ON SUMMER BREAK, Back in October

Posted on 07-29-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Administrative Update, Weekly Feature

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We have secured several consulting projects during the last few weeks, so I will not have time to post stories for the next two months or so. When I do come back, the Blog will be less active. The audience for Paper and Other Absolute Truths has remained, for the most part,  those individuals who work in the paper and related industries. Readership is almost always highest when reports cover paper or paper/environmental topics. When we begin again in October, the plan is to post 2-5 paper/environmental reports a month. As time allows, and  venting seems emotionally cathartic, I will delve into other subjects – but to a much lesser degree than has been the case previously.

Also, I apologize that the “NewVerso” story, which was to be posted in July, will have to be delayed.

De-development Won’t Save the U.S from Increasing Levels of Energy Dependence

Posted on 07-08-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Energy Issues, Environmental Issues, Fossil Fuels, Weekly Feature

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The Jon Stewart clip we posted two days ago reminded us that the last eight U.S. presidents promised energy independence. (If you have not watched it yet, don’t miss Jon Stewart on “Energy Independence” ).  The promises went unfulfilled, however, as we have become more and more dependent on foreign oil over the last 40 years.

Why have we failed to accomplish this objective? Unfortunately, oil supplies are finite and our energy wants seem infinite. U.S. oil production peaked in 1970, but U.S. demand for oil continues to grow rapidly. Our economic growth and prosperity over the last century have allowed us to build an energy intensive society that runs on fossil fuels – primarily oil. Meanwhile, we have not allowed the development of energy sources that would reduce this dependence.

The point Jon Stewart makes is that it is time to face the truth. We are dependent on foreign oil, and we are going to be dependent on foreign oil long into the future.

However, what Stewart does not address is that political decisions made in the past determined our present – and political decisions that will be made during Obama’s term as president will determine our future – at least for a time. We can either choose to reduce energy dependence or to increase it. It is up to us.

How can this imbalance be resolved? There are only two ways. Increase the supply of energy, or reduce the demand.

President Obama makes “energy independence” speeches like the previous seven presidents, but his approach is dramatically different. Each of the other seven presidents did what they felt was prudent in setting aside funds for developing alternative sources of energy, and encouraging conservation.

The last seven presidents, however, understood the supply side of the equation. They knew that we needed to encourage the development of as much U.S. based fossil fuel energy as possible. Their philosophies differed on coal, nuclear, offshore, etc. but they all recognized that fossil fuel supply was as crucial as demand.

Obama, however, has a simplistic and dangerously naïve view. He sees fossil fuels as evil. He speaks out against the oil sands in Canada. The offshore drilling ban will significantly reduce U.S. supplies. The president hopes to place a carbon tax on coal. A cap and trade system would also greatly increase energy costs, create a gigantic government bureaucracy, and make energy development in the U.S. less competitive.

Around the time Obama was voted into office the enormous potential of natural gas shale deposits was becoming evident – and yet nothing is being done (politically) to encourage the use of this new energy source in automobiles. This is a clean-energy windfall of gigantic proportion and yet the President ignores it, simply because it is a fossil fuel.

The fact that his policies will dramatically reduce supply and increase energy costs doesn’t faze the President. The President’s supply answer is wind, solar, ethanol, and wood. But that is not the whole story. The President also has a plan for the demand side of the equation. Obama is intent on changing the way we live. In order to wean us from our dependence on fossil fuels, he is very willing to use economic weakness to get us there. In fact, a forced redistribution of economic resources, along with “de-development”, is the objective.Obama’s new science tsar John Holdren has similar beliefs; that is why he was chosen for this post. Holdren describes it this way.

“A massive campaign must be launched to restore a high-quality environment in North America and to de-develop the United States. De-devolopment means bringing our economic system (especially patterns of consumption) into line with the realities of ecology and the global resource situation. Resources and energy must be diverted from frivolous and wasteful uses in overdeveloped countries to filling the genuine needs of underdeveloped countries.”

“The need for de-development presents our economists with a major challenge. They must design a stable, low-consumption economy in which there is a much more equitable distribution of wealth than the present one. Redistribution of wealth both within and among nations is absolutely essential, if a decent life is to be provided for every human being.”

(I looked up photos to see what I could find under “de-development”  and I found this photo of  Ted Kaczynski, the Harvard trained Unibomber. He was ahead of his time – a man committed to de-development.)

To claim that the President intends to de-develop the economy seems extreme, I suppose, but how else can we explain the President’s actions. Costly and subsidized alternative energy is not going to grow rapidly enough to fill the energy void – that is a fact. If Obama’s energy policies are enacted – energy costs are going to soar! That is a certainty.

The economy is resilient, but it can be killed. All travel businesses, auto sales, etc will be directly damaged. Businesses will raise prices to recover higher energy costs. Individuals will then have less income to spend on more expensive products. High energy and health care costs will send the economy into another severe depression.

De-development may sound innocuous, but it is frightening. Obama and Holdren have no idea of the problems they are about to unleash.

For those of us who prefer growth, rather than decline, we can hope that sanity returns – that neither the cap and trade nor the carbon tax is passed. New natural gas supplies will continue to grow and that could ultimately save us. Nuclear energy must be revived, but this is not a short term solution. We live in perilous economic times.

Green America Suggests that We “Get with the [Recycling] Program”

Posted on 06-14-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Environmental Issues, Recycling, Weekly Feature

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Frank Lacontore of Green America commented on my recycling stories in April… see here and here. His retort was condescending, but I always appreciate hearing from readers, even when they have an attitude.

His comment follows, in its entirety. When you reach the end, I will take my turn.

