compete against one another: in the World Series, the right to host the Olympics, the battle to attract employers.

Now, some urban areas are starting a new race: to lead the nation in reducing greenhouse gases. In Massachusetts, the mayors of Salem and Worcester are competing to see who can sign up more customers for green power.

Chicago Mayor Richard Daley says he wants to make his city the greenest in America, and to back that up, the Windy City is planting trees, creating more rooftop gardens, and fast-tracking green buildings.

Wait a New York minute, Chicago. Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently announced intentions to make the Big Apple the leader in reducing greenhouse gases.

The concept is relatively simple: act locally to reduce global warming. This means city councils from Cambridge, Mass., to Seattle are changing building codes, beginning to encourage nonautomobile transport, and setting targets for carbon-dioxide reduction. The potential for greenhouse-gas reductions could eventually become significant, since cities are some of the major producers of greenhouse gases.

In all, some 319 mayors representing more than 51.4 million Americans have pledged they will attain the goals of the 1997 Kyoto agreement in their cities, even though the United States has not ratified the protocol. "The cities can do a lot to lead by example," says Andrew Shapiro, founder of GreenOrder, a sustainability strategy and marketing firm in New York. "Cities are where the majority of influencers are, such as the press, financiers, big company headquarters."

One organization that green-conscious cities can join is ICLEI, an international sustainable-development clearinghouse. Last year, half of the 212 member cities reported reducing greenhouse-gas emissions by a total of 23 million tons. (Cities are not obligated to report reductions.) This resulted in a savings of $550 million, due largely to increased energy efficiency.

ICLEI is providing members with computer software to help identify potential improvements. "It shows them how to start with the lowest hanging fruit and then move on to the more substantial changes," says Michelle Wyman, the Oakland, Calif.-based executive director.

Some cities have been actively involved in the process of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions for some time. That's the case with Seattle, which last month announced a plan by 2012 to reduce emissions by 7 percent, enough to meet the goal of the Kyoto Protocol.

Some solutions in Seattle involve shifting the entire municipal fleet to biodiesel, getting cruise ships to plug into the electrical system instead of running their engines when in port, and passing a green building code.

"We're also planning to launch a drive-smart campaign that examines your driving choices from operating the car to tire inflation," says Steve Nicholas, the city's director of the Office of Sustainability.

Next month, ICLEI will try to persuade yet more mayors to join. It expects to host 50 mayors at Robert Redford's Sundance resort in Utah. Two-thirds of them are known to be skeptics. However, "Some of the skeptics in the past are now our strongest supporters," says Ms. Wyman.

Achieving significant reductions in carbon-dioxide emissions will be a challenge for some cities. New York City currently represents about 2 percent of the nation's entire CO2 emissions. Most of its buildings are old and would require a significant investment to make them more energy-efficient.

"How many people regulate their heat in the winter by just opening their window?" asks Marc Brammer, executive director of New York Climate Rescue, a volunteer organization.

On a walk around midtown New York, Mr. Brammer stops outside a large condominium. There are no solar panels and no indications of any green technology. Like those in many New York buildings, he points out the boiler is likely to be 40 years old. "When will the city take on the real estate industry, the biggest political player, the 800-pound gorilla in the room, and tell them what they have to do?" he asks.

But Brammer also points out that the city is full of opportunities. There are enormous diesel fleets in New York, ranging from sanitation trucks to delivery trucks to Con Edison vehicles. And most of the city's ferries run on oil. "Right now, there is no biodiesel sold in the Tri-State area," he says. "Look at all the restaurants that fry food. With the old grease, we could run fleets of garbage and delivery trucks, and it would all be locally produced."

New York is still in the planning process for how it will implement the mayor's contention that the city will lead the nation in emission reductions. The heads of all the major city agencies are part of a committee studying the issue.

"The mayor has convened this group to thoroughly map out and do a community-wide assessment, not just a reduction in municipal emissions," says Michael Northrop, program director for Sustainable Development at the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. He says the report should be issued in the next two months.

While the city works on its report, the City Council is debating a proposal to commit the city to reduce its greenhouse-gas emissions by 20 percent by 2009 and 30 percent by 2020. "In the last 10 years, the city has been doing things that give us optimism in the direction we are going," says Ashok Gupta, director of air and energy programs at the Natural Resource Defense Council in New York.

Canadian cities petition U.S. to curb air pollution

Last Updated: Wednesday, November 1, 2006 | 12:07 PM AT
CBC News

Thirteen Canadian municipalities plan to file a petition with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday that calls for reduced emissions from 150 coal-fired plants in seven U.S. Midwestern states.

