GLOBAL CLIMATE DEBATE

[PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA]    The tragedy unfolding on our coast is the most painful and powerful reminder yet that the time to embrace a clean energy future is now.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    President Obama uses the Gulf spill to rally Americans toward a clean energy agenda.

    Hello, and welcome to “Clean Skies Sunday”, a weekly half-hour look at energy issues facing Washington and America. I'm Susan McGinnis. This week, highly advanced technology allows oil companies to drill miles under the sea, but when it comes to oil spill cleanup, why are we seeing the same shovels and rakes of disasters decades ago? We talk to the experts.

    From the spill to the bill, how the horizon disaster could reshape energy and climate legislation, and the world's greenest skyscraper. We tell you what LEED Platinum means and show you how the Bank of America tower won the rating.

    Well, huge technological advances now allow oil companies to go tens of thousands of feet down to reach offshore oil. But where is that kind of ingenuity and innovation when it comes to oil spill response?

    Lee Patrick Sullivan takes a look at high tech drillers cleaning up with racks and shovels.

[KEVIN COSTNER]        If we want to discuss the what-if's looking back, I think you could fill in the blanks of understanding if these machines were already deployed.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    The company actor Kevin Costner has invested in is one of hundreds saying they have the solution to cleaning up the environmental nightmare caused by the deep water horizon gusher. One thing they all have in common, none of them are major oil companies.

    Despite billions in annual profits over the past few decades, most of the big oil R&D money has gone into drilling techniques, not spill cleanup. That leaves it up to smaller companies, like Ecosphere Technologies. And like Costner's company, Ecosphere also has celebrity investors, former Dallas Cowboy Quarterbacks, Troy Aikman and Drew Bledsoe.

    The folks at Mid-Gulf Recovery Services, a veteran disaster cleanup company, have teamed up with Ecosphere. Two of their cleanup units have been shipped to New Orleans, waiting to get a contract with BP.

[MALE SPEAKER]    Now, this isn't something you guys built for the cameras, this can go on a barge and work today?

[GLEN SMITH]    This will go on the barge and work today. This unit, the unit outside, the second unit that will accompany this one, will go on the barge and go to work. No, this isn't for show. It looks nice, but it's not for show.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    Like Costner's machine, the Ecosphere system uses a centrifuge to separate oil from water. The Ecosphere people say their large unit can clean more than 800,000 gallons of water a day, which is twice as much as Costner's machine. And besides separating water and oil, the unit also injects oxygen back into the processed water. Think of it as a B12 shot for the ecosystem.

    The company says it will promote a quicker recovery time for plants and animals, as well as create millions of oxygen bubbles pushing oil to the surface, making it easier to clean up

[MALE SPEAKER]    And this is basically sixth grade physics, oil and water don't mix, and if you spin them, one is heavier than the other and it separates.

[GLEN SMITH]    On the centrifuge, yes. So the trick is getting the centrifuge to turn at 2000 Gs, but because again of this technology here, that water is treated, and if put in the mindset of highly oxygenated water, so when you put it back in, it's not only going to float up the material to help clean, but it's going to kind of revitalize the ecosystem.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    BP has received more than 20,000 proposals for inventions to help clean up the Gulf. They have narrowed it down to about 500, and one of those finalist is Enviro Voraxial Technology. Their machine creates a vortex to separate oil from water and company officials say, a vortex machine can process more water than a centrifuge and it has a smaller footprint.

[JOHN A. DI BELLA]        We bring a new way of doing separation that can increase oil recovery by over 10 times.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    Kyriakos Papadopoulos is a professor in Bio and Chemical Engineering at Tulane University. He says, it's not just BP, all the big oil companies are not prepared for major spills.

[KYRIAKOS PAPADOPOULOS]    Hopefully, this spill is going to be one that is going to promote interest in research and development as to how to clean oil spills.

[MALE SPEAKER]        What makes you guys so smart? How come BP doesn't have this? They need something like this. Why don't they have 30 of these units on a barge, ready to go at any one time?

