GLOBAL CLIMATE DEBATE

[SUSAN McGINNIS]  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, a massive ice island breaks from a glacier and is now adrift south of the North Pole.  Scientists say it is the biggest such event in the region in five decades.  We talk to one about whether climate change is a culprit.
Harnessing energy from wind, solar, geothermal, and other renewable sources just got tougher, as the White House grabs funding from those industries to use it elsewhere.
And we head to an island off of Denmark that's completely carbon neutral.  We'll show you how the people of Samso make that happen.
First, in energy news this past week, the legacy of former Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, who died in a plane crash on an Alaskan mountainside last Monday.  Stevens played a crucial role in the energy debate for decades.  He was Alaska's longest-serving senator, best known for efforts to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR, to oil drilling.
He devoted much of his time to the Rampart Dam, a massive hydroelectric project planned for the Yukon River.  It would have created an estimated 3 1/2 to 5 gigawatts of electricity, but the plan was scrapped.
Stevens also wrote legislation that ended all legal challenges to a pipeline connecting the port of Valdez to the North Slope.  And he played a role in legislation that paid native Alaskans to allow drilling on tens of millions of acres of land.  He was also a major player in the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which designated millions of acres of lands for national parks, preserves, forests, and wildlife refuge.
The renewable energy sector suffers a blow as $1.5 billion in loan guarantee funding is snatched away.  The House passed a measure shifting $26 billion to states under its Education, Jobs, and Medicaid Assistance Act, part of it from the DoE's Renewable Energy Program.  House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office says the Obama administration has said it will work to restore that funding.  We'll have more on that in a moment.

And, just a few more feet to go, but drilling on the relief well to permanently plug the leak in the Gulf had to be stopped last week because of a tropical depression.  Government scientists say the storm could actually be good for the area, as it will break down some of the oil that remains.  Once the relief well is completed, BP can pump mud and cement into the broken well.
Has oil spill chic arrived?  Vogue Italia's latest photo shoot, called "Water and Oil," was inspired by the Gulf spill, with models covered in oil, lying on dirty rocks.  The editor-in-chief says, while she knows the spread is evocative, she says the message is about being careful with nature.
Well, now to Greenland and a giant ice island that's floating across the Arctic Ocean.  It broke off the Petermann Glacier last week.  Covering 100 square miles, it's about four times the size of Manhattan.  This is the biggest chunk of ice to detach from a glacier in the Arctic in nearly 50 years.  Its expected path across the Arctic Ocean goes southward across the Nares Strait between Greenland and Canada.  Oil platforms and shipping lanes will lie in its path.
Glaciologists say it is so big, it can't be stopped.  But while a 100-square-mile island makes for dramatic images, is it dramatic evidence of a warming globe?  We talk to Associate Professor Andreas Muenchow of the University of Delaware, among the first to get the word out of the breakage, which scientists call "calving.”  He has studied glaciers in that region for years and gave us his take on the significance of the event to science and to the climate change debate.
An ice island four times the size of Manhattan breaks off the Petermann Glacier.  How unusual is this, or how typical an event is that?  This has happened before. 

[MUENCHOW]  Yes, it's an event that appears to be happening about every 25 to 30 years.  Last time before this that it happened, it was 1991.  And sometime between 1958 and 1962, a similar break-off has happened.  Slightly smaller, so it's the biggest one, but I wouldn't call it terribly significant. 
[McGINNIS]  Why do we care? 

[MUENCHOW]  If you want to know why I care, I care because I'm excited about it, because of the science that I can do with it.  Something happened that I have not seen before.  The last time that it happened, I missed it, and the time before that that it happened, I wasn't even born.  So in that sense, it's significant because I've never seen it, I've never had the capability to look at it, and, um...  Actually, when it happened, 1991, I didn't have the context for this channel.  I had not visited the area.  I had not thought about all the physics and how this might further the advancement of science.  That's why I care. 