This is an important discussion and I thank Verlefor raising the issue. As one of those “distrustful” NGOs, it would probably be helpful to provide my perspective. My points are the paper industry and NGOs are working together, and that decisions should be based on relevant comparisons.

In full disclosure, I am employed by the non profit, Green America and I direct our Better Paper Project assisting magazines’ efforts to use environmentally responsible paper. As one of the founding members of the Environmental Paper Network (EPN), I also collaborate with some of those other “frightening” and “distrustful” NGOs like ForestEthics, Dogwood Alliance, and National Wildlife Federation (NWF).

With the AF&PA, the EPN co-hosted a Paper Summitin AF&PA’s DC offices on 4/8 to talk about recovering more paper from the waste stream. You ask, “How will we recover more paper?” Guess what? We decided to collaborate; yes, NGOsand industry, and EPA, and academic institutions, and waste haulers would collaborate to boost recovery to 75% up from the current 63% recovery rate. A couple of the decisions we made that day were to develop a cohesive and comprehensive communication strategy to help educate people about recycling particularly children in K-12; and, we’d build more support from office building owners and managers to collect their paper.

As for using relevant comparisons, the argument that P&W consumers using recycled paper are harming the environment is just way off the mark. A magazine publisher’s (overly simplified) paper decision is will I print on virgin fiber paper or recycled paper? They are not deciding whether or not to print their magazine on recycled P&W vs. recycled newsprint or paperboard. If a magazine decides to use recycled paper, they will need, on average, 1.4 tons of recovered paper to make 1 ton of recycled paper – a 71.4% fiber efficiency. {We’ve learned from your recent post about your conversation with FutureMark CEO Steve Silver, that they have a much higher fiber efficiency than the average.] But, here’s the key comparison: That 71.4% fiber efficiency must be compared to the magazine’s other choices CGW or CFS, not newsprint or egg cartons. If a magazine publisher chooses CGW it requires 2.2 tons of fresh wood to make 1 ton of virgin fiber paper – a 45% fiber efficiency. If the publisher chooses CFS, they are choosing to consume 4.4 tons of fresh trees to make 1 ton of paper – a 23% fiber efficiency.

I havenot seen any research that demonstrates pulping 2.2 or 4.4 tons of trees is less energy intensive, uses less water, emits fewer greenhouse gases, or diverts more paper from the waste stream than the process of deinking 1.4 tons of paper.

Yes, there is conflict between NGOs and industry, and, just as in with democracy, a respectful debate around conflicting ideas can be healthy and drive towards lasting solutions. But, being fearful and distrustful is not just unhelpful, it’s so 2002. The last ten years has ushered in a new era of collaboration and activism. Let’s get with the program and work together to solve the problems.

Point 1 – Mr. Lacontore put “distrustful” and “dangerous” in quotes, as if it were bizarre to accuse such altruistic organizations of deceit and self-interest.  Later he suggested that “being fearful and distrustful is not just unhelpful, it’s so 2002”.

That “holier than ‘for profit’” nonsense doesn’t fly here. Fund raising and philosophy drive NGOs, and that makes them more dangerous than “for profit” businesses that are primarily motivated by financial success. 

Oh, and I can’t believe he really made that “it’s so 2002″ comment. Admittedly, I am not a very good writer, but I could never have come up with a phrase so reflective of eastern, liberal, elitism. Wow, that is perfect.

“Virtue is more to be feared than vice, because its excesses are not subject to the regulation of conscience.” — Adam Smith

Mr. Lacontore writes that we should not be fearful, but he had to be smiling and winking at the time. The entire environmental movement is based on fear. These organizations sell fear like a commodity. They warn us that we will not have enough clean water, clean air, trees, waste disposal sites, and most crucial of all, climate is out-of-control. “Act now, before it is too late.”  Over and over we hear these emotional pleas. Remember, if there is no fear, then there is no money coming in. (For more on “fear” and NGOs, see pages 2 and 3 from Conventional Wisdom and the Modern Environmental Movement, part one). 

Then, of course, fear is the strategy these organizations use to coerce corporations into agreeing to this program or that. ForestEthics and Greenpeace blatantly admit to blackmailing corporations. They are proud of these “campaigns” – which, by the way, are great fund raisers. I see on the Green America web site that this NGO tells us where to shop and where not to shop, where to invest, and what companies to boycott. Obviously, Mr. Lacontore wants his NGO to be feared, and it is disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

I am afraid of these organizations. Not because they can harm me personally, but because of the impact of their policies. Pressure from environmental organizations resulted in changed laws that led to the deaths of tens of millions of the poor. See here, and here, and here. Many other programs, particularly those related to climate change will, if adopted, wreak economic havoc, and result in more pronounced world poverty.

Point 2 – In his third paragraph, Lacontore misquotes me. I did not ask “How will we recover more paper?”, but that is the question he answers. He goes on to describe initiatives that his NGO and others are involved in that will assist in recovering more paper. That is wonderful. I have been encouraging NGOs to become more involved in paper recovery for many years. By the way, while working on this issue, I hope they are also addressing the contamination problems being created by growth in the single stream collection method.

Point 3 – Lacontore suggests that my “argument that P&W [printing and writing] consumers using recycled paper are harming the environment is just way off the mark”. He then goes on to compare the fiber recovery rate of 71.4% (when converting waste paper into P&W grades) with his estimates of fiber efficiency rates when using virgin fiber.