[GLEN SMITH]    This is like a continuing Katrina, instead of the storm just hitting and we cleaning up, it just keeps coming, and that's when we got involved in it. So I really don't think that the need now -- the need is actually coming forth now because of something like this. It's bringing everything to the forefront.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    As for when the oil washes up on the beaches and the marshlands in the Gulf, Professor Papadopoulos says, there may not be a high-tech solution, because bringing in machines for the cleanup could do more harm than good.

[KYRIAKOS PAPADOPOULOS]    You cannot just go there and bring machinery and press down the sediment, because you are going to create a lot of problems doing that on the ecosystem, that tries to remediate itself.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    Now, these units aren't cheap, each Ecosphere machine cost close to $3 million, but the oil that is recovered will be sent back to BP and sold on the world market.

[GLEN SMITH]    The technology is expensive getting going, but after you get going, it basically runs out a percentage of your cost. We can return 70,000 barrels a day to, in this case BP, then what exactly is that worth? You are probably going to get these units for free.

[LEE PATRICK SULLIVAN]    Now, some of this technology is actually in use right now. Take the folks over at Ecosphere, for example. Several of their units are up in Arkansas, cleaning up water near a refinery, but the owners of that refinery say, if those units are needed in the Gulf, they will let them go.

    On the coast of Louisiana, Lee Patrick Sullivan, Clean Skies News.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    And Gerald Graham joins us now. He is an oil spill specialist, with his own firm, World Ocean Consulting, joining us from Victoria, British Columbia.

    Dr. Graham welcome to the show. I wanted to ask you, as drilling has gone farther and deeper, there have been great strides in technology there. When it comes to spill response technology, tell us what great strides have been made there? We are still seeing people with rakes and shovels and brooms, what advances have there been over the past 10, 20 years?

[DR. GERALD GRAHAM]    That's a very good question Susan. There have been a number of advances actually in 30 years, and especially I would say in the last 20 years, since the Exxon Valdez Spill. There have been advances with satellite technology, for instance, detecting and tracking oil spills. There have been advances with the dispersions that are somewhat less toxic than they were 20 years ago. Other advances, with skimmers and the booms.

    But basically these are incremental changes and improvements. There have been no revolutionary advances in the course of the last two decades or so.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    So the standard approaches, some of them have improved, and mostly it seems that information technology has seen the biggest improvements, but the standard response seems to have remained at the same. I mean, what would you be doing differently in the Gulf right now?

[DR. GERALD GRAHAM]    Yeah. Well, as you said Susan, information technology is one of the areas where there has been actually revolutionary change. I mean, we all know what the situation is with communications technology just in the last five, ten years. So that's one area of enormous improvement that has been applied to oil spill. Modeling, trajectory planning, where the spill is going to go, and coastal sensitivity atlases.

    But as you mentioned, we are still faced with cleaning up this gooey stuff that ends up on the beaches. And so you have to use the rakes. And it's grunt work and it's messy and it's slow, and you are only going to get probably 10% of the oil off the surface of the water, if you are lucky, and that's the same recovery rate that we had 20 years ago.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Wow! And the brooms and the shovels, and it just  seems so primitive, it being the same process as 20 years ago.

    Can you talk about money spend, government money; is enough going in versus private industry investment? Billions get spent on R&D over the past 20, 30 years. How much is actually gone to find ways to manage a high pressure deep water gusher like this one, say since Ixtoc in Mexico blew up in 1979; that was only in a 160 feet of water, it went off for ten months?

[DR. GERALD GRAHAM]    Yes. Well, there has been a lot of money spent since the Exxon Valdez Spill; I would say probably $2 billion around the world. Not much has been spent on controlling these blowouts, because they are very, very rare, and we are operating in deeper and deeper water, so it's getting riskier and riskier. And unfortunately, the push for R&D now will come from this spill itself. BP has committed 500 million to R&D over the next ten years. So it's just a fact of life that the money flows when there has been a catastrophe like this.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    And then what happens later, the money goes in after a catastrophe and then does everybody say, well, we will fix it with fancier fail safe equipment and don't have to worry about an uncontrolled gusher and go back to business as usual when the media go away?