Albert Koehl, a lawyer for the Sierra Legal Defence Fund in Toronto, said the 150 coal-fired plants are polluters on a massive scale and are among the oldest and dirtiest in the United States.

The 150 U.S. plants produce emit twice as many tonnes of smog-producing sulphur dioxide and and nitrogen oxides as Canada's major industries combined, the Sierra Legal Defence Fund says.

The defence fund will file the petition on behalf of municipalities representing more than five million people in Central and Eastern Canada, including Toronto, Halifax, Windsor, Cornwall, Peel Region, Durham Region and Essex County in Ontario and Laval, Gatineau and Châteauguay in Quebec.

"It shows there's a groundswell of support among communities and their leaders to take matters into their own hands when it comes to protecting their own air, either from pollutants coming from abroad or even domestically," Koehl said.

Under U.S. law, the EPA is supposed to force power plants to lower their emissions if evidence exists that the emissions are harming the health of Canadians. The petition refers to evidence from international reports that document the flow of air pollution from the United States into Canada.

May have limited success under Bush administration

However, Koehl warned that under the administration of President George W. Bush, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has actually been trying to loosen air pollution laws rather than enforce them.

The petition may have a limited chance of success, he said.

He said it was nonetheless important for Canadian municipalities to join a fight by U.S. cities, states and environmental groups. There is already a slate of lawsuits by U.S. states calling for a reduction in emissions.

If the EPA fails to act, the Canadian municipalities have the right to sue the agency in U.S. courts.

Pollution from plants dwarfs Canadian totals

According to a news release from the defence fund, the 150 U.S. plants emit about 4.5 million tonnes of sulphur dioxide and 1.6 million tonnes of nitrogen oxides annually — double the amount produced by all of Canada's major industries combined.

These contaminants produce smog and acid rain.

"Windsor is in the eye of this toxic storm. Windsor gets about 90 per cent of its pollutants that cause smog from the U.S.," Koehl said.

The 150 plants emit about the same amount of greenhouse gases as does all of Canada, including its transportation, industry and oil sands industries, the news release said.

Originally filed in 2005 on behalf of a coalition of environmental groups, the amended petition includes new information on smog, acid rain and climate change.

U.S. pollution blamed for thousands of Ontario deaths

According to the Ontario government, about half of the 5,000 premature deaths caused by smog in the province every year can be attributed to air pollution that crosses the Canada-U.S. border.

Dr. David McKeown, Toronto's medical health officer, said the city has a serious air pollution problem, a large part of which is blowing in from across the U.S. border.

"About half of our airborne pollution comes from across the border in the United States. That pollution is coming from dirty coal-fired plants in the Ohio valley and in the Midwest," he said.

McKeown said he agrees that the petition will face an uphill battle. "In the U.S., efforts to weaken laws and regulations will make things worse for Ontario and people in Toronto," he said.

The Ontario government has joined one of the lawsuits launched by a U.S. state, but McKeown said the move is questionable, given its recent decision to withdraw its promise to close coal-fired plants in the province by 2009.

New Brunswick, Nova Scotia also affected

Halifax Mayor Peter Kelly said the air pollution is also causing problems in the Maritimes.

"As I understand it, over 50 per cent of air pollutants over New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are from the U.S. For us, we're trying to deal with what's coming our way, but also what we generate here as well."

The seven states in which the plants are located are Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky.

Change the world, one light at a time

Wakefield Observer

Thursday, November 2, 2006

The towns of Reading and Wakefield are squaring off in a neighborly competition to see which community can change the most light bulbs.

The two towns are challenging each other to see who can collect the most pledges to install energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulbs as part of ENERGY STAR's Change a Light, Change the World campaign.

Congressman John Tierney, D-Salem who has worked continuously to promote energy efficiency, initiated the friendly competition. As part of this national campaign, Tierney is encouraging individuals to pledge to replace at least one light with one that has earned the government's ENERGY STAR label - as a first step to conserve our energy resources and environment.

"If each household in the thirty-six communities of the 6th District switched just one bulb to an energy-efficient compact fluorescent lamp, we could save over $16 million in energy costs and prevent 137 million pounds of greenhouse gases from entering the atmosphere," said Tierney.

"If every home in the nation took this small step, we could save enough energy to light seven million homes. High energy costs and concern over global warming are not going away. This campaign promotes an easy step that everyone can take to be part of the solution."

"This is a win-win program, said Peter I. Hechenbleikner, Reading Town Manager. Residents get an opportunity to save money on energy costs and at the same time have a positive effect on the environment. What could be better?"