(These fiber efficiency rates of 45% for coated groundwood and 23% for coated free sheet have little meaning, for a number of reasons. We will just mention a few items, and then move back to the main issue. First, harvesting trees is not a bad thing and preferable to allowing trees to die of disease, old age, and fire. Second, virgin fiber is needed to produce lumber and paper, etc because we can not recycle more than 100% of all waste paper recovered. There is no more waste paper to recycle. Third, the majority of fiber used to produce paper in North America is residual fiber which is a lumber mill by-product.)

Lacontore  frames his argument as a choice between using recycled fiber to produce P&W grades and using virgin fiber to produce these same grades. But that is not the issue. The issue is that there is more demand for recycled fiber than there is supply. We can not increase the use of recycled fiber in P&W grades without reducing the use of recycled fiber in other grades. The choice is simply where to use the limited supply of recycled fiber at our disposal.

In order to be clear, a summary of our position on paper recovery and recycling follows.

1. Recovering waste paper and recycling it is a net positive for the environment.

2. Since more fiber is recycled when utilizing waste paper for production of packaging, and the lower quality paper grades (as well as insulation and other industrial applications) these low-end applications generally havea relative environmental benefit over P&W grades. (Steve Silver of FutureMark taught us that this is not always the case. His company’s coated groundwood mill does not fit the pattern and utilizes recycled fiber even more efficiently than newsprint recycled machines.)

3. For at least the last decade, probably the last 15 years, and maybe the last 20 years, all recovered paper has been recycled. Recovered paper does not go to landfill! A possible exception to this blanket statement might be a short period of time in late 2008 or early 2009 after the financial crisis.

4. So in summary, if we choose to use the limited amount of recovered paper we have access to in the production of higher quality grades (with the FutureMark exception), then the amount of fiber recycled would be reduced due to lower efficiency. Therefore, promoting recycled fiber in new value-added applications (copy paper, magazines, direct mail, Sunday inserts, etc) results in less paper fiber being recycled.

Let’s not exaggerate; the amount of fiber lost or gained from using recycled fiber to produce one grade rather than another is not enormous. It has only a very small environmental impact. Nevertheless, the point is that NGO and government pressures to increase recycled content are not only unneeded, but disruptive to the free market system (drive some of the most efficient paper recyclers out of business), and are even negative for the environment.

What Steps Can We Take to Recycle More Paper

The actual question I had asked (see point 2 above) was, “How do we increase the amount of paper being recycled?” In the past I suggested that there was only one way to increase the amount of paper being recycled, but I have modified that stance a bit. There is one primary step we can take to recycle more paper, and that is to recover more waste paper. Growth in the use of recycled fiber is not constrained by too little demand, but by too little supply.

Although  increasing paper recovery rates is the primary answer, there are at least two other ways we can recycle more paper fiber. The single stream collection method is contaminating and destroying up to 20% of all the paper recovered. It is extremely important, therefore, to take steps to clean up this means of paper recovery. If the single stream method can not be fixed, then other methods for collecting paper should be developed.

Lastly, utilizing recovered paper in the most efficient manner increases the amount of fiber being recycled.

Increasing Demand is not the Answer

Creating additional demand for recycled fiber does not result in more paper being recycled! That would only be the case if additional demand saved recovered paper from going into landfill – and it doesn’t.

Just as an aside, it could be argued that high demand for waste paper is actually resulting in reduced supply. If municipal waste collection companies had to work hard to find buyers for their waste paper, then they would do a better job of figuring out how to reduce paper contamination. As it is, with recovered paper in short supply, waste paper buyers are forced to buy whatever is collected, regardless of the poor quality. Waste companies have no incentive to reduce contamination. In fact, throwing a little garbage into each bale of paper increases the weight, and therefore the price, of that bale of “paper”. I am not suggesting that this happens intentionally, but it is clear that waste companies have inadequate financial incentive to improve the cleanliness of the process.

How About the Future?

Even if paper consumption was still growing in North America (so that the supply of recovered paper was increasing), and even if there had been no great surge of demand from China, the free enterprise system would have been able to efficiently recycle all the waste paper recovered in the years ahead. However, I will acknowledge that if North American paper demand was still growing, and China was not a major source of demand for recovered paper, then the NGOs could make a counter argument (weak though it would be) that demand for recycled paper should be encouraged because that demand would be needed in the future.

But that is obviously not the case. There is absolutely no reason to believe that there will be an excess of recovered paper in the future that will have to be landfilled. It is highly probable that P&W paper demand in the US will continue to decline (cyclically) – we just hope it is a slow decline. As the graph below demonstrates, supply of recovered paper probably won’t increase at all, even if our recovery rates jump much higher. By the way, keep in mind that growth in paper recovery rates in recent years is primarily due to the greater adoption of single stream collection methods. If we don’t clean up the single stream process then much, maybe all, of the additional paper recovered will be lost to contamination.

Meanwhile Chinese demand for U.S. waste paper continues to climb. The only thing that tends to slow Chinese purchases is extremely high prices. When recovered paper prices run up sharply, the Chinese back off. But they will always return. Many of the machines in China require recycled fiber to operate. We expect the Chinese to continue buying higher volumes of recovered paper from the U.S. in the years ahead – as long as U.S. trade regulations allow this to happen.

Summary

Our government and NGOsshould be held accountable for false claims. The facts are clear. This is not a subjective issue. What we hear from Green America, Greenpeace, ForestEthics, etc is  dead wrong. Furthermore, these NGOs know that they are not being truthful when they claim that additional demand for recycled paper is needed and helpful.

The absolute truth is that there are only two reasons for government entities and NGOs to promote increased demand for paper containing recycled fiber – ignorance or opportunism.

