Oceans regulate our climate and our weather. They are essential for cycling water, carbon, and nutrients. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, the oceans have absorbed nearly 30 percent of human generated carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. As carbon dioxide mixes with ocean water, the water becomes more acidic — today, the oceans are 30 percent more acidic than they were before the Industrial Revolution. Even more troubling is that the chemistry of the oceans is changing 10 times faster than at any other time in the past 50 million years, making it challenging for organisms to adapt to these new conditions at the same rate.
More acidic oceans will have broad and significant impacts on marine ecosystems, the services they provide, and the coastal economies which depend on them. In addition to decreasing our carbon emissions, it is critical that we understand the process of ocean acidification and its impacts. A necessary first step toward developing a better understanding is to monitor and measure the ocean to learn what changes are occurring and when. This requires a network of scientists around the world collecting, organizing, and analyzing data on ocean acidification — a global ocean “vital signs” monitoring network focused specifically on ocean acidification and its effects on ocean health. A new and growing Global Monitoring Network for Ocean Acidification is starting to be developed and will require strategically placed monitoring equipment and trained personnel to be effective and help us to understand and respond to this growing problem.
Ocean acidification is one of the three topics — along with sustainable fisheries and marine pollution – discussed at the U.S. Department of State’s Our Ocean Conference. Learn more about these issues and the conference at state.gov/ourocean.
President Barack Obama, with Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy, center, talks with EPA staff members who worked on the power-plant emissions standards, in the Rose Garden of the White House, June 2, 2014. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza) Courtesy of White House
For more information:
Read the “Our Ocean” Conference Agenda for June 17, and watch the live webcast of events on state.gov/ourocean.
Join Secretary of State John Kerry and Bill Nye “The Science Guy” for a Twitter Q&A at 10:00 a.m. EDT on June 17.
Follow the Bureau of Oceans, International Environmental, and Scientific Affairs (OES) on Twitter, and like OES on Facebook.
This article is a repost (6-17-14), credit: State Department. Video courtesy of State Department.
Dan Utech Special Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change Photo courtesy of White House
By Dan Utech, White House
Today, as part of the President’s Climate Action Plan, the EPA proposed new carbon pollution standards for power plants. These standards represent a commonsense proposal that will have huge benefits for all Americans. In fact, for every dollar of investment spurred by this proposal, there is roughly seven dollars’ worth of health benefits in return.
Here are some numbers that help explain today’s announcement:
Nearly 40 is the number of percentage points of total carbon pollution that comes from power plants. The President’s Climate Action Plan has focused on modernizing our buildings, factories, cars, and trucks – but altogether, they make up a little over half of all the carbon pollution. It makes sense, then, that our next logical step would be to modernize the power sector, putting in place the first-ever carbon pollution standards for power plants.
More than 300 is the number of groups EPA engaged with across the country – including 11 public listening sessions that hosted more than 3,000 people – in order to develop its proposal. And the outreach continues. After the proposed rule is published, there will be a 120-day public comment period to make sure the final standards reflect all the best ideas and input from everyone includes states, utilities, labor, health advocates, environmental groups and industry.
30 is the number of percentage points of total carbon pollution that will be cut from our power sector by 2030 – relative to 2005 levels. That is like erasing the annual carbon pollution from two-thirds of all cars and trucks in America. And if you add up what we will avoid between 2020 and 2030 under the proposal, it’s more than the carbon pollution from every power plant in America in 2012 – times two.
50 is the number of ways the EPA proposal can be implemented; this proposal puts tools in the hands of each state and its governor – there’s no one-size-fits-all approach here. And let’s remember that the idea of setting higher standards to cut carbon pollution isn’t new. 47 states have utilities that run demand-side energy efficiency programs, 38 have renewable portfolio standards or goals, and 10 have market-based greenhouse gas emissions programs.
48 to 84 billion is the number of dollars of net benefits that the proposal will generate in 2030. A big share of those net benefits come from lives saved and quality of life improved, asthma attacks avoided and fewer days of missed school or work. Specific 2030 benefits include up to:
150,000 fewer asthma attacks
3,700 less cases of bronchitis in children
180,000 fewer days of school missed
310,000 fewer lost work days
6,600 less premature deaths
3,300 fewer heart attacks
1,700 avoided hospital emergency room visits
Tens of thousands are the number of jobs that EPA and others estimate will be created by the proposed standards – including machinists to manufacture energy-efficient appliances, construction workers to build efficient homes and buildings or weatherize existing ones, service providers to do energy audits and install efficient technologies, and engineers and programmers to design and improve building energy management systems.