[McGINNIS]  I can see why you're so excited.  Tell me why the rest of us should find this significant. 

[MUENCHOW]  Because it's part of a big debate of what is happening with the Greenland ice sheet right now. 

[McGINNIS]  Right, so some people are pointing to global warming as the reason this massive piece of ice broke off of the Petermann Glacier.  Others say this is something that happens every 20 to 30 years.  It would have happened anyway.  What do you say? 

[MUENCHOW]  It's not inconsistent with global warming.  The question is, how much does global warming contribute to that, and that part, we don't know. 

[McGINNIS]  Are they becoming more frequent over time, that might point to global warming? 

[MUENCHOW]  Based on three data points -- 1960, 1990, and 2010 -- anyone that says it's happening more frequent or less frequent, I would call a hack. 

[McGINNIS]  That's because we don't know enough yet? 

[MUENCHOW]  That's right.  If the cycle is 25 years or 30 years, and the first time that a person has been near that region is only 150 years ago, we don't know. 

[McGINNIS]  So you can't say it's not global warming. 

[MUENCHOW]  That's correct, I cannot, and I do not and never said that it would not be global warming.  My feeling right now is that people that want to put the label "global warming" on every event that happens, it cheapens the debate.  It takes the care and attention to detail away, because, hey, if it's global warming, we understand it.  End of story -- we don't have to understand the science any better. 

[McGINNIS]  But if this event is related -- and the bottom line is we don't know yet because not too many of them have been tracked and studied in this manner -- if they are coming closer together, if they're becoming more frequent, if these breakages are becoming larger and that does eventually show evidence of global warming, then this event is very significant.

[MUENCHOW]  What you're saying is then the way that the mass balance of this specific glacier has been operating for...  decades, maybe centuries, is changing.  And that is certainly possible.  But nobody knows that, if that's going to happen or not. 

[McGINNIS]  So maybe the most significant thing about this breakage is the research opportunity? 

[MUENCHOW]  Opportunities. 

[McGINNIS]  Muenchow appeared before an energy subcommittee headed by Congressman Ed Markey this past week.  The exchange between the two was called intense and almost hostile, as Markey sought to get more concrete answers out of Muenchow about the role of climate change in the event and couldn't pin him down.  Markey actually suggested the ice island is so big, global warming deniers should go live there.  Muenchow said that through all of this, he learned that both the science and the politics of this debate are a lot like the ice island -- what is visible at the surface is only a tiny fraction of what's below.

Well, meanwhile, just a few hundred miles from Greenland's southeastern coast, a radical new way to battle global warming by cutting CO2 emissions is now being tested in Iceland.  Scientists working on an international carbon storage project near Reykjavik are converting carbon dioxide into rock.  Clean Skies' Chief Correspondent Tyler Suiters traveled to Iceland late last year for a closer look at what could be revolutionary research. 

[SUITERS]  This is how Icelanders generate virtually all of their electricity -- with hydro and geothermal power, both providing exceptionally clean energy.  But these renewable resources aren't enough to eliminate the country's carbon emissions. 

[EIRIKUR HJALMARSSON, REYKJAVIK ENERGY]  The industries that are plugging into our renewable resources is mainly aluminum smelter, which is quite carbon emitting.  So I think that -- And we are actually quite few here, so if you would measure it per capita, you would have rather high carbon emissions in Iceland. 

[SUITERS]  And that carbon emission level is part of the reason for this research -- a twist on the more traditional carbon emission storage projects.  Iceland's international CarbFix program aims to pull CO2 out of the air and put it inside rock. 

[HOLMFRIDUR SIGURDARDOTTIR, CARBFIX PROJECT MANAGER]  We are going to take the CO2 from the steam, dissolve it in water, and inject it into basaltic bedrock, where it will react with minerals in the basaltic rock and form solid carbonates.  So the CO2 will be stable for thousands of years in the bedrock. 