DDT, Environmental Politics, and Genocide

Posted on 06-07-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : DDT, Environmental Issues, International, Weekly Feature

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Most of us in the developed world have no concept of the pain, suffering, and death being caused by malaria. This preventable disease puts about 40% of world population at risk, and kills roughly 3 million people a year. Most health experts admit that a high percentage of deaths being attributed to AIDS, are actually malaria deaths, so the number may even be considerably higher.

The suffering associated with death by malaria is horrible, but malaria survivors don’t get off easily either. Survivors often suffer brain damage, chronic illnesses, and weakened immune systems. As a result, malaria deaths are associated directly with a malaria attack, or indirectly many months or years later.

Christine Silvestri was a student from the U.S. studying in Ghana when she contracted malaria. In a brief overview of her ordeal she wrote…

The clinic near the university where I sought treatment was dark and claustrophobic, filled with old and outdated medical equipment. The doctor told me I had malaria as he handed me the edge of a piece of newspaper to stop the bleeding from my blood test (they had temporarily run out of band-aids). He assured me that with a packet of anti-malarials I would be fine within a week.

That didn’t happen. As it turned out, I had accidentally been given substandard pills. Meanwhile, my uncomplicated malaria was given the time to morph into a dangerous, drug-resistant strain…I visited yet another public hospital, which unfortunately, like the first, provided substandard care. Consequently my malaria became even more deadly. The parasite attacked my brain and neurological system, leaving my upper body partially paralyzed and my legs able to move just a few inches. I could hobble only a few feet before becoming unconscious due to uncontrollable dizziness…

Just a few weeks after my check-up with the private clinic, due to my own recently weakened immune system, I contracted a water-borne parasite resulting in fever, vomiting and violent diarrhea. At 5’8,’’ I weighed a little over 100 pounds. When I looked in the mirror, I saw a skeleton. My cheeks were indented and my round jaw had lost its natural curve. My skin had turned a grayish green, and my hair had lost its shimmer. Friends and family encouraged me to return to the States immediately, but I wanted to complete my semester abroad so badly. I slept 20 to 22 hours a day for a week. After two months of fighting malaria and other parasitic diseases, I finally returned home.

Over a year and a half has passed since I was diagnosed with malaria, and I am still recovering. I go to physical therapy three times a week to build strength, and I participate in a brain-training program to improve memory and attention span.

Ms. Silvestri acknowledges that if she had been a citizen of Ghana, and provided routine health care, she would have died. She wants to get well and dedicate her life to improving health care opportunities for those poor people in Africa.

Well, the sad truth is that this death and suffering is preventable. In fact, by 1972, after DDT had been used to fight this disease for 20 years, most malaria deaths had been eliminated. Then a book was written that made false claims, a movement was created, and 10 years later DDT was banned. Environmental paranoia, population concerns, elitism, and political irresponsibility joined forces to commit what is likely the worst case of genocide in history.

But let’s back up and tell the abridged story in sequence.

DDT Considered Miracle Insecticide

DDT was introduced in the developing world in the1940s. The walls of homes were treated, mosquito nesting areas were sprayed, mosquito nets treated with DDT were provided, etc. In 1970 the National Academy of Sciences claimed that DDT had saved the lives of 500 million people!

“To only a few chemicals does man owe as great a debt as to DDT… In little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million human deaths, due to malaria, that otherwise would have been inevitable.”

That (500 million people saved) was probably a big exaggeration – maybe it was only 100 million saved in 20 years. Those that were saved from 1950 to 1972, however, were put in risk again in the 1970’s. If 500 million people (or 100 million) were saved in those 20 years, how many died during the 30+ years since DDT has been banned.

The previous quote and a number of statements that follow were taken from 100 Things You Should Know About DDT. The entire list is very interesting to browse through.

DDT Demonized

Rachel Carson sounded the initial alarm against DDT, but represented the science of DDT erroneously in her 1962 book Silent Spring. Carson wrote “Dr. DeWitt’s now classic experiments [on quail and pheasants] have now established the fact that exposure to DDT, even when doing no observable harm to the birds, may seriously affect reproduction.

There was no proof of damage and, in fact, Rachel Carson also lied, by omission at least.

Carson also omitted mention of DeWitt’s report that “control” pheasants hatched only 57 percent of their eggs, while those that were fed high levels of DDT in all of their food for an entire year hatched more than 80% of their eggs.

World Health Organization and Population Groups Grew Concerned That DDT Was So Effective

Population control advocates blamed DDT for increasing third world population. In the 1960s, World Health Organization authorities believed there was no alternative to the overpopulation problem but to assure that up to 40 percent of the children in poor nations would die of malaria. As an official of the Agency for International Development stated, “Rather dead than alive and riotously reproducing.”

 

DDT “Safe” but Banned Anyway

Extensive hearings on DDT before an EPA administrative law judge occurred during 1971-1972. The EPA hearing examiner, Judge Edmund Sweeney, concluded that “DDT is not a carcinogenic hazard to man… DDT is not a mutagenic or teratogenic hazard to man… The use of DDT under the regulations involved here do not have a deleterious effect on freshwater fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds or other wildlife.”

Overruling the EPA hearing examiner, EPA administrator William Ruckelshaus banned DDT in 1972. Ruckelshaus never attended a single hour of the seven months of EPA hearings on DDT. Ruckelshaus’ aides reported he did not even read the transcript of the EPA hearings on DDT.”

After reversing the EPA hearing examiner’s decision, Ruckelshaus refused to release materials upon which his ban was based. Ruckelshaus rebuffed USDA efforts to obtain those materials through the Freedom of Information Act, claiming that they were just “internal memos.” Scientists were therefore prevented from refuting the false allegations in the Ruckelshaus’ “Opinion and Order on DDT.”