[DR. GERALD GRAHAM]    Well, there will be more investment, more R&D, the more people dedicated to spill response, but then if there is not another spill for another five years, six years, interest will wane. They will look for --  companies and governments will look for areas in which they can cut their cost and expenses, and so oil spill response or R&D might be one of the areas that gets the cuts.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Right. Do you see any revolutionary technologies coming out now that there has been this -- will it spark innovation as well as more money going in? Or do you think that pipeline will start flowing more quickly right now? I mean, you say this Gulf spill is going to rewrite the textbooks on oil spill technology.

[DR. GERALD GRAHAM]    I think we are already seeing interest in new techniques. I have had inquiries from at least a dozen firms from around the world asking me how I can help them advance their technology using microbes, bacteria, to ingest the oil.

    Kevin Costner has his scheme for oil-water separation, which BP has finally bought into. He has been working on this project since 1984. It's a very conservative sector. There is all sorts of room for improvements in decision support software, for instance, hi-tech solutions. It's still a low-tech sector that's ripe for advancement.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]        Right. Alright. Well, we are hoping for new innovations in this area, as in all energy areas.

    Gerald Graham, oil spill specialist with World Ocean Consulting. Thank you so much for joining us.

    And still ahead on “Clean Skies Sunday”, how will the Gulf spill reshape energy policy in Washington? Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle say the leak proves the country needs new legislation; leaders tell “Clean Skies” what they hope a future Bill will include.

    Plus, this $2 billion skyscraper in New York City is the greenest of the green. We will take you inside for a close-up look at a super energy efficient workplace.

[BREAK]

    The Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America has important information for the millions of people with Asthma.
   
    You know that asthma symptoms can really slow you down. What you may not know is that there are two main causes of asthma symptoms: airway constriction you feel, and inflammation you may not feel.

    If your medicine is only treating one, it can make asthma feel like an uphill battle.
   
    Learn how to better manage your asthma by treating both main causes of asthma symptoms. Treating both causes can help prevent symptoms before they even start, and preventing asthma symptoms could mean a smoother ride.

    You can find information and resources about asthma and learn how to help prevent asthma symptoms at asthma.com.

[END BREAK]

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Welcome back to “Clean Skies Sunday”. Through the aftermath of the Gulf disaster, lawmakers have pointed to that spill as an example of why the U.S. needs new energy legislation. And amid the momentum of public outrage over the Gulf, we are now getting a clearer picture of the Bills that Congressional leaders want to pass.

    “Clean Skies'” Chief Correspondent, Tyler Suiters, has been talking with leaders from both parties about their plans for new energy legislation.

    Tyler, good morning!

[TYLER SUITERS]    Good morning Susan! We will see new legislation, that's clear. And I think that both Houses will pass Bills that will raise liability caps for oil spills and also raise the taxes that oil companies pay on each barrel of oil they produce.

    But even if these spill Bills do sail through Congress, let's be clear, there is still game-changing energy legislation that's stalled right now. And with that in mind, Congressional leaders are gauging just how far they can reach on Energy Bills to push through in this post-Gulf Congressional climate. Let's take a look at what the leaders of both Houses are saying right now.

    First of all in the House, Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said that energy policy must move in what she calls a new direction. “We will pass whatever additional legislation is needed to prevent a repetition of this catastrophe.”

    On the Senate side, Majority Leader Harry Reid has said, “I look forward to working with the President to find a bipartisan path to passing meaningful, comprehensive, clean energy legislation this year.”
   
    And let's focus on that term, comprehensive, clean energy legislation, just how much of a reach does that involve? Last year the House passed a major Energy Bill, one that would limit our carbon emissions, the most controversial issue on the table right now.

    Well, last week, I talked to one of those authors, Henry Waxman, about just what comes next in this post-Gulf climate?

[REP. HENRY WAXMAN]    Well, I think we will have legislation relating to how to deal with any agreements or the government signs off on any drilling to be sure that it's done safely.

    I also hope that we will have legislation dealing with the broader energy policy, because of our over-dependence on oil. We need to move away from that, because of the harm it does to the environment and the national security concerns as well.