8 is the number of percentage points by which families and businesses will be able to cut their electricity bill under the EPA proposal in 2030. Taking advantage of energy efficiency, states can implement the EPA’s proposal in a way that drives billions of investment into retrofits like upgrades to windows and heating and cooling systems; deployment of better appliances through programs like accelerated buy-back; and improved energy management including through smart metering. Steps like this will cut energy waste and cut electricity bills.
More than 80 is the number of countries – representing over 80 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions – who pledged in 2009 to take climate actions through 2020 under the Copenhagen Accord. As countries prepare long-range carbon reduction goals for a global climate deal expected in 2015, they are looking to the United States for leadership and an example to follow. The President’s Climate Action Plan ensures that America will be a leader in those negotiations and in the global fight against climate change.
44 is the number of years that EPA’s legal authority to reduce air pollution has been around. The Clean Air Act, enacted by Congress in 1970, established mechanisms for controlling emissions of air pollutants from stationary sources – including power plants. In the year 2010 alone, updates to the Act are estimated to have prevented more than 160,000 premature deaths, 130,000 heart attacks, 86,000 hospital admissions, 13 million lost workdays, and 3.2 million lost school days due to respiratory illness and other diseases caused or exacerbated by air pollution.
Finally,zero– that’s the number of times special interests have been right about having to choose between the health of our people and the health of our economy.
Learn more:
See how the standards will make our communities healthier
Find out more about the President’s plan to fight climate change
Dan Utech is the Special Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change.
This article is a repost, credit: White House Blog. Video courtesy of White House Blog (5-31-14).
Survey reveals cities are planning for climate change, but still searching for links to economic growth.
Infographic courtesy of NOAA
By Peter Dizikes, MIT
An increasing number of cities around the world now include preparations for climate change in their basic urban planning — but only a small portion of them have been able to make such plans part of their economic development priorities, according to a unique global survey of cities released today (5-29-14).
The Urban Climate Change Governance Survey (UCGS), based on responses from 350 cities worldwide, underscores the extent to which city leaders recognize climate change as a major challenge — even as they are trying to figure out how their responses can create jobs, growth, and cost savings in areas ranging from cities’ transportation networks to their distribution of businesses.
“Climate change isn’t an isolated issue,” says Alexander Aylett, a postdoc in MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP), and the lead author of today’s report. “It has large implications for all other aspects of urban life. What we are seeing is cities starting to build it into the DNA of how they approach urban planning.”
According to the findings, 75 percent of cities worldwide now tackle climate-change issues as a mainstream part of their planning, and 73 percent of cities are attempting both climate mitigation and climate adaptation — that is, they are trying both to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and to adapt to long-term changes that are already in motion. But only 21 percent of cities report tangible connections between the response to climate change and achieving other local development goals.
Aylett calls it a “cliché” that environmental and economic progress cannot coexist, citing a number of cities where jobs and growth have derived from climate-change efforts. Portland, Ore., he observes, developed incentives, training, and regulations to help sustainable construction firms grow, while a pilot program called Clean Energy Works Portland employed 400 workers to reduce home energy use, reducing carbon emissions by 1,400 metric tons annually.
Urban planners in Alberta, as Aylett notes, have studied the cost savings associated with limiting metropolitan sprawl and concluded that denser development could save $11 billion in capital costs over the next 60 years, and $130 million in annual maintenance. But most cities, he suggests, have simply not yet identified ways to link climate planning and economic development in the first place.
“It isn’t so much that it’s hard to reconcile economic and environmental priorities,” Aylett says. “It’s that we’re not trying.”
Regional differences remain
The new report is a companion to a survey conducted in 2012. This year’s results revealed continuing regional disparities in urban climate planning. Compared with the global average of 75 percent, U.S. cities lag in planning for both mitigation and adaptation, with just 58 percent of cities addressing both. This echoes the 2012 survey, which revealed that a smaller portion of U.S. cities were doing basic climate-change planning, compared with those in other regions — 59 percent in the U.S., for instance, compared with 95 percent in Latin America.
Globally, 63 percent of cities say they have between one and five employees dedicated to climate-change planning; North American cities are most likely to have just one staff member focused on the topic. As the report’s executive summary notes, “A lack of funding to hire sufficient staff to work on climate change is a significant challenge for 67 percent of cities.”
On a different note, about 85 percent of cities have conducted an inventory of local greenhouse-gas emissions, and 15 percent, as part of that effort, have tried to track the emissions that stem from goods and services consumed within that city. As Aylett points out, “Beginning to address these upstream emissions is crucial if cities are really going to help bring down global emissions.”