Environmental Organizations Stifle Opposition

Environmental activists planned to defame scientists who defended DDT. In an uncontradicted deposition in a federal lawsuit, Victor Yannacone, a founder of the Environmental Defense Fund, testified that he attended a meeting in which Roland Clement of the Audubon Society and officials of the Environmental Defense Fund decided that University of California-Berkeley professor and DDT-supporter Thomas H. Jukes was to be muzzled by attacking his credibility.

Malaria Gains Lost as Disease Returns Full Force

The graph below shows how malaria returned with a vengeance in South and Central America when DDT was removed from the market. The situation in Asia and Africa was exactly the same.  

 

 

It is only a graph, but imagine what the graph represents. Each dot of red print added to the second figure represents untold suffering and death for tens of thousands of people. These are poor people from poor countries that can not protect them. This is serial killing on a scale Hitler could never imagine. Western environmental organizations and western politicians from wealthy countries are directly responsible for this genocide.

These are real people, just like you and me, with families that love them. The New York Times did a touching series of stories about those people who died in the 2001 attack. Maybe the Times should do a story for each of these victims of politics and malaria. The problem is that the job is too big for the Times – more than 8,000 malaria deaths occur every day.

DDT is Not a Carcinogen and Not Harmful to Animals

Over the years many additional tests have been carried out that exonerate DDT. There is no credible evidence that DDT is harmful to animals or humans. I will include just a few items from the list of 100, but you can also cover this on your own if you choose.  

No correlation at the population level can be demonstrated between exposures to DDT and the incidence of cancer at any site. It is concluded that DDT has had no significant impact on human cancer patterns and is unlikely to be an important carcinogen for man at previous exposure levels, within the statistical limitations of the data.(Study completed 1985)

None of 35 workers heavily exposed to DDT (600 times the average U.S. exposure for 9 to 19 years) developed cancer.

Men who voluntarily ingested 35 mgs of DDT daily for nearly two years were carefully examined for years and “developed no adverse effects.”

After 15 years of heavy and widespread usage of DDT, Audubon Society ornithologists counted 25 percent more eagles per observer in 1960 than during the pre-DDT 1941 bird census.

The Audubon Society’s annual bird census in 1960 reported that at least 26 kinds of birds became more numerous during 1941 – 1960.

The white-tailed kite, a raptor, was “in very real danger of complete extirpation in the U.S.” in 1935, but “by the 1960′s, a very great population increase and range expansion had become apparent in California and the breeding range had extended through the Central American countries.”

Conclusion – DDT and Genocide

There has been some progress in reintroducing mosquito nets into malaria infested areas but the progress is very slow. Other chemicals are available but they are too expensive for poverty stricken countries. Economic pressure is still being applied to leaders of poor countries that prevent the re-adoption of DDT for wide-scale use.

This (DDT – Malaria) is a shameful episode in human history. If you have supported an environmental organization that has fought against the use of DDT, past or present, your assistance is contributing to the deaths of millions on people.

Where is the outrage?  Why aren’t the people responsible for this carnage help  accountable? Why, when we know the truth, do we still refuse to act?

Prominent Environmentalist Rethinks His World View

Posted on 05-23-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Energy Issues, Environmental Issues, Fossil Fuels, Nuclear, Weekly Feature

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We have an excellent report for you. The environmentalist alluded to in the title is Stewart Brand, who recently published a new book, Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto. The book is excellently reviewed by Peter Huber and can be found here. Don’t miss this one.

Brand, in his new book, offers a mature example of what real environmentalism should be. His views have changed over the years. He is open to what he acknowledges were errors of the past. He is now pro-nuclear, in favor of genetically engineered crops, concerned with the precautionary principle, etc. I disagree with him on some issues, but respect his approach.  A few interesting passages follow.

Consider Stewart Brand’s meaty, well-informed, and mostly sensible new book, Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto. The man who used to be so California Hip that in 1968 he made a cameo appearance in Tom Wolfe’s The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test now presents himself as a “hacker (lazy engineer) at heart,” ready to promote realistic responses to the great eco-existential crisis of our time—climate change. How can Greens fulfill their new mission, which is to save not only birds and trees but all humanity? The man who founded and then edited the Whole Earth Catalog for 16 years—a magazine guided by “biological understanding” and enamored with the planet-saving power of organic farming, solar, wind, insulation, bicycles, and handmade houses—now concludes: “Cities are Green. Nuclear energy is Green. Genetic engineering is Green.”…

The question I ask myself now,” Brand tells us when he gets to nuclear power, is: “What took me so long? I could have looked into the realities of nuclear power many years earlier, if I weren’t so lazy.” When he got over his nuclear sloth, here’s what Brand learned. (Most of the words quoted here are Brand’s own, but some are Brand quoting others approvingly.) “Fear of radiation is a far more important health threat than radiation itself.” “Reactor safety is a problem already solved,” and the new reactors are even safer than the old. Waste isn’t a problem; we need the $10 billion Yucca mountain disposal site “about as much as we need a facility for imprisoning dangerous extraterrestrials.” Nuclear power isn’t just the cheapest practical carbon-free option around, but the cheapest, period, when not snarled up in green tape. Scientists “invariably poll high in support of nuclear.” The people so pragmatic that they actually keep the lights lit, he might have added, have polled that way for 40 years, on the strength of reams of data and analyses, as well as the operating experience of our nuclear navy and a wide range of commercial reactors scattered across the planet.