"The possibility of reducing energy costs and simultaneously improving the environment makes this a worthwhile endeavor," said Tom Butler, Town Manager of Wakefield.

"With ENERGY STAR rated lights using 60-70 percent less electricity than incandescent bulbs, the average household could save about $60 a year if they replaced five bulbs - plus they last 6 to 10 times as long," said Bill White of the Environmental Protection Agency.

Individuals can take the pledge online at ww.energystar.gov. They have the opportunity to pledge on behalf of their community and encourage friends to take the pledge as well.

The campaign runs through Nov. 30.

ENERGY STAR was introduced by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 1992 as a voluntary, market-based partnership to reduce air pollution through increased energy efficiency. Today, with assistance from the U.S. Department of Energy, the ENERGY STAR program offers businesses and consumers energy-efficient solutions to save energy and money, and help protect our environment for future generations. More than 8,000 organizations have become ENERGY STAR partners and are committed to improving the energy efficiency of products, homes and businesses. For more information about ENERGY STAR, visit www.energystar.gov or call toll-free 1-888-STAR-YES (1-888-782-7937).

The ENERGY STAR Change a Light Pledge is already having a dramatic impact. Individuals who pledged to change a light in 2005 alone have the potential to save more than $2 million in energy costs and prevent more than 33 million pounds of greenhouse gas emissions!

The ENERGY STAR Change a Light, Change the World campaign is an annual event sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, to encourage Americans to consider the energy they use and to switch to light bulbs and fixtures that have earned the government's ENERGY STAR for energy efficiency.

California Debates Ownership of Solar Renewable Energy Certificates

by Stephen Lacey, RenewableEnergyAccess.com

San Franciso, California [RenewableEnergyAccess.com]


November 12, 2006

A California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) proposed decision to grant 100% ownership of solar renewable energy certificates (SRECs) to utilities from solar system owners could hamper the California Solar Initiative (CSI) and slow down the state's burgeoning solar market, according to solar advocacy groups.

"If RECs go to the utilities, it is going to eliminate a very important revenue stream that can help make more projects possible."

-- David Hochschild, Executive Director of PV Now

But California utilities disagree, saying that it will encourage more utility participation in the solar program if they own SRECs and RECs from other renewable distributed generation (DG) facilities. The difference of opinion between solar groups and utilities is just one of many issues that need to be sorted out before implementation of the CSI on January 1, 2007.

David Hochschild, Executive Director of PV Now, said that utilities have no right to take 100% of SRECs from their customers. "If RECs go to the utilities, it is going to eliminate a very important revenue stream that can help make more projects possible," he said. "If they go to customers it's going to grow the solar market and everyone is going to benefit."

PV Now has partnered with the Vote Solar Initiative and the California Solar Energy Industries Association (CALSEIA) to oppose any ruling that takes RECs from solar system owners. According to these three organizations, there are many reasons for keeping RECs in the hands of the customer.

Firstly, ratepayers will benefit as more solar installations reduce load, therefore reducing the renewable energy procurement obligations of the utilities. According to Hochschild in a letter to CPUC President Michael Peevey, "every MWh of load reduction reduces RPS [renewable portfolio standard] procurement obligations by 33%." The goal of the California RPS is to get 20% of electricity from renewable resources by 2010.

Also, if only 30% of a solar system's cost is paid for by the state through rebates, utilities should not be able to claim 100% ownership of the energy generated. The government doesn't claim it owns the energy and neither should the utilities, the three parties said.

And finally, system owners will not be able to legally say they are solar powered if utilities claim ownership of the energy. RECs are the value of generated clean energy, so if they are not the property of the system owner, it can't be said that a building is solar powered. If companies cannot use this claim for their public image, it could affect their decision to invest in solar.

But the utilities have argued that they are helping out ratepayers who subsidize the solar and renewable DG programs by contributing SRECs toward the RPS procurement target. If the utilities have to buy the SRECs, they said, then ratepayers will be paying twice for the renewable energy output for the RPS requirements.

"Due to their substantial funding of renewable DG, it is appropriate that those ratepayers be permitted to count the output of those renewable generators toward meeting the utility RPS requirements," said Pacific Gas and Electric in a written statement to the CPUC.

But because the RPS and the CSI were created separately from each other, the SRECs should not automatically go toward the utilities' contribution to the RPS, said Hochschild. Lumping the two programs together will result in less offsets of CO2 emissions.

