Transcript

12.4.25 · Science Show KY

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Speaker 1: Hello. This Kelly Taylor, and I'll be your host for
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Radioized Diary of Science and Nature. We'll have articles related
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to science and nature. But first a reminder. RADIOI is
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a reading service intended for people who are blind or
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have other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material. Today,
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I'll apologize for being kind of stopped up and hopefully
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you'll be able to understand everything. Okay, We'll begin with
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an article that focuses on how we can help wildlife
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in the winter time. This comes from huff Post and
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the title is I asked Wildlife Charities how to be
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kind to nature this winter? Written by Amy Glover. Tis
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the season to spread kindness and though that can include
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your friends, family and neighbors. According to the Wildlife Trusts,
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winter is a great chance to make a difference in
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the creatures on your doorstep too. Tom Hibbert, a wildlife
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expert from the charity, told HuffPost UK that as the
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colder winter creeps in, water and food sources become scarce
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and nature needs our helping hand. Doctor Benedict Dempsey, people
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and nature advisor at WWF, a World Wildlife Fund, agrees,
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noting that our gardens and outdoor spaces become vital refuges
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for wildlife preparing for the coldest months ahead. There are
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many simple ways we can show nature kindness over these
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chilly months, he added, So here are some of the
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steps the experts recommend. Number one, provide ice free water.
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One of the most obvious ways to help is by
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keeping water stations in your garden ice free and clean.
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Hibbert shared, offer a shallow dish of fresh water, making
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sure to clean and replace weakly. And if you have
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a pond, melt a hole in the ice with hot
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water to allow birds and other animals to drink and
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access it. Also, if you plan to clean your pond
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in the chillier months, doctor Dempsey urges caution. Quote even
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beneath the surface, life stirs. Dragonfly larvae remain active hunters
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throughout midwinter in ponds, he explained. Number two, leave your
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leaves good news for tired gardeners. The Wildlife Trust said
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that those dead leaves piling up on your grass are
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best left alone or at least placed in a pile,
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rather than being disposed of completely. Quote. Leaving a douvet
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of leaves can provide a perfect hiding spot for insects
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that are shutting down until next year. Hibbert said, many
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of next year's butterflies are already with us, waiting out
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the the winter as eggs, caterpillars or pupy and dead
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leaves can be important sanctuaries for these and other insects.
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In quote number three, have a couple of messy backyard patches,
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it's not just leaves that can provide sanctuary either. Quote.
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Providing even the smallest wild spaces makes a real difference.
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Dead Wood and log piles are havens for life wwfs.
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Doctor Dempsey stated a wide range of insects, like patchwork
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leafcutter bees use holes in dead wood as nest chambers.
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You can help by drilling holes in leftover timber or
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creating a simple bee hotel. Leaving seedheads and log piles
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can provide shelter for the many mini beasts in your
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garden and food for birds, Hibbert agreed. Meanwhile, sleepier species
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such as newts, beetles, and plenty of other insects can
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crawl into the logs to get cozy and curl up
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for the foreseeable Number four consider bat and bird boxes.
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Shelter is crucial for small animals in the winter, which
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is why the Wildlife Trust started. Or stated it's great
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idea to provide specially made kinds if you can place
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bird and bat boxes away from human activity without encroaching
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on any other critter's turf for the best results. After all,
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doctor Dempsey explained, small birds like tits and wrens can
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lose five percent or more of their body weight on
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a single cold night. They sometimes huddle together in empty
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nest boxes to conserve warmth, so leaving these in place
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can be a lifesaver. Number five, remember to look after
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the wildlife you can't see. Though a lot of the
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natural world rests in winter, it's important to remember that
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much of it is still there. Doctor Dempsey said, moth
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larvae and pupy shelter in the soil. Spider eggs can
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be found in sheltered places and quiet corners waiting to
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hatch in spring. He said, try to be aware of
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our less visible wildlife so you don't disturb their homes.
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And number six, don't let not having a garden hold
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you back. I don't have a garden of my own,
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but neither expert thinks that should hold me back from
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giving nature a helping hand, turning off unnecessary lights, switching
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to warmer toned bulbs, and using motion sensor lights and
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timers will help reduce light pollution and protect our furry
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friends throughout the chili season, said Hibbert. Additionally, doctor Dempsey
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said indoor container gardening can make a big difference for nature.