Other Greens, Brand reports, have experienced similar nuclear epiphanies as age moved them closer to a place hotter than tropical. Among them is Gwyneth Cravens, a novelist, former New Yorker editor, and activist who in her salad days “helped frighten the American nuclear industry to a standstill” by successfully crusading to kill a brand-new nuclear power plant in Shoreham, Long Island. And James Hansen, a NASA climatologist and the most outspoken American advocate of drastic reductions in carbon emissions. And founders and former high officials of Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, and “a surprising number of [other] prominent environmentalists.” Canada, Finland, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, Italy, England, and other countries that not long ago either froze new construction or resolved to shut down their nukes have flipped from red-hot aversion to tepid embrace.

But tepid may not suffice. “One of the greatest dangers the world faces is the possibility that a vocal minority of antinuclear activists could prevent phase-out of coal emissions,” Brand writes, quoting Hansen. It’s an indubitable historical fact that the developed world was poised to break free from a carbon-centered energy economy 30 years ago. Greens locked us back into it. By demonizing nukes so effectively, they boosted U.S. coal consumption by about 400 million tons per year. We would instantly cut our coal consumption in half if we could simply conjure back into existence the 100-plus nuclear plants that were in the pipeline three decades ago. If global warming is a problem, Brand and his ex-friends own it…

The Three Mile Island of Off-Shore Drilling

Posted on 05-03-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Environmental Issues, Fossil Fuels, Weekly Feature

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On March 16, 1979, The China Syndrome opened in theaters across the country. I was actually in line to buy tickets for that movie when I first heard of the nuclear incident at Three Mile Island. The problems at Three Mile Island, in Harrisburg Pennsylvania, occurred 12 days after the opening of the movie. At one point in the movie, a physicist states that the china syndrome would render “an area the size of Pennsylvania” permanently uninhabitable.

The nuclear energy industry was already under great pressure from environmental groups, but the Three Mile Island incident put it is a coma. Then, in 1986 the disaster at Chernobyl, in the Ukraine occurred, and that made new projects in the U.S. completely impossible.

Not that caution was inappropriate. After those two incidents, it was only reasonable to step back and consider whether nuclear power was really safe. Nothing is ever guaranteed, of course, but it does not make sense to endure anything but the remotest risk of a serious nuclear accident.

Over the years, new safeguards have been put in place. Today even anti-nuclear environmental groups don’t generally raise concerns over plant safety; the concern over radioactive waste and its safe disposal is the primary issue.

Unprecedented Disaster –   President Obama visited the gulf this week-end and called the oil spill situation a “potentially unprecedented disaster”. Unfortunately, this is not an exaggeration. See here.

The environmental record of offshore drillers had been outstanding – not only off the U.S. coast, but around the world. There have been serious tanker disasters, of course. But I don’t remember serious off-shore drilling accidents, certainly not anyhting like what is taking plce in the gulf right now.

The current oil spill, or oil flood, is absolutely horrible. We don’t know how bad the environmental catastrophe will become; we are hoping for the best. Perhaps the damage will be less serious than it now appears, and maybe we will figure out how to ensure that this kind of problem does not occur in the future. Nevertheless, even if our greatest hopes are realized from this point on, new offshore drilling will be pushed back many years.

The economic fall-out will be severe – not today, but in the years to come as oil supplies dwindle. We will become more even more dependent on foreign oil that we would have been.

I have been strongly supportive of opening up more areas for drilling. It is only reasonable to acknowledge, however, that this changes everything.

“It Was an Innocent Mistake, It Was Not My Fault” – Danny Williams, Newfoundland Premier

Posted on 04-25-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Newsprint, Weekly Feature

Tags: ,

Danny Williams claims that his government did not intend to confiscate AbitibiBowater’s mill property in Grand Falls Newfoundland. Williams indicated that the province had only intended to take from its rightful owner everything that had value, not the mill itself. The CBC reports here that… Continue Reading

U.S. Geological Survey Study Claims Eastern Forests Shrinking, But Claims Are False

Posted on 04-11-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Forestry, Weekly Feature

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What should we call farm land at the end of the fall harvesting season? Silly question, right? Just because the land is void of vegetation in the winter does not mean that it is something less than farm land; unless, that is, you work for the U.S. Geological Survey. If that is the case, then what had been a farm is “defarmed” after harvest. It is a brown, barren, and scarred wasteland. At least that is the logic being proposed by M Drummond and T Loveland (great name for an environmentalist) in Eastern U.S. Forests Resume Decline, which was printed in Science Daily.

In this study, once forest land is harvested, Drummond and Loveland remove it from the category of “forest lands”, and put it in a category with the title of “mechanically disturbed”. Even though trees begin to grow back immediately after harvest, and these lands are still set aside for growing trees, the authors remove the “forest” label.

This makes no sense at all. By this definition, forests destroyed by fire, disease, and infestation are no longer forests. How tall do the replanted trees have to be before they qualify as “forests” again? Returning to the farm land analogy, based on this way of thinking, the U.S. and Canada have no farm land between November and April each year – except in the warm weather climates.

Second Thoughts – This post was initially written based on a synopsis covered in Science Daily and it was planned for posting last Friday. Then it occurred to me that the Science Daily synopsis seemed ridiculous. Maybe the wording in the synopsis just made it appear as if the authors of the study were counting harvested forest land as something other than forest land. Maybe the post being planned would misrepresent their work. So the post was held until the original 13 page report that was published in BioScience, could be reviewed.  (Available here for the rest of April)

It turns out that the post could have been published on Friday without doing injustice to the fidelity of the study. As the study is reviewed below, keep in mind that the study designers do a lot of estimating, and the authors had a vested interest in the outcome, so we should be skeptical of the data. Nevertheless, even if we assume the data is accurate, the conclusions the authors draw misrepresent the data.