[SIGURDUR GISLASON, CARBFIX SCIENTIFIC STEERING COMMITTEE]  The ocean floor covers about 70% of the Earth's surface.  All the ocean ridges are made of basalts, and Iceland is the largest part of the ocean ridges that are above sea level.  If we're going to use this method to fully dissolve the carbon dioxide in water, if we do it in sea water, if we do it on the ocean floor, there's endless supply of water, so there's no limit to the water we have. 

[SUITERS]  No, but there is a limit on the scope of Iceland's CarbFix research, so far confined to the lab only.  And scientists say the comfort of this controlled atmosphere is far from the challenges a true field test would present. 

[SIGURDARDOTTIR]  We're actually planning to start injecting CO2 dissolved in water, early 2010.  That's actually the first step, to prove that the theory does work in the field.  We know it works in the lab, but we are taking it out into the field in scale 1 by 1. 

[GISLASON]  We've been doing experiments in the lab.  Then we've been taking the experiments and putting them into computer models and then we try to predict what's going to happen once the carbon dioxide gets into the ground.  But in the end, you really have to kind of jump.  You don't know what's going to happen in details until you really do it.  Therefore, we have to start by a small pilot study where we do the actual injection on a small scale, and then we can always scale it up to industrial scale if the experiment is successful. 

[SUITERS]  This is what Gislason refers to as a "small pilot" -- a CarbFix testing program involving a sprawling energy complex -- Reykjavik Energy's Hellisheidi facility about 20 minutes outside of Iceland's capital city.  The company, a partner in the CarbFix project, proudly calls this the newest and most modern geothermal power plant in the world, an emphasis there on "modern."  That's because Hellisheidi is now home to the initial CarbFix field testing. 

Now, one obvious question is, why locate a carbon storage project on the site of a geothermal plant which produces zero carbon emissions?  The answer lies deep underground in these volcanic fields, where the carbon emissions occur naturally. 

[GISLASON]  The basaltic rocks at the sites are -- is the ideal rock type for this.  It is rich in elements like calcium, magnesium, and iron that can combine with carbon dioxide to form this solid, calcium carbonate. 

[SIGURDARDOTTIR]  We have the basaltic rock and also that -- Well, the CO2 is originated from the cooling magma under the volcano.  And we have seen these reactions taking place in the nature.  So the CarbFix method is to imitate what nature is actually doing already in the geothermal systems. 

[SUITERS]  And if it can mineralize CO2, CarbFix would solve a major carbon storage problem.  CO2 sequestered underground -- that is, "structural containment," as it's known -- can inevitably leak, posing a potential health threat to anyone nearby.  That is not a risk with CO2 stored as rock.  And another benefit, according to Sigurdardottir -- one essential ingredient to the process is abundant.  She says more than 10% of the Earth's crust is basaltic, and there are substantial basalt fields in the U.S., Siberia, and India. 

No doubt exporting the CarbFix process would be excellent business for the country, but Iceland's scientists tell me the ability to store carbon, that environmental boon, that will be their true measure of success. 

[SIGURDARDOTTIR]  My hope is that this is going to be a success and we are going to be able to build this set-up and use it.  Because, how we are thinking about this, this is no rocket science.  So if we are able to build a relatively cheap and not so complicated set-up, then I would be happy. 

[SUITERS]  In Reykjavik, Iceland, Tyler Suiters, Clean Skies News. 

[McGINNIS]  Projects are now underway across the country to sequester carbon emissions.  Most are trying to store CO2 underground, and the CarbFix project also has a presence here.  The Earth Institute at Columbia University is also involved. 

On our Web site, you can watch Tyler's complete interviews with the CarbFix scientists.  You can also get a closer look at how Iceland is able to generate so much of its electricity while producing no carbon emissions.  That is all at CleanSkies.com. 

Still to come, we head to a carbon neutral land. 

[SULLIVAN]  I'm Lee Patrick Sullivan on a ferry crossing the Kalundborg Fjord.  Destination -- Samso Island.  That's Denmark's energy self-sufficient island.  How do they do it?  Stick around and find out. 