[TYLER SUITERS]        Now, Waxman watched those exact themes play out last week. Leaders from the five major oil companies faced some sharp questioning about offshore oil exploration and the nation's oil dependence as well.
   
    During the testimony, it became clear that many Democrats, just like Waxman, want new energy policy that helps other energy sources, an effort to get us off oil quickly or potentially completely at some point.

    But Republicans railed against that idea. They say the Gulf disaster does show the need for some reform legislation, but not too much and certainly not a cap on carbon emission.

    I talked with the top Republican on the Energy Committee, Jeo Barton of Texas, this is before he made those unwanted headlines last week. And he tells me, he wants solutions to what went wrong in the Gulf, but he doesn't want a new Energy Bill that reaches too far.

[JEO BARTON]    If we need federal legislation, I am open to that, but I don't want to kill the patient to solve the problem. We need the energy in the outer Continental Shelf. We need to minimize our dependence on imported oil, and one way to do that, and right now the most economically viable way, is to drill in the outer Continental Shelf.

[TYLER SUITERS]        Okay, that's the House picture, now on to the senate, which is a bit more complicated. Harry Reid says he wants an Energy Bill, which could be quite broad, on the floor of the Senate by July, sometime next month. Again, trying to capitalize on the momentum involved here.

    To that end, he met with all of his Democrats and two Independents last week, essentially trying to discern what can pass this year under the heading of energy legislation. And I want you to listen closely, because here he ties the Gulf oil spill to a different kind of pollution.

[HARRY REID]    Any of the legislation spoken of in there today creates lots and lots of jobs. And of course we must cut pollution. One of the things we talked about in there today is the really disaster we are facing, our children today with the air they are breathing and it's not good for adults either. And we must strengthen our economic security, our national security, and of course our energy independence.

[TYLER SUITERS]    Alright, you heard Harry Reid say air pollution. That's the big one here. In my mind that equals legislation to cap carbon emission, it's a question of just how far the Senate can reach amid the public outrage over the Gulf spill.

    Opponent say that capping emissions is the same as an energy tax here in the U.S. Proponents, including the President himself, say that this will be a key to cutting our oil dependence.

    Susan, we should learn more from Democrats a little later this week when they reconvene to talk energy issues with the majority.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Alright. Tyler Suiters, thank you.

    U.S. geologists in Afghanistan have discovered minerals that some believe could change the picture for clean energy vehicles in the U.S. Scientists, with the U.S. Geological Survey under contract by the Afghan government, say that vast quantities of minerals, including lithium, lie under areas of Afghanistan. Lithium is used in batteries and is right now a key component of batteries for hybrids and electric vehicles.

    Here to talk about what a new source of lithium means for the U.S. energy picture is Charles Ebinger, he is a Senior Fellow with the Brookings Institution. Charlie, good to see you.

[CHARLES EBINGER]    Nice to see you Susan.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Let's talk first about where these vast quantities of lithium are located. We have got a lot in Afghanistan.

[CHARLES EBINGER]    Excuse me, right along here.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Afghanistan-Pakistan border, which are areas where the fighting is right now. Some of these areas are under Taliban control. So how significant is this find?

[CHARLES EBINGER]    The find is terribly significant, because right now the       vast resources of lithium in the world are down in Bolivia, a country not terribly hospitable to the United States. There are also some in Peru, over in this area, but Bolivia controls the market, and with the vast reserves of lithium in Afghanistan, this could fuel the electric vehicles we are talking about having in the future, as we move to 10, 20, 30 million all electric cars in addition to the hybrids you mentioned.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    So this makes the U.S. market for electric vehicles  and hybrids more promising, because Bolivia was the main -- we were going to be most dependent on Bolivia, which is not too thrilled about parting with its lithium for the U.S.

[CHARLES EBINGER]    That is correct.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    So now we have Afghanistan, which may end up more friendly, but this is pretty far into the future, because it takes three to five years to start developing this and they are still fighting.