Study Conclusion – The authors conclude that between 1973 and 2000 forest cover in the eastern U.S. declined from 54.7% to 52.4%, a total decline of 4.1% over the 27 year period. According to the report, a  total of 3.70 million hectares of forest cover was lost. (See table on page 292 for a list of various changes in land use)

It turns out, however, that if we consider harvested forest lands as forests, as any reasonable person would, then the entire loss of forest cover during the 27 -year period is no more than  .50 million hectares. (Even this loss is questionable. The authors show 1.27 million hectares moving from “mechanically disturbed” to shrub land. This is unlikely. Forest land that has been harvested of trees, and has proven economic value as a forest, will not sit idle as shrub land. This is probably just another in-between and temporary category).

The designers of the study were only able to arrive at the inflated number (3.70 million acres of forest land lost) by manipulating the data. As mentioned above, harvested forests were no longer considered forests…until some period of time passed. At some point the study designers add these “mechanically disturbed” lands back into the category of forests. However, and this is the key, they concluded that (over the 27-year period) more land (3.2 million hectares more) went from forests to mechanically disturbed than moved from mechanically disturbed to forests.

The authors are clear in how they arrive at forest cover data. Note the following passages from the study.

The net loss occurred even though reforestation of abandoned fields and pastures continues, in some regions more than others. Most net forest loss occurs as result of mechanical disturbance of forests for timber production, which keeps some land free of forest, and as a result of urban expansion, which is generally a permanent change…

The authors acknowledge the short-lived ephemeral nature of site-specific disturbances…ie tree harvesting.  They even go on to point out that the reason more trees were harvested during the 1973-2000 study period than in years previous to the study period is simply due to the surge of timber plantations in the southeast during  the ‘50s and ‘60s. Southern pines can be harvested in 20 years or so. Therefore, as these plantation pines grew to maturity and were harvested, more forest land was being harvested (mechanically disturbed) than had been the case prior to establishing these plantations.

Stated differently, there is no intimation that forests are being harvested in a non-sustainable manner.

Discussion – Let’s just logically review the forestry big picture in the east. When most Americans were farmers and were migrating west across the country, forests were cut down along the way to build homes, etc, but mostly for farming. When farming jobs were replaced during the industrial revolution, the less efficient farm lands (particularly in the northeast) were abandoned. Forests have been regenerating naturally for at least the last 100 years. (By the way, this type of migration, and conversion of forests to farmland is the reason for deforestation in the Amazon.)

Forest regeneration slows over time, of course, and at some point the process will be complete. As regeneration is slowing, expansion of urban areas is consuming more forest land. It is possible that the writers of this report are correct in that sense. Perhaps total forest area in the east is declining slightly. If not now, it will certainly happen in the future. But the fact that urban expansion is absorbing some forest land is not something to panic over.

In this report, the authors suggest that 1.91 million hectares moved from forest land to urban “developed” over that 27 year period. Moving in the other direction, however, 3.39 million hectares were changed to forests – from farm land and shrub land.

One more point. Why did the study period stop at 2000 rather than 2009 or 2008 or whenever the latest data was available? My guess is that the trend of reduced forest cover (as measured in this report) began to reverse itself. Remember, once equilibrium (sustainability) is reached with those new plantations from the ‘50s and ‘60s, the negative trend in forest cover stops.

Summary – This study actually demonstrates that the land set aside for forests in the eastern U.S. was little changed during the study period.

Health Care Bill: How it Passed and What it Means

Posted on 03-28-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Health Care, Politics, Weekly Feature

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The passage of the health care bill was so depressing  that I avoided the topic for a few days, while concentrating on a much more positive subject; the long term viability of the paper industry. I am not familiar with the official ”steps of bereavement”, but I am in one of those steps, or maybe all of them. But life goes on, so I picked out a few items of special interest for you.

Unintended Consequences– Congress provides penalties and incentives in laws it passes but never properly gauges how our society will react to those inducements.  One is not required to know all of the details of the health care bill to understand that a 3,000 page document will change everything – and not in the way Congress intended.

An example is provided in Big Employers Rethink Their Healthcare Plans. Congress decided, in the new health care bill, to raise money to offset health care costs by taxing companies that provide drug-benefit programs for retired workers.

Among its many effects, the new health care law eliminated a tax deduction that companies used to cut the cost of drug-benefit programs for retired workers.

The potential tax revenue is big; AT&T will record a one billion dollar first quarter charge as a result, Caterpillar $150 million for Q1, and John Deere $150 million. So the companies are just resigned to paying this new tax, right? No, anyone with a clue would know that this would not happen. For instance…

“As a result of this legislation, including the additional tax burden, AT&T will be evaluating prospective changes to the active and retiree healthcare benefits offered by the company,” AT&T said Friday in a government filing.

This week, Verizon Communications Inc. sent a letter to employees suggesting that changes to their health plans could be afoot. AT&T and Verizon are the two largest phone companies in the U.S. and employ a substantial number of unionized workers.

So after the big companies bail out and no longer pay drug assistance for retired workers, who will pick up the tab?  That’s right, you and me.

Several million retirees are estimated to receive drug benefits from a few thousand companies. If those retirees were shifted to the federal Medicare program, the government would pick up the expense.

The net result of this item in the health care bill will be that the government takes over costs that had been assumed by large corporations. In addition, the revenue that Congress hoped to gain by taxing corporations will be a small fraction of what it hoped to gain. This was one brainless piece of legislation! The impact of government control, however, has much greater implications.