"The PV industry has been very consistently advocating that the RECs belong to the purchaser of a system and not to the utility, and that's our position as well," said Les Nelson, Executive Director for CALSEIA. "However, I can see the other position. If there's nothing in it for the utilities, there's going to be less of an incentive for them to become involved."

CPUC Administrative Law Judge Maryam Ebke will issue a proposed decision on who owns SRECs on November 14th. There will be a 30-day comment period after the ruling. Hochschild and other solar advocates are encouraging anyone interested in the proposed decision to become an intervener and file comments to the CPUC during this period.

Nike Named Top U.S. Company for Social Responsibility Reporting

GreenBiz

BEAVERTON, Oregon, Nov. 10, 2006 - Nike's commitment to industry-leading transparency in its social responsibility reporting has led to the company being named the top U.S. company and one of the world's top 10 in the latest SustainAbility Global Reporters Program ranking.

"Nike's inclusion on the list signifies its leadership in corporate responsibility and clearly sets it apart as one the world’s leading companies in sustainability reporting," said John Elkington, founder and chief entrepreneur at SustainAbility, the think tank and strategy consultancy that operates Global Reporters and produced the rankings in its “Tomorrow’s Value” report. “Similar to the other top reporters, Nike is embracing the idea that sustainability and reporting are about far more than mitigating risk and appeasing stakeholders, they are the very basis for entrepreneurship inside their company that will lead to strategic innovations and the building of new markets yet to come.”

Global Reporters is the flagship SustainAbility research program and report that surveys and ranks leading practice in corporate sustainability reporting. The report is published in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and Standard and Poor’s. The report ranks the world’s leaders in corporate sustainability reporting, transparency and disclosure. Nike’s ranking is based on its 2004 report.

“We believe transparency is central to responsible business strategy and that reporting is key to delivering transparency,” said Hannah Jones, vice president of corporate responsibility for Nike. “It is an honor for us to be ranked among the world’s leading companies for sustainability reporting. We see reporting as the pathway for all companies that are serious about their corporate responsibility efforts. We aim to continue finding innovative ways to detail our targets, report on our success against them and articulate our strategy for embedding corporate responsibility throughout our business operations as a source of inspiration and innovation for employees, consumers and stakeholders alike.”

Nike’s 2004 report, released in April 2005, highlighted the Nike brand’s CR priorities, programs, progress and challenges relating to workers in contract factories; employees and diversity; the environment; and community investment during the period covering primarily Nike’s 2004 fiscal year (FY04), which began June 1, 2003 and ended May 31, 2004. In addition, the company became the first in its industry to voluntarily disclose the names and locations of active contract factories making its products. For advice in preparing the report, Nike invited experts from the trade union, NGO, academic, investor and business communities, acting in their capacities as individuals, to participate in a Report Review Committee (RRC). The committee provided feedback that helped establish the scope, coverage and focus for the company’s report and in addition provided unedited comments on the content of the report and the reporting process that are included in the report.

The 2004 report earned Nike widespread praise for setting a new level of transparency in the industry, including the Ceres-ACCA North American Award for Sustainability Reporting. Fortune magazine named the company to its annual “Best Companies to Work For” list, noting its compliance efforts and response to overseas manufacturing conditions. The socially responsible investment community also responded to Nike’s sustainability reporting and transparency efforts, with the company earning placement on the Calvert Social Index, Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes, KLD’s Broad Market and Large Cap Social Indices, and FTSE4Good Index Series.

The 2004 report is located at www.nikeresponsibility.com/reports. Nike plans to release its next report covering fiscal years 2005 and 2006 in the spring of 2007.

Many Companies See Opportunity in Sustainability, But Few Have Strategies, Says Report

GreenBiz

NEW YORK, Nov. 10, 2006 - A majority of big companies concerned with corporate responsibility issues acknowledge that they lack an active strategy to develop new business opportunities based on those concerns, according to a new report by The Conference Board.

The report is based on a new survey of 198 medium to large multinational companies. It is the first report issued by The Center for Corporate Citizenship & Sustainability, just launched by The Conference Board, to help senior executives seize opportunities and avert risks stemming from corporate social responsibility issues.

Nearly half (46%) of the responding companies say that corporate citizenship and sustainability are major sources of business opportunity and not only sources of business risk alone. When added to the 44% who see these issues as sources of both risk and opportunity, a total of 90% of participating companies say their company's approach to corporate citizenship and sustainability issues reflects at least some belief in the potential rewards.