The results also reveal that local industries and businesses are relatively disengaged with urban responses to climate change: About 25 percent of cities say that local businesses have been crucial to creating and implementing their climate mitigation plans, whereas 48 percent of cities report that local civil-society groups, such as nonprofits or other organizations, have been involved in climate planning.
The survey is a collaboration between DUSP and ICLEI, the world’s largest association of cities. Today’s report is being released in conjunction with an ICLEI-backed conference on urban planning, being held in Bonn, Germany. To conduct the survey, questionnaires were sent to officials in more than 700 cities worldwide, with 48 percent of them responding to a set of 69 queries.
Other scholars believe the UCGS results are valuable. John Robinson, a professor of geography at the University of British Columbia, calls the survey “extremely important and extremely useful.” In particular, Robinson says, an “important issue raised by this work is what the connection is between framing these responses in terms of climate change and framing them in terms of broader conceptual frameworks, such as sustainability.” Promoting the general idea of sustainable development in urban areas, he adds, may be “most helpful in mainstreaming climate policy.”
Coal Photo courtesy of US Energy Information Administration
25 March 2014 | Geneva – In new estimates released today, WHO reports that in 2012 around 7 million people died – one in eight of total global deaths – as a result of air pollution exposure. This finding more than doubles previous estimates and confirms that air pollution is now the world’s largest single environmental health risk. Reducing air pollution could save millions of lives.
New estimates
In particular, the new data reveal a stronger link between both indoor and outdoor air pollution exposure and cardiovascular diseases, such as strokes and ischaemic heart disease, as well as between air pollution and cancer. This is in addition to air pollution’s role in the development of respiratory diseases, including acute respiratory infections and chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases.
The new estimates are not only based on more knowledge about the diseases caused by air pollution, but also upon better assessment of human exposure to air pollutants through the use of improved measurements and technology. This has enabled scientists to make a more detailed analysis of health risks from a wider demographic spread that now includes rural as well as urban areas.
Regionally, low- and middle-income countries in the WHO South-East Asia and Western Pacific Regions had the largest air pollution-related burden in 2012, with a total of 3.3 million deaths linked to indoor air pollution and 2.6 million deaths related to outdoor air pollution.
“Cleaning up the air we breathe prevents non-communicable diseases as well as reduces disease risks among women and vulnerable groups, including children and the elderly…”
Dr Flavia Bustreo, WHO Assistant Director-General Family, Women and Children’s Health
“Cleaning up the air we breathe prevents noncommunicable diseases as well as reduces disease risks among women and vulnerable groups, including children and the elderly,” says Dr Flavia Bustreo, WHO Assistant Director-General Family, Women and Children’s Health. “Poor women and children pay a heavy price from indoor air pollution since they spend more time at home breathing in smoke and soot from leaky coal and wood cook stoves.”
Included in the assessment is a breakdown of deaths attributed to specific diseases, underlining that the vast majority of air pollution deaths are due to cardiovascular diseases as follows:
Graphic courtesy of EIA
Outdoor air pollution-caused deaths – breakdown by disease:
3% – acute lower respiratory infections in children.
Indoor air pollution-caused deaths – breakdown by disease:
34% – stroke;
26% – ischaemic heart disease;
22% – COPD;
12% – acute lower respiratory infections in children; and
6% – lung cancer.
The new estimates are based on the latest WHO mortality data from 2012 as well as evidence of health risks from air pollution exposures. Estimates of people’s exposure to outdoor air pollution in different parts of the world were formulated through a new global data mapping. This incorporated satellite data, ground-level monitoring measurements and data on pollution emissions from key sources, as well as modelling of how pollution drifts in the air.
Risks factors are greater than expected
“The risks from air pollution are now far greater than previously thought or understood, particularly for heart disease and strokes,” says Dr Maria Neira, Director of WHO’s Department for Public Health, Environmental and Social Determinants of Health. “Few risks have a greater impact on global health today than air pollution; the evidence signals the need for concerted action to clean up the air we all breathe.”
After analysing the risk factors and taking into account revisions in methodology, WHO estimates indoor air pollution was linked to 4.3 million deaths in 2012 in households cooking over coal, wood and biomass stoves. The new estimate is explained by better information about pollution exposures among the estimated 2.9 billion people living in homes using wood, coal or dung as their primary cooking fuel, as well as evidence about air pollution’s role in the development of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, and cancers.
In the case of outdoor air pollution, WHO estimates there were 3.7 million deaths in 2012 from urban and rural sources worldwide.