[McGINNIS]  And later, how clean diesel locomotives could be making your commute even greener. 

[BREAK] 

We're fighting for a day when we can all breathe easier.  We're fighting to make every section a smoke-free section.  For a day when even vehicles quit smoking.  We're fighting for clear skies over every city and healthy lungs throughout the country.  The American Lung Association isn't just fighting for air -- we're fighting for all the things that make it worth breathing.  Join us in the fight at fightingforair.org. 

[GRAPHIC ON SCREEN]  American Lung Association.  FightingForAir.org

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're there, through the American Red Cross.  Down the street, across the country, around the world.  You help save the day, every day.  Your support truly matters.  You can help today.  Visit redcross.org. 

[GRAPHIC ON SCREEN]  American Red Cross.  1-800-RED CROSS.  redcross.org

[EVAN WOLF, GULF COAST CLEAN UP, LOUISIANA NATIONAL GUARD]  When I signed on with the National Guard, I did it to help protect America from our enemies, like in the Persian Gulf -- not to clean up an oil company's mess here in the Gulf of Mexico. 

We'll do whatever mission we're given, and do it well, but America needs a new mission, because whether it's deep-drilling oil out here or spending a billion dollars a day on oil from our enemies overseas, our dependence on oil is threatening our national security. 

The thing is, a clean American energy plan would cut our dependence on oil in half.  It's more power for America, made here in America, putting our people to work using all the resources we have. 

Some folks in Washington say now's not the time for clean American power.  I got to ask, if not now...  when? 

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[McGINNIS]  Welcome back.  If you have a wind farm project proposed in your area, you may just see it grind to a halt.  As we said earlier, the wind, solar, geothermal, and other renewable energy industries just suffered a big blow, as the White House grabbed $1.5 billion dollars in funding away from renewable energy loan guarantees.  Renewable energy advocates say the cuts will undermine the loan program and endanger the future of these budding industries.  Rhone Resch, head of the Solar Energy Industry Association, reacted to the funding cuts. 

[RESCH]  This is a huge impact on the solar industry.  Right now, in the Loan Guarantee Program, there are over 80 projects that have applied for funding in this program.  By decreasing it by over 50%, most of these projects won't go forward.  You're talking about new factories, you’re talking about utility-scale solar projects in the Southwest.  Ultimately, you're talking about the loss of tens of thousands of jobs in the United States. 

[McGINNIS]  And Darren Goode of the Hill Newspaper covers these issues.  He talked to us about the impact. 

[GOODE]  It is true that the Energy Department has been slow in doling out this money.  In fact, Senator Reid, Majority Leader Harry Reid, last week, said that this money was not going to be missed right now because it just wasn't being doled out. 

[McGINNIS]  Meanwhile, a small island off the coast of Denmark is a living experiment in sustainability.  Samso Island is not a top European tourist destination, but politicians and environmentalists are flocking to this farming community.  They want to see how this island of 4,000 people has become CO2 negative, actually producing more energy than it uses.  And it does so with no oil wells or coal mines in sight.  Clean Skies' Lee Patrick Sullivan traveled to Samso in the winter to see the island's simple approach to reversing its carbon footprint. 

[SULLIVAN]  After a two-hour ferry ride, entering Samso Island looks like stepping back in time.  But this Danish island farming community is on the cutting edge of energy sustainability. 

In 1997, the Danish government held a contest to find an area that could be carbon neutral in 10 years.  Samso won.  In 1998, the Samso Energy Academy was set up, and the entire island -- 20 miles long and 6 miles wide -- became one big experiment in renewable energy.  And now, a little more than 10 years later, how are the people of Samso doing? 

[JESPER KJEMS, SAMSO ENERGY ACADEMY]  If you measure everything that goes out of the island and comes into the island, we actually now are CO2 negative, you can say, sending more clean energy to the mainland than we import. 