"This mixed perspective of a glass more than half full of market awareness and nearly half empty of product response demonstrates that there is work to be done in bringing corporate citizenship, sustainability, or 'CSR’ programs to the forefront of top executives’ minds," says David J. Vidal, Research Director, Global Corporate Citizenship, The Conference Board.

Two-thirds of survey participants say that corporate citizenship and sustainability issues are of growing importance for their businesses. But the absence of a link between an awareness of these issues and a verifiable means of extracting a business benefit from them was further underscored in survey respondents’ choices of the three greatest challenges currently facing citizenship programs: measuring results (cited by 75%); coping with limited financial and staffing resources (58%); and aligning with business objectives (57%).

While the majority of companies say they are not active in citizenship and sustainability-related business product development, a majority (62 percent) have formal programs to manage their corporate citizenship and sustainability practice. Another 35 percent lack a formal program but conduct regular reviews of these activities.

The top three activities that are the focus of current citizenship and sustainability attention are community and stakeholder involvement (64%), corporate giving to worthy causes (55%), and environmental sustainability/climate change (52%).

Ninety-two percent of companies surveyed cite “enhancing corporate reputation and brand” as an “extremely important” (55%) or “very important” (37%) internal driver of their corporate citizenship programs. No other choice came close in importance. Twenty-six percent say that “managing corporate reputation and brand” is one of the top three challenges they face today.

Recruiting and retaining talent is second in importance with a combined rating of 78% (42% “very important” and 36% “extremely important”); reducing risk is third (64% total: 36% “very important” and 28% “extremely important”); and developing innovative products and services fourth at 60% (31% “very important” and 29% “extremely important”).

Survey participants named the C-suite board of directors and employees as the two major internal stakeholder groups with the most influence on corporate citizenship and sustainability issues.

The C-suite and the board earn a 76% mention (27% “extremely important” and 49% “very important”) and employees 71% (22% “extremely important” and 49% “very important”).

“This indicates that the migration of these issues up the corporate authority chain is well under way, and that the internalization of these issues by employee groups is also significant,” says Vidal.??Boards of directors are routinely engaged in reviewing citizenship and sustainability activities at 49% of responding companies, while another 40% say that their boards do this only from time to time. Only 11% indicate no board review involvement at all on these issues.

Among purely or largely external stakeholder groups, the order of influence on company citizenship policies is local communities at 70% (25% “extremely important” and 45% “very important”); customers and consumers at 65% (25% extremely important” and 40% “very important”); and shareholders at 52% (23% “extremely important” and 29% “very important”).

The influence of shareholders is considered roughly equal to that of governments—51% (19% “extremely important” and 32% “very important”). The measure of influence of financial institutions and investors on corporate citizenship and sustainability policies is recognized by 43% of respondents (16% “extremely important” and 27% “very important”).

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the media, once important forces in designing corporate citizenship policies, now rank last (37% and 27% respectively).

Most companies surveyed (71%) report publicly on citizenship and sustainability performance. A total of 52% do so in self-standing annual corporate citizenship/social responsibility reports apart from their annual financial reports. A substantial 40% reference these matters in their annual reports.

Kyoto Nations Explore Baby Steps

Reuters 11:25 AM Nov, 11, 2006

NAIROBI -- No breakthrough will happen next week in talks to extend the Kyoto pact on global warming, but a softening of stances will produce an agreement on next steps to take, senior negotiators have told Reuters.

Ready to debate a united response to the threat of climate change, 189 countries are scheduled to attend a 2-week conference in Nairobi.

The Kyoto Protocol has already taken a very small first step to curbing man's contribution to climate change, capping greenhouse-gas emissions by some industrialized nations. Scientists say much tougher caps are needed to avert catastrophic weather changes.

Developing countries have now come to accept that the developed world has to take time to work out the scope of the emissions cuts it can afford with available technologies.

"They have themselves proposed that this be a first step in the work map," said Michael Zammit Cutajar, head of the U.N. group set up to plot Kyoto's future post-2012. "I don't think there will be a date on it. It will be a series of steps, on the overall understanding that the deal will be done in time for the parties to ratify before the end of 2012."

The EU's chief negotiator, Outi Berghall from the current EU president Finland, also saw agreement on next steps: "We want to establish a work program and how to proceed. In my understanding it should be possible here because, even in Group 77 (the developing countries), it's understood that we need some analytical work."

The European Union has accepted cuts to be implemented by 2012, when Kyoto's provisions expire.

Poorer nations had feared any delay in negotiations might pile pressure on them to make binding emissions cuts themselves. They argue that they cannot take action on climate change until they pull themselves out of poverty.