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Plant pots of hardy early bloomers like crocuses, hell bores
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or snowdrops that provide vital nectar for pollinators. These pots
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also offer shelters of slugs and spiders escaping the frost.
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Just make sure to choose peat free compost. Wildlife Trust
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and WWF offer animal adoption programs too, which you can
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support no matter where you live. Now we'll turn to
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The Guardian. This article headline is the environmental costs of
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corn should the US change how it grows its dominant crop,
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dated December the third, written by Ames Alexander. For decades,
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corn has rained over American agriculture. It sprawls across ninety
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million acres, about the size of Montana, and goes into
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everything from livestock feed and processed foods to the ethanol
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blended into most of the nation's gasoline. But a growing
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body of research reveals that the US's obsession with corn
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has a steep price. The fertilizer used to grow it
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is warming the planet and contaminating water. Corn is essential
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to the rural economy and to the world's food supply,
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and researchers say the problem isn't the corn itself, it's
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how we grow it. Corn farmers rely on heavy fertilizer
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use to sustain today's high yields, and when the nitrogen
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in the fertilizer breaks down in the soil, it releases nitrosoxide,
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a greenhouse gas nearly three hundred times more potent than
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carbon dioxide producing nitrogen. Fertilizer also emits large amounts of
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carbon dioxide, adding to its climate footprint. The corn and
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ethanol industries insist that rapid growth in ethanol, which now
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consumes forty percent of the US corn crop, is a
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net environmental benefit, and they strongly dispute research suggesting otherwise.
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Industry is also pushing for ethanol based jet fuel and
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higher ethanol gasoline blends as growth in electric vehicles threatens
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long term gasoline sales. Agriculture accounts for more than ten
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percent of US greenhouse gas emissions. And corn uses more
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than two thirds of all nitrogen fertilizer nationwide, making it
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the leading driver of agricultural nitrous oxide emissions. Since two thousand,
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US corn production has surged almost fifty percent, further adding
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to the crops climate impact. The environmental costs of corn
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rarely make headlines or factor into political debates. Much of
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the dynamic traces back to federal policy and to the
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powerful corn and ethanol lobby that helped shape it. The
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Renewable Fuel Standard the RFS, passed in the mid two thousands,
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required that gasoline be blended with ethanol, a biofuel that
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in the United States comes almost entirely from corn. That
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mandate drove up demand and prices for corn corn, spurring
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farmers to plant more of it. Many plant corn year
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after year on the same land. The practice, called continuous corn,
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demands massive amounts of nitrogen fertilizer and drives especially high
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nitrous oxide emissions. At the same time, federal subsidies make
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it more lucrative to grow corn than to diversify. Taxpayers
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have covered more than fifty billion dollars in corn insurance
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premiums over the past thirty years. According to Federal data
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compiled by the Environmental Working Group. Researchers say proven conservation
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steps such as planting rows of trees, shrubs, and grasses
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in corn fields could sharply reduce these emissions, but the
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Trump administration has eliminated many of the incentives that helped
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farmers try such practices. Experts say it all raises a
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larger question. If the US is most widely land crop
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is worsening climate change, shouldn't it begin growing it in
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a different way. In the late nineteen nineties, the US
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corn farmers were in trouble. Prices had cratered amid a
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global grain glut and the Asian financial crisis. A nineteen
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ninety nine report by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis
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said corn crop prices had hit crop bottom. Corn production
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really took off in the two thousands after federal mandates
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and incentives helped turn much of the US corn crop
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into ethanol. In two thousand and one, the US Department
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of Agriculture launched the bio Energy Program, which paid ethanol
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producers to increase their use of farm commodities for fuel.