[SULLIVAN]  The bulk of that extra energy comes from the wind turbines dotting Samso's countryside and the offshore ones that stand guard like kinetic soldiers.  Samso also saves energy on heating.  It's done in this unassuming red building.  It's one of four central heating stations on the island.  It's fueled by something Samso has a lot of -- straw. 

[KJEMS]  What I remember when I was a child, you see all these fields of burning straw.  But now we're just taking it in here and burning it to get the energy. 

[SULLIVAN]  Here's how it works.  The straw is stored in this building.  It's put on a conveyor belt where it is cut up and then piped into the furnace room.  Here, the straw is blown into this blast furnace, heating up water before sending it through these pipes to local homes and businesses.  This heating station uses solar power to preheat the water.  Once the water is cooled, it is then sent back to the central station, reheated, and the system repeats.  Pretty simple.  Even the rodent extraction mechanism isn't high-tech. 

It boils down to it, you're burning straw and boiling water, aren't you? 

[KJEMS]  Exactly.  It's not really rocket science.  And I think it shouldn't be. 

[SULLIVAN]  How the Samso Energy Academy got this island of conservative farmers to embrace renewable energy is the key.  Like many small towns, Samso was losing its youth to larger cities, and its economy was suffering.  So the Samso plan makes the farmers partners in this experiment.  The heating plant is now another source of income for excess straw that would have normally just been burned in the fields.  And the straw's ashes are returned to the farms, adding nutrients to the soil. 

And those wind turbines?  No problem getting approval from the neighbors because they are owned by the people of Samso, at least partially.  Shares in the turbines were sold to residents like Inge Larsen -- real-estate agent by day, energy entrepreneur by night.  She says without the profit motive, the community would never have signed on. 

[LARSEN]  If it hasn't been a good buy, we wouldn't have done it.  It would just be another bunch of hippies, I'm sure. 

[SULLIVAN]  The folks at the Energy Academy know that they're a small island but say if countries think of neighborhoods instead of cities, it can be replicated. 

[KJEMS]  It seems unrealistic when you are Cairo or New York, or something like that, to do this, but then you just have to define your area.  Say, now this area, we want to do this 100%.  And maybe the next areas will follow. 

[SULLIVAN]  The island has become a rock star in the environmental world, proving that sustainable living can be achieved.  But calling the people of Samso "tree huggers" would be a little bit off base. 

[LARSEN]  They've been stressing climate for the last few years, and we never thought about climate to begin with.  It's not important to us.  That's not what we're talking about.  It's being independent because we use sustainable energy. 

[KJEMS]  It's only a matter of defining your project and then do it, not to save the world, but to save that area.  I mean, that's a key thing to this.  We did this to save Samso, not to save the world. 

[SULLIVAN]  There are still challenges for Samso's energy independence.  With no storage capability, when the wind doesn't blow, the island uses coal energy from the mainland.  And then there are the cars and tractors and the diesel ferry that is the lifeblood of this island.  So saying goodbye to fossils altogether may take some time. 

[LARSEN]  Transport is definitely the next step, and it's a very big step and we can't do it on our own. 

[SULLIVAN]  Now, that will be the next challenge in Samso's quest for energy independence, and they may already have a head start.  Some local farmers have been putting rapeseed oil into their tractors and automobiles.  It may not be the solution, but it just goes to show that this one-time sleepy farming island now has sustainability on its mind.  In Samso, Denmark, Lee Patrick Sullivan, Clean Skies News. 

[McGINNIS]  And still to come on "Clean Skies Sunday," a cleaner locomotive is coming down the tracks.  We'll show you how one D.C. area commuter train is making your ride to work a little greener. 

[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. 

[GRAPHIC ON SCREEN]  Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.  Funding and editorial support provided by GlaxoSmithKline. 