But not all developing countries are in the same position, said Berghall: "Some of the countries we classify as developing countries have higher GDP per capita than some in the EU, while some are very poor indeed."

Asked about South Korea, for example, she said: "We would like them to have a greater role ... even binding commitments. Of course that would be very welcome if they would take it."

Former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern last month injected fresh urgency in the climate change debate, saying failure to act could trigger severe floods and harsh droughts, uproot as many as 200 million people, and cause economic upheaval on the scale of the Depression of the 1930s.

Maine campuses embrace sustainability

Maine Today
October 12, 2006

A recycling bin for empties in the dorm foyer doesn't cut it anymore.
College and university campuses have gone green big-time in the past few years. Lecture halls are heated with biodiesel fuels, the food in the dining hall is grown down the street, and the leftovers are composted.

By embracing the sustainability movement, schools hope to contain soaring energy costs, show the rest of the world what can be done to help reverse climate change, and even win the notice of potential students.

"We ought to mirror the action that we expect in society, and for us to be irresponsible polluters is even less acceptable than for anyone else," said David Hales, president of the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, which this fall became the first college in the nation to adopt a "net zero" greenhouse gas emissions policy.

The policy means the college will use less fuel to reduce its own emissions or invest in activities such as wind power to offset the emissions created by the college, including travel to and from the school by students.

Most Maine colleges have set up sustainability committees and sustainability offices complete with staff who issue newsletters and ensure that new construction is up to the latest environmental standards.

Some Maine colleges have joined the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education, a Portland, Ore., group formed last year to promote environmentally sound practices with a membership of more than 160 colleges and universities.

Katherine Creswell, an intern with Bowdoin College's Sustainability Office, said a survey of incoming freshmen this year showed that they shopped for colleges with the environment in mind.

"Overwhelmingly they said they all care and looked at schools with sound environmental practices that were in keeping with their beliefs," Creswell said.
Her office is working closely with the admissions office to make sure that Bowdoin's sustainability programs are prominently displayed on the admissions office Web site and that tour guides mention the environmentally focused efforts taking place.
This fall, a host of new initiatives kicked off at Maine colleges and universities.

HEATING WITH VEGETABLE OIL

The University of New England in Biddeford is experimenting with citrus-based cleaners and is heating one of its buildings with vegetable oils this year after converting its fleet of diesel vehicles to biodiesel last year. The two projects percolated up from students and faculty members before receiving an endorsement to go ahead from the university's environmental council.

"The university recognizes this is a high priority for many students," said Matt Haas, assistant vice president of campus services.

At Unity College, students are raising their own meat for the first time on 40 acres of what had been unused pasture. The point is to wean the campus from trucking meat in from the Midwest, burning fossil fuels in the process, said coordinator Aimee Sawyer.

The students started out with seven Katahdin sheep. Three will be slaughtered soon and served as burgers and stew at the campus student center. The others will be kept for breeding. The students are also caring for 10 beef cattle on loan to the college to determine whether a beef operation will work.

Sawyer said setting up a sheep and cattle ranch on a college campus can be complicated, especially if the student body, like Unity's, includes a mix of animal rights activists and hunters. The student handbook was revised just in case to include a section on disciplinary actions that would result from tampering with the animals in any way.

Most students seem to understand the value of raising meat on campus, said Eric Bragg, a senior from Thetford, Vt., and president of the campus chapter of Future Farmers of America.

Bragg said the exercise has also taught students about sustainable farm practices, such as organically reclaiming a field for pasture while ensuring the grass offers top nutritional value.

"We are really utilizing the land to full potential," he said.

COMMUNAL BICYCLES

Bowdoin students launched the Bowdoin Communal Bike Club to entice people to stop driving and start pedaling instead, said coordinator Ben Lake, a senior from Stillwater, Minn. The bikes are placed strategically around the campus for use by any club members. The program grew out of two years of discussions and surveys to determine whether anyone was interested. The project got the go-ahead and even a small budget from the student activities council.

The bikes were largely donated by campus security, which winds up with racks of unclaimed bikes each year. Lake has been slowly repairing them and painting them bright yellow. The first two bikes, dubbed Annabel and Beatrice, hit the campus late last month.

"I have been getting a lot of positive feedback," Lake said.

Already more than 50 people have signed up for the club, paying $1 in dues annually in exchange for the combination to the bike locks.

Faculty at the University of Southern Maine are being trained to incorporate sustainability issues into their lectures, thanks to a program initiated last year by Sandy Wachholz, an associate professor of criminology. She believes it's possible to make environmental issues relevant to any discipline.