Many people are exposed to both indoor and outdoor air pollution. Due to this overlap, mortality attributed to the two sources cannot simply be added together, hence the total estimate of around 7 million deaths in 2012.
“Excessive air pollution is often a by-product of unsustainable policies in sectors such as transport, energy, waste management and industry. In most cases, healthier strategies will also be more economical in the long term due to health-care cost savings as well as climate gains,” says Dr Carlos Dora, WHO Coordinator for Public Health, Environmental and Social Determinants of Health. “WHO and health sectors have a unique role in translating scientific evidence on air pollution into policies that can deliver impact and improvements that will save lives.”
The release of today’s data is a significant step in advancing a WHO roadmap for preventing diseases related to air pollution. This involves the development of a WHO-hosted global platform on air quality and health to generate better data on air pollution-related diseases and strengthened support to countries and cities through guidance, information and evidence about health gains from key interventions.
Later this year, WHO will release indoor air quality guidelines on household fuel combustion, as well as country data on outdoor and indoor air pollution exposures and related mortality, plus an update of air quality measurements in 1600 cities from all regions of the world.
This article is a repost, credit: WHO (World Health Organization).
DALIAN, PRC: 1200 zero-emission, electric buses made by BYD Company Ltd will soon hit the streets of China’s “Bright Northern Pearl”, Dalian. Dalian’s municipal government has signed a cooperative agreement with global electric vehicle and battery leader, BYD. The agreement stipulates the purchase of 600 BYD electric buses in 2014 and another 600 in 2015, totaling 1200 units. BYD took the opportunity at the signing event to announce the opening of a new electric bus manufacturing facility in the Dalian Huayuankou Economic Zone to service the growing needs of northern China. The agreement also mentions a conversion initiative of more than 50% of new purchased taxis in Dalian to new energy vehicles in support of the “new energy vehicles promotion and local environment improvement” initiative.
BYD Electric Bus Photo courtesy of BYD
At the event with Liaoning Province Governor Zhenggao Chen, BYD Founder and CEO Chuanfu Wang, introduced company milestones, R&D capabilities and products including the electric bus and fully electric e6 SUV being used worldwide in fleet applications. He also took the chance to talk about BYD’s latest consumer offering – the break-through, plug-in-hybrid, Qin. Chairman Wang highlighted operational statistics of the BYD electric fleets now totaling over 175 million Km traveled (~111 million miles in revenue service) and operating in many cities including recent projects in London, England and New York City. A key message from the BYD Chairman was that this technology is not just environmentally friendly, but very efficient and profitable for the operators as witnessed in the Shenzhen fleets. Zhenggao Chen, Governor of Liaoning province, expressed his view that BYD is a pioneer in the aspect of new energy vehicles, and is confident BYD will seize the opportunity to develop and keep mastering the core technologies for new energy vehicles to keep winning the war combating poor air quality.
Photo courtesy of BYD
About BYD
BYD Company Ltd. is one of China’s largest companies and has successfully expanded globally. Specializing in battery technologies, their green mission to “solve the whole problem” has made them industry pioneers and leaders in several High-tech sectors including High-efficiency Automobiles, Electrified Public Transportation, Environmentally-Friendly Energy Storage, Affordable Solar Power and Information Technology and Original Design Manufacturing (ODM) services.
As the world’s largest manufacturer of rechargeable batteries, their mission to create safer and more environmentally friendly battery technologies has led to the development of the BYD Iron Phosphate (or “Fe”) Battery. This fire-safe, completely recyclable and incredibly long-cycle technology has become the core of their clean energy platform that has expanded into automobiles, buses, trucks, utility vehicles and energy storage facilities. BYD and all of their shareholders, including the great American Investor Warren Buffett, see these environmentally and economically forward products as the way of the future.
BYD has made a strong entrance to the North, Central and South American markets with their battery electric buses, and lineup of automobiles. Their mission lies not just in sales growth, but also in sociological integration and local job creation as they have poured incredible investments into developing offices, dealerships and manufacturing facilities in the local communities they now call home, truly a first for Chinese companies. For more information, please visit www.byd.com.
Largest order to date for BYD all-electric Buses and e6 Taxis
Nanjing, China — The ancient capital of China and Nanjing Public Transportation Group is transforming city public transport fleets with an order for more than 1,000 fully electric transit buses and taxis from BYD Company Ltd. The city will be taking delivery of more than 600 BYD K9 battery-electric Buses, 50 of which were delivered for the city’s Youth Olympic Games in August 2014. Authorities also placed an order for 400 of BYD’s all-electric e6, a 5-passenger cross-over utility vehicle, some of which have already hit the streets. Nanjing Jiangnan Electric Taxi Ltd. will be operating the electric vehicles. Nanjing is one of the pilot cities in China that has been chosen by the Central Government to participate in air quality improvement programs. In November of last year, Nanjing and BYD signed a strategic co-operation agreement that also brought BYD to the area to build and develop their zero emission products.