The government health care bill will create new mandatory employer costs. As a result, in the years to come, employee health care benefits will change from an optional benefit, to an obligation.  As this happens, most companies will reduce benefits to the level required by law.  At times, marginally profitable large and small businesses will find it impossible to fund health benefits, and will discontinue operations, further stifling economic growth.

The Anti-Abortion Democrats – This item is not an argument for or against abortion, it is about the deception and hypocrisy that took place during the health care bill negotiations.

The health care bill would not have passed without the support of anti-abortion Democrats in the house. So, in order to gain the support of this group, President Obama agreed to sign an executive order banning the use of federal funds for abortion. But the President is committed to “free choice” so why would he agree to this and undermine his position within this element of his constituency?  Well, the answer is simple. The executive order will only be symbolic. It will have no impact on anything.

Why then would the Democrats in the House agree to a symbolic gesture that would go against their consciences and everything they promised their pro-life constituents? Obviously, their opposition to abortion was symbolic as well. They have not voted their conscience nor kept their promises. This sham fooled no one and is childish. See the following passage from the Patriot Post.

One Democrat feeling the heat is Rep. Bart Stupak, the supposed “stalwart” pro-lifer from Michigan. Stupak led a small but seemingly determined band of Democrat congressmen opposed to the Senate bill’s permissiveness concerning abortion funding. As it turns out, it was all a show.

Stupak caved after Barack Obama promised an executive order banning the use of federal funds for abortions. Tellingly, even Planned Parenthood didn’t object because, first, the executive order isn’t legally binding; second, it can be revoked easily; and third, it said nothing that the bill didn’t already say. It changed nothing — federal funds will be used for abortions…

By the way, just two days before the vote, the Obama administration awarded $726,409 in grants to three airports in Stupak’s district…

And from Chuck Colson:

Up until that fateful day, it wasn’t clear whether Rep. Bart Stupak and other pro-life Democrats would support the health care bill. Then, Stupak made a stunning announcement. In exchange for Stupak’s support, the President would sign an executive order prohibiting the spending of federal funds for abortions…

But in the end, he and other pro-life Democrats have sold out the pro-life cause, and with it, the lives of the unborn.

Now, some abortion-rights advocates excoriated the President. The National Organization of Women said that it was “incensed” by the executive order. But as Bill McGurn wrote in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal, Planned Parenthood seems quite pleased. Why? Because as McGurn writes, “an Executive Order cannot change the law.”

That’s because the courts have made it clear that an executive order will have no effect. There are four “decades of federal appellate rulings that apply the principles of Roe v. Wade to federal health legislation.” … funding for abortions is required in federal health care programs unless “Congress clearly forbids such funding.” Absent a clear prohibition, executive orders and regulations can—and will be—overridden by the courts. The precedents are clear.

One Case Demonstrating the Expansion of Entitlements – The new health care bill allows for long term health care. The purpose of this item, keeping the elderly in their homes as opposed to nursing homes, is admirable. This could be accomplished, however, by addressing current Medicare guidelines. Instead we are building another new element of the health care bureaucracy that will be an entitlement sinkhole fraught with additional opportunities for fraud.

While the plan’s opponents don’t question the need for long-term care, they say the federal government should not be managing it, and they believe the program will eventually add to the deficit.

“This creates a whole new bureaucracy that is going to break this country,” .Nunes [Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA)] said. “In the early years there will be money in it, but at the end of the day there won’t be enough money to cover the problems because there will be too many people in the program.”

Nunes says Republicans were blindsided by the provision because they were unable to see the final bill until the very end. But Democratic supporters say the provision, which was championed by the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, should not be controversial…

See, Little-Known Health Care Law Provision Is a Budget Buster, Critics Say.

The Issue is Costs Not Who Pays – The Democrats have this fixed size of the pie mentality so they are all about changing who pays for everything. In the end, however, we all pay for waste in government, excessive business regulations, needless environmental laws, and wasted health care expenditures. Waste slows economic growth. In fact, the quesion for the future might be whether there will be any economic growth at all. Economic growth is not a given.

Controlling costs should have been the emphasis of the health care initiative, but it was not. The following graph estimated growth in spending costs for Medicare and Medicaid even before the health care bill was passed. The health care bill will make the situation worse, not better.

This level of spending (as a % of GDP)  is not possible, of course, so rationing will begin before many years have passed. Rationing would not be necessary if we would make changes suggested here, or here,  and make lower costs a priority.

Which Country Has Universal Health Care?

Posted on 03-22-2010 | By: admin | 

Category : Health Care, Politics, Weekly Feature

Tags:

Access Only – Universal access to health care is, in theory, a major flaw that the current health care legislation intends to fix. But is access to medical care really a problem in the U.S.?

Before we compare health care access in the U.S. with Canada, however, we want to emphasize that there are serious problems with the health care system in the U.S. Health care costs are much too high, and this results in costly health insurance, and high government expenditures. The reason costs are so extreme is a question for another time.

Other major difficulties include: (1)The issue of pre-existing conditions; (2) Very high insurance costs for those 55-64 years old who are not part of a large employer group; (3) Enormous litigation costs, especially the related impact of excessive tests and procedures; (4) Fraud accounts for maybe 10% of total health care expenditures; (5) The U.S. health care system has no compassion for those with assets, but not health insurance – if people choose to roll the dice, they can lose everything. (6) Americans are, in general, very much over medicated and over-tested. There are others issues, but high costs, in combination with these six issues are probably the primary problems. Continue Reading

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