"We look at it in the context of spraying pesticides to eradicate illegal drugs and the impact of that on the environment," she said.

So far 30 teachers have gone through the program.

KITCHEN COMPOSTING

The University of Maine at Farmington is about to expand its kitchen composting program, adding compostable to-go containers and eating utensils made from corn byproducts to the retail food counter. Last year the campus composted 24,000 pounds of kitchen waste, such as vegetable peelings and old bread. This year all scraps left on plates are also composted, said Chris Kinney, dining services director.

"It is the right thing to do and an exciting thing to do," he said.

Last week seven College of the Atlantic students flew off to a United Nations global climate conference in Nairobi, Kenya, but only after purchasing carbon offsets, which involves paying a company to reduce the amount of carbon dixoide in the atmosphere by the same amount contributed by the buyer's activity, such as traveling.

Matt McInnis, 19, a sophomore from Portland, paid about $50 for his offset, which will be used to introduce clean energy into the grid. He even purchased carbon offsets to cancel out his family's carbon emissions.

"They were really pretty psyched about it," he said.

Staff Writer Beth Quimby can be contacted at 791-6363 or at: bquimby@pressherald.com

Hull, Massachusetts Wins DOE Wind Power Pioneer Award

EERE News

11/7/2006

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced that the town of Hull, Massachusetts is receiving the 2006 Wind Power Pioneer Award. Hull’s wind program, which serves more than 10 percent of local energy needs, was cited for leadership, demonstrated success and innovation.



The Town of Hull was one of twelve public power utilities from across the United States nominated for the award this year. Given by the DOE Wind Powering America program, the award is being presented at the American Public Power Association’s 2006 Customer Connections Conference in San Antonio, Texas on November 7.



The Town of Hull is being honored for its outstanding leadership in advancing the use of wind power in a coastal community. The award recognizes Hull’s success in engaging the entire community to understand and move forward together on this project, from school teachers, utility engineers and local leaders to state government, academia and industry.



Located on a peninsula in Boston Harbor, the Town of Hull first developed wind power in the 1820s. Modern wind technology came to Hull in the 1980s, when the school district installed a small-scale wind power project. The Hull Municipal Light Plant supported that effort and subsequently worked with Citizen Advocates for Renewable Energy, to plan a utility-scale project. A 660-kW turbine, Hull Wind 1, was installed on the harbor in 2001. This past spring, the Hull Municipal Light Plant dedicated a second turbine. Hull Wind 2 is a 1.8 MW Vestas V80, installed on a closed landfill. The two wind turbines supply more than 10 percent of the community’s energy needs.



Award finalists, which will also be recognized, include American Municipal Power – Ohio, the City of Palo Alto (CA), CPS Energy (San Antonio, TX), and Sacramento Municipal Utility District (CA).



The American Public Power Association is the national service organization representing the Nation’s more than 2,000 community- and state-owned electric utilities and it cosponsors the Wind Pioneer Awards program. Previous winners have included municipal utilities in Waverly, Iowa, Fort Collins, Colorado, and Austin, Texas.



Wind Powering America is a program of the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE). The program is committed to dramatically increasing the use of wind energy in the United States.


EERE, through its Wind Powering America effort and other programs, is helping the nation achieve targeted regional economic development, enhanced power generation options, improved environmental conditions, increased domestic energy supply and national security. For more information visit www.eere.doe.gov.

When it comes to global warming, market rule poses a mortal danger

Jonathan Freedland
Wednesday October 25, 2006

Guardian

Whose job is it to stop climate change? For a while, it's seemed like it's up to us, as individuals, to change our personal behavior. Witness the BBC news item this week, exposing Britons' sloppy habit of leaving electronic appliances on stand-by, in contrast with the conscientious, energy-efficient Germans. David Cameron's wind turbine on the roof, even his cycling, have fed the notion that greenism is now all about personal conduct.

But we should be careful: climate change is too big a problem to be solved simply by virtuous individuals hopping on a bus instead of taking the car, or disconnecting the tumble dryer, valuable though those moves are. This is one responsibility that can't be saddled solely on activists and consumers. This is a job for government.

Which means governments, no less than individuals, have to rethink their behavior. Until now, administrations here and abroad have tended to dump climate change into the laps of their environment ministries. The odd speech from the president or prime minister, to raise the issue's profile, but otherwise filed under "e" for environment.

That approach is no longer, how shall we put it, sustainable. It should be obvious that climate change is not a discrete policy problem but an across-the-board threat to every aspect of our lives, if not our very survival. Confronted with a planetary emergency, it takes a special kind of bureaucratic myopia to allocate it to a single government ministry.