BYD all-electric, zero-emissions buses can travel 24 hours in service before charging during off-peak hours. Photo courtesy of BYD
“The Nanjing announcement will create one of the world’s largest fleet of pure electric public transport vehicles and certainly the largest supplied by BYD to date,” said Isbrand Ho, a BYD Managing Director. “This is a positive sign of the growing acceptance of pure electric transport vehicles such as the ebus having a significant role in making urban environments less polluted.”
BYD E6 Taxis Photo courtesy of BYD
About BYD
BYD Company Ltd. is one of China’s largest companies and has successfully expanded globally. Specializing in battery technologies, their green mission to “solve the whole problem” has made them industry pioneers and leaders in several High-tech sectors including High-efficiency Automobiles, Electrified Public Transportation, Environmentally-Friendly Energy Storage, Affordable Solar Power and Information Technology and Original Design Manufacturing (ODM) services.
As the world’s largest manufacturer of rechargeable batteries, their mission to create safer and more environmentally friendly battery technologies has led to the development of the BYD Iron Phosphate (or “Fe”) Battery. This fire-safe, completely recyclable and incredibly long-cycle technology has become the core of their clean energy platform that has expanded into automobiles, buses, trucks, utility vehicles and energy storage facilities. BYD and all of their shareholders, including the great American Investor Warren Buffett, see these environmentally and economically forward products as the way of the future.
BYD has made a strong entrance to the North, Central and South American markets with their battery electric buses, and lineup of automobiles. Their mission lies not just in sales growth, but also in sociological integration and local job creation as they have poured incredible investments into developing offices, dealerships and manufacturing facilities in the local communities they now call home, truly a first for Chinese companies. For more information, please visit www.byd.com.
Sierra Club Executive Director Michael Brune Photo courtesy of Sierra Club
Everybody knows that standing in front of a moving car is dangerous, but what about standing behind one? Currently, four out of ten Americans live in a place where the air is sometimes dangerous to breathe, thanks in part to smog from cars and trucks. Today, the Obama administration finalized cleaner tailpipe standards that will help us all breathe easier.
Beginning in 2017, these cleaner tailpipe standards will require that refiners produce cleaner-burning, lower-sulfur gasoline, and that automakers use advanced pollution control technology on new cars. Although the impact of cleaner new cars will be felt over time, the cleaner gasoline will be used by all cars, old and new, and reduce pollution almost immediately. In the first year alone, smog-forming NOx emissions will be reduced by 260,000 tons. That’s like taking 33 million cars off the road — nearly two out of every ten cars in the U.S.
Cleaner tailpipe standards mean cleaner air, and cleaner air has real health benefits. Smog pollution, or ground-level ozone, can cause asthma attacks, respiratory disease, and even premature death. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that by 2030 these cleaner tailpipe standards will prevent roughly 2,000 premature deaths a year, along with reducing hospital admissions and asthma attacks.
That’s good news for everyone, but it’s especially important for families who live near a major road. According to the American Lung Association, living or working near a major roadway results in a greater risk of health problems, especially for children and teenagers.
Disappointingly, the oil industry did everything it could to derail or delay these health-protecting standards. They failed in part because the standards will dramatically clean our air for less than a penny a gallon, all while creating jobs. A study by Navigant Economics found that these standards would create almost 5,400 permanent jobs in the operation and maintenance of new refinery equipment, as well as more than 24,000 new jobs during the three years it takes to install that equipment.
The economic and employment benefits of the standards explain the strong support for them from automakers, auto parts manufacturers, and the United Auto Workers.
These cleaner tailpipe standards mark the third time that President Obama has acted to make our cars and trucks cleaner and more efficient. In 2012, finalizing historic vehicle standards of 54.5 miles per gallon was the biggest single step any country had ever taken to reduce climate-disrupting pollution. Then, just two weeks ago, the president directed his administration to move forward with the next round of fuel-economy standards for tractor-trailers and delivery trucks.
Eventually, cars and trucks that run on gas will be found in museums instead of garages, and the smog and health problems they caused will only be bad memories. Until that day, though, we can be thankful for these standards, which will eliminate so much pollution for so little cost.