[CHARLES EBINGER]        Realistically, I think we are talking a lot more than three to five. Because in this part of Afghanistan and along the Pakistan border, there are virtually no roads to get minerals out, there is no energy for the mining of them. I mean, considering all of Afghanistan, there is like a 100 megawatts of electric power, that's like one-tenth of a nuclear power plant in this country, that's the whole country.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    But looking at that far, do you still see lithium as the mineral -- do you see it needed as much then, I mean could another mineral --

[CHARLES EBINGER]        Absolutely! It's possible that we could have another mineral for batteries, but right now everyone is planning that lithium is going to be the wave of the future for probably 20, 30 years. So yes, it's very, very significant.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Do you see this changing energy policy at all for the U.S?

[CHARLES EBINGER]        I think it will aid Mr. Obama to say that we need to accelerate this. I was kind of surprised in his speech, he didn't get more specifically last night. But absolutely, this --

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    And it accelerates the momentum behind electrics?

[CHARLES EBINGER]    Worldwide, not just for the United States, but worldwide. You look at a market like India, very close to Afghanistan, that has a tremendous growth trajectory for automobiles. This could be a game-changer for India, potentially for China. So the whole world will benefit if these reserves are really there.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Just briefly, it could also hurt the possible market and potential for other alternative fuels.

[CHARLES EBINGER]    I think that’s true. Although, probably in our country, natural gas vehicles still have some potential, as do advanced biofuels.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Maybe there will be a basket of choices.

[CHARLES EBINGER]    I think there will be a basket of choices down the road, very different than our situation today.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Okay. Charlie Ebinger with the Brookings Institution, thank you.

[CHARLES EBINGER]    Thank you.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Still to come on “Clean Skies Sunday”, more buildings are going green. We are going to take you to the tallest skyscraper in the world, to get what’s called LEED Platinum certification. We will show you all the energy efficient bells and whistles there.

[BREAK]   

    When every moment matters and a life is saved, when someone gives blood, when a hand reaches out, that moment when heartbreak turns to hope, you are there through the American Red Cross. Down the street, across the country, around the world, you help save the day, everyday. You can help today; support your local Red Cross.

[END BREAK]

[ED BEGLEY]    The American Lung Association is so important to me, because they have been there, side by side with the environmental community for decades in cleaning up the air in cities across America. We couldn’t have done it without their expertise. They put a human face, the cost of air pollution, asthma, emphysema, lung cancer. They are the best resource out there, medical information, scientific information, to help us clean up the air.

[PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA]    The transition to clean energy has the potential to grow our economy and create millions of jobs, but only if we accelerate that transition, only if we seize the moment.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    This past week, President Obama used the Gulf oil catastrophe to spotlight twin themes; the urgency of moving to cleaner energies and shrinking U.S. dependence on oil, no matter where it comes from.

    One approach the President has favored is energy efficiency, and with buildings among the biggest energy hogs, they are prime candidates for efficiency savings. We take a look at green building and go inside one, that’s won top-level recognition for energy efficiency.

[JEFF BARKER]    When friends ask me where I work and I say I am at the New Tower on 6th Avenue and 42nd Street, One Bryant Park, they say, isn’t that the one? They may not know LEED Platinum, per se, but isn’t that the one with all the environmental aspects?

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Bank of America’s Jeff Barker is talking about the company’s new headquarters at Bryant Park in Manhattan. It was recently designated among the greenest of green buildings. “Clean Skies News” got a tour of this 55-story green giant from the bottom-up.

[JORDAN BAROWITZ]    What we do down here is heat and cool the building.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Jordan Barowitz of The Durst Organization, architects of the tower, showed us these 1,200-1,500 ton chillers that cool the building remotely by computer, saving energy with air conditioning, a top energy user.

[JORDAN BAROWITZ]    We can isolate air conditioning by floor, by multiple floors. There are readers all over the building, that’s constantly sending back information and evaluating the temperature on the 23:28 floors, so that can be adjusted.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    They all sort of run at different levels.

[JORDAN BAROWITZ]    They run at different levels. They are running if it's a hot day or running 23:33 as well.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    And during cooler nights, tanks like this one go to work.