Yesterday there were two signs that this penny has at last dropped. The first, reported in the Guardian this morning, was word of a new climate change bill, which will create a new body dedicated to following the science on global warming and setting targets on carbon emissions decade by decade. The second sign was a useful speech by Margaret Beckett. She flew to Berlin to give it (thereby adding to a carbon dioxide cloud of nearly 1,000 tonnes in 2005-2006 alone, thanks to the 6.5m air miles racked up by traveling British cabinet ministers and their entourages), but we'll put that particular inconvenient truth to one side. Significantly, this was a speech about climate change delivered not by an environment minister but by the foreign secretary. "This is not just an environmental problem," she said. "It is a defense problem. It is a problem for those who deal with economics and development, conflict prevention, agriculture, finance, housing, transport, innovation, trade and health." She's right, with economics the obvious example.

Next Monday, Sir Nicholas Stern will deliver his report on the economics of climate change, and I'm told his message will be stark. He believes that climate change represents the biggest market failure ever, bigger than the two world wars and the Depression put together. To combat it will cost a huge amount. But Stern will say that it is affordable, if only because a refusal to act will end up costing a whole lot more.

Still, if global warming is inseparable from economics, it casts a similar shadow over foreign policy. John Ashton, who sits as the UK's special representative for climate change within the Foreign Office, reckons that the fires that diplomats spend their lives putting out will only proliferate as the planet heats up. He cites Darfur, where a main cause of conflict has been a shift in rainfall, pitting nomadic herders against settled pastoralists. "And there will be more Darfurs," he says, the more the climate changes. As Beckett put it yesterday: "Wars fought over limited resources - land, fresh water, fuel - are as old as history itself." And climate change threatens to reduce the supply of each one of those resources in some of the most unstable places on Earth, with Africa and the Middle East first in line.

More straightforward still, if we remain dependent on fossil fuels, then we remain dependent on the countries that produce them. That leaves us held to ransom by Russia for its gas, and the Gulf states for oil. Even if global warming did not matter, that would be a hard-headed, realpolitik reason to wean ourselves off fossil fuels.

Still, more hearteningly, if climate change is a foreign policy problem, foreign policy can surely be part of the climate change solution. It's a truism that carbon dioxide does not recognize borders, and that any effort to tackle it will have to be supranational. Ideally, that would mean global treaties, accepted by everyone, which would see the entire human race come together to deal with a threat that is choking the planet we all share. But that's hardly likely, not when the world's biggest polluter, the US, is still led by an administration barely emerging from official denial that there is a problem at all.

That means interim action, starting with the EU. Heaven knows there are ample reasons to be skeptical about the EU, but when it comes to tackling climate change, we should fall to our knees and give thanks that such a body exists. It has more clout, over a larger area, than any single country could ever hope to wield. With its mighty €120bn budget, it can encourage the technological innovations, from alternative energies to more efficient gadgets, that might get us out of this mess. And it can regulate out of existence those that make our troubles worse.

Some diplomats are pushing for ever closer engagement with China, working urgently to perfect the technology that might capture the carbon generated by coal-fired power stations, sending it back into the earth rather than into the atmosphere. That's especially pressing in the case of China, which is building a new coal-fired station every four or five days.

Why doesn't the EU go further, constructing a low-carbon free trade area with China, a single market for low-carbon technology? Europeans might design, say, an ultra-efficient fridge; China could build it and, with the resulting economies of scale, they could end up selling them all over the world.

All these ideas are fizzing away among those who have come to realize that no area of life is left untouched by this danger. Very smart people in government ministries across the globe are trying to think of the right blend of taxes, regulation, incentives and trading schemes that might stop the world emitting too much carbon. They acknowledge that most of the $17 trillion (£9 trillion) that will be spent in the energy sector between now and 2030 will be spent by private companies - and that, therefore, public servants are limited to prodding and pushing them, hoping they move in the right direction.

But a heretical thought nags. Governments are limited in what they can do because they no longer control the key economic levers: if they did, they could act swiftly. Instead, they are left hoping that market mechanisms will work their magic and that the polluters' behavior will change. But that can take time and time is the one commodity we don't have. As John Ashton says: "We don't set the deadlines, nature sets the deadlines." It's true that we cannot go back to the days of state ownership and the command economy. (True, too, that state-run industries polluted as badly as private ones, and were often achingly slow to change). Yet if ever there was a time when the sovereignty of the market posed a mortal danger, it is surely now.