In 1977, in Johannesburg, South Africa, an 8-year-old boy picked up the game of golf from his father.  By the age of 9, he was already outplaying him.  The odds of this gentle lad winning the Junior World Golf Championships at the age of 14 -- 1 in 16 million.  The odds of that same boy then making it to the U.S. and European pro-golf tours -- 1 in 7 million.  The odds of the Big Easy winning the Open Championship once and the U.S. Open Championship twice -- 1 in 780 million.  The odds of this professional golfer having a child diagnosed with autism -- 1 in 110.  Ernie Els encourages you to learn the signs of autism at autismspeaks.org.  Early diagnosis can make a lifetime of difference. 

[GRAPHIC ON SCREEN]  Autism Speaks.  It's time to listen.  autismspeaks.org. 

[MAN]  There's also an extended warrantee option.  There's just no need for you to get that.  You failed to get the tests that you needed at the doctor, so you won't be around in two years.  Okay?  Sign here, please. 

For a list of tests every man should have, go to ahrq.gov. 

[END BREAK] 

[McGINNIS]  Well, riding the rails to work has long been a way to cut carbon emissions by just getting folks out of their cars and on to mass transport.  But commuter rail lines often rely on older diesel engines that are not very efficient, a lot of them handed down from freight rail companies.  Well, that's beginning to change.  In March, Clean Skies' Dan Goldstein looked at one commuter railroad in Maryland that's starting to go green, and he tells us where they are now. 

[GOLDSTEIN]  Meet the MP36.  If this locomotive were a car, it would be a Prius on steroids.  Built by Motive Power in Boise, Idaho, it's really two trains in one.  MARC rail of Maryland is buying 26 of them.  A high-efficiency diesel, putting out 3,600 horsepower, means plenty of pull.  Or, in this case, push.  But more important, it's got an electric auxiliary power unit, meaning no wasteful idling, a big environmental no-no.  That means... 

[JOHN HORVATTER, DIRECTOR, MARC TRAIN/COMMUTER BUS SERVICES]  Less emissions, less particulate going into the air. 

[GOLDSTEIN]  Just how much less?  MARC says the new engines, which run on low-sulfur diesel, will cut emissions of nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, and particulate matter by as much as 70%.  It will be compliant with the EPA's stringent Tier-2 rules.  That's particularly important, as older engines like this one here in Washington's Union Station have to idle all day, especially in cold weather, to keep the brakes and the lights on, awaiting for its next run.  Idling diesels contribute to smog, but the MP36 is different.  Its electric APU keeps the engine turning until it's ready for the next trip. 

[HORVATTER]  Most of our trains park underneath the parking garage here.  And when the engines were running, there's a lot of smoke, and it got all over the place.  Well, these units will not have that anymore.  They have small units that will run, and they will basically keep everything ready to go.  All an engineer has to do is get in there and start the main power unit up, and off they go. 

[GOLDSTEIN]  These new engines still get a Hummer-like 4 miles to the gallon, but that's better than the engines they replaced, which got 3.  They still cost a pretty penny -- $3 million each -- but MARC says they can make up the cost with the fuel savings. 

[HORVATTER]  We're going through the process right now of getting these units approved from 90 miles an hour to 100 miles an hour.  At that time, we'll start to do some fuel efficiency testing and see exactly what our improvement will be, but we're hoping it's going to be between 25% and 30% fuel efficient. 

[GOLDSTEIN]  But getting the locomotives on the rails have hit a few red signals along the way.  They were supposed to be in service last year but only started making appearance here in Washington in January because of testing delays.  Nevertheless, Motive Power has orders from commuter lines in Virginia, Utah, and Illinois to add MP36 power to their fleets.  For Clean Skies News, I'm Dan Goldstein. 

[McGINNIS]  Those Tier-2 standards are part of the EPA's National Clean Diesel Campaign that started in 2008.  They're meant to cut down on emissions of nitrogen oxide and what's called "particulate matter," which are blamed for many breathing problems. 

Well, that does it for us for this edition of "Clean Skies Sunday.”  I'm Susan McGinnis.  Enjoy the rest of your weekend.  We will see 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. 

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