[JORDAN BAROWITZ]    So at night it makes ice, and then in the morning, instead of running a chiller plant, we can just burn this ice off with running a pump over it.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    That can cool the building for several hours in the morning. This tower makes its own power. Barowitz says a 4.6 megawatt natural gas plant on site makes energy sense.

[JORDAN BAROWITZ]    There is no energy lost in the transformation of the electricity. Second, and more importantly is, we capture the waste heat from the combustion of the natural gas and we put it to use in the building.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    A building that now gets about 70% of its power off the grid.

    These features are just some of the reasons One Bryant Park was the first commercial highrise to achieve LEED Platinum certification by the U.S. Green Building Council. Platinum is the cream of the crop among the Council's Certified Gold, Silver and Platinum levels. They recognize homes and buildings as designed to achieve energy savings, water efficiency, carbon emissions reductions, better air quality and more.

[SCOT HORST]    Platinum is just about as far as you can go in buildings today.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Scot Horst is Vice President at the U.S. Green Building Council, which developed the LEED system.

[SCOT HORST]    The more of these things you do, the higher you get certified.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]        That has more companies seeing the need to go LEED. Consultant Nico Kienzl at a Sustainability Conference in New York said building owners have little choice, but to pursue LEED.

[NICO KIENZL]    It’s almost the requirement now in terms of market expectations. If they don't do a LEED project in New York City, they don't really have a marketable product.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    The Visionaire in Battery Park City is known as the first LEED Platinum set of condos in New York City. The residents here have floor to ceiling windows and they control the window shades automatically. And we think the residents here take green living very seriously; we found an all-electric Tesla parked right out front.

    More building owners find the cost of certification worth it. Of the $2 billion total cost of the Bank of America building, the owners shelled out an estimated $40-60 million to go LEED Platinum.

[MALE SPEAKER]    We will find this building to be a tremendous investment for the Bank of America.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    As do owners of other green buildings, including the Platinum LEED Verdesian in downtown Manhattan and the Duke Energy Building in Charlotte, which also requires tenants to pursue LEED certification.

    The benefits go beyond energy bills. Barowitz says a cleaner environment leads to more productive workers and that's a selling point to companies.

[JORDAN BAROWITZ]    So if you tell them that the employees are going to be more productive, there are going to be fewer sick days, they are going to happier, and their productivity will increase by four or five percentage points, that's something that gives you a competitive advantage in the market.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    But while LEED is highly regarded, with more than 35,000 buildings now registered, not all agree it's the best way to go. It has come under fire for the cost to business and energy modeling, commissioning, and more. Some complain about the complexity of complying. Others say a LEED rating is too easy to get and question the environmental benefit.

    Not so at Bank of America, where other bells and whistles include elevators that know workers' destinations before they get in. Floor to ceiling windows that maximize natural light. Electronic shades that minimize glare. Ceramic dots baked into windows deflect the sun's heat. Meters track CO2 in the air here, which is 95% clear of particulate matter, and no worker is far from one of these.

[MALE SPEAKER]    So all the building has these registers.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Adjustable registers in the floors, more efficient than ceiling vents, let employees control their own airflow.

    So the women come out and they make it warmer.

[MALE SPEAKER]    Exactly! Women make it warmer and the men make it cooler.

[LINDA KAPLIN]        It’s bright and it's beautiful and I love it.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    Employee Linda Kaplin enjoys the vent, the view, and the big picture too.

[LINDA KAPLIN]    If we don't take care of our planet, it's not going to be around, and it will affect future generations. So whatever we can do now is wonderful.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    While the return on investment is a growing motivation for buildings to go green, many hope the bottom line for companies goes beyond the bottom line.

[JEFF BARKER]    Building a building like this really is just the right thing to do, and that's where the social responsibility comes in.

[SUSAN MCGINNIS]    And the experts we talk to say the next big trend in building efficiency is the carbon neutral or zero carbon building, although they see that as prohibitively expensive for the foreseeable future.

    And that does it for us for this edition of “Clean Skies Sunday”. I'm Susan McGinnis. Enjoy the rest of your weekend. We'll see you right here next Sunday morning, and until then, we'll see you at cleanskies.com. You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Have a great day!

[END SHOW]