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Then the two thousand and two Farm Bill created programs
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supporting ethanol and other renewable energy. Corn growers soon mounted
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an all out campaign to persuade Congress to require that
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gasoline be blended with ethanol, arguing it cut greenhouse gases,
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reduced oil dependence, and revived rural economies. Quote. I started
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receiving calls from Capitol Hill saying, would you have your
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growers stop calling us. We are with you. John Doggett,
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than the industry's chief lobbyist, said in an article published
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by the National Corn Grower Association. Quote I had not
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seen anything like it before, and haven't seen anything like
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it since. In two thousand and five, Congress created the RFS,
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which requires adding ethanol to gasoline, and expanded it two
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years later. The amount of corn used for ethanol domestically
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has more than tripled in the past twenty years. When
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demand for corn spiked as a result of the RFS,
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it pushed up prices worldwide. The result was more land
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cleared to grow corn. The Global Carbon Project found that
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nitrous oxide emissions from human activity rose forty percent from
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nineteen eighty to twenty twenty in the United States. King
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corn in quotes became a political force. Since twenty ten,
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national corn and ethanol trade groups had spent more than
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fifty five million dollars on lobbying and millions more on
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political donations to Democrats and Republicans alike, according to campaign
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finance records. In twenty twenty four alone, those trade groups
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spent twice as much on lobbying as the National Rifle Association. Now,
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the sectors are pushing for the next big prize, expanding
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higher ethanol gasoline blends and positioning ethanol based jet fuel
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as aviation's low carbon future. Corn and ethanol trade groups
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did not respond to requests for interviews, but they have
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long promoted corn ethanol as a climate friendly fuel. The
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Renewable Fuels Association cites government and university research that finds
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burning ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions by roughly forty to
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fifty percent compared to the gasoline. The ethanol industry says
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the climate critics have it wrong, and that most of
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the corn used for fuel comes from better yields and
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smarter farming, not from plowing up new land. The amount
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of fertilizer required to produce a bushel of corn has
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dropped sharply in recent decades. They say, quote ethanol reduces
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carbon emissions, removing the carbon equivalent of twelve million cars
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from the road each year, quote, according to the Renewable
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Fuels Association. Growth Energy, a major ethanol trade group, said
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in a written statement to Floodlight that US farmers and
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biofuel producers are quote constantly finding new ways to make
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their operations more efficient and more environmentally beneficial, using things
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like cover crops to reduce their carbon footprint. The statement
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went on to say biofuel producers are making investments today
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that will make their products net zero or even net
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negative in the next two decades. Some research tells a
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different story. A recent Environmental Working Group report finds that
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the way corn has grown in much of the Midwest,
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with the same fields planted in corn here after year,
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carries a heavy climate cost and research in twenty twenty
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two by agricultural land use expert Tyler Lark and colleagues
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links the renewable fuel standard to worsening water pollution and
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increased emissions, concluding the climate impact is quote no less
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than gas lean and likely at least twenty four percent higher.
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Lark's research has been disputed by scientists at the Argonne
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National Laboratory, Purdue University and the University of Illinois, who
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published a formal rebuttal arguing the study relied on questionable
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assumptions and faulty modeling, a charge that Lark's team has rejected.
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One recent study found that solar panels can generate as
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much energy as corn ethanol on roughly three percent of
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the land. It's just a terrible use of land, says Searchinger,
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a Princeton researcher. And you can't solve climate change if
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you're going to make such terrible use of land. The
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nitrogen used to grow corn and other crops is also
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a key source of drinking water pollution, experts say. According
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to a new report by Clean Wisconsin and the Alliance
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for the Great Lakes, more than ninety percent of nitrate
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contamination and with ker Conson's groundwater is linked to agricultural sources,
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mostly synthetic fertilizer and manure. In twenty twenty two, Tyler
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Frye and his wife moved into a new home in
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the rural village of Casco, Wisconsin, about twenty miles east
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of Green Bay. Testing found their well water had nitrate
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levels more than twice the EPA's safe limit. We were
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pretty shocked. Fry said he installed a reverse osmosis system
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in the basement and still buys bottled water for his wife,
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who is breastfeeding their daughter. When he watches manure or
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fertilizer being spread on nearby fields, he said, one question
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nags him, where does that go? Reducing Korn's climate footprint
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is possible, but the farmers trying to do it are
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swimming against the policy tide. Recent moves by the Trump
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administration have stripped out Biden era incentives for climate friendly
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farming prectices, which the Agriculture Secretary Brook Rollins dismissed as
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part of the green new scam. Research, however, shows that
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proven conservation practices, including planting trees, shrubs and hedgerows and cornfields,
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could make a measurable difference. In northern Iowa, Wendy Johnson
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is planting fruit and nut trees, organic grains, shrubs, and
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other plants they need little or no nitrogen fertilizer on
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one hundred and thirty of the twelve hundred acres of
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corn and soybeans she farms with her father. Across the
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rest of the farm, they enriched the soil by rotating
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crops and planting cover crops. They have also converted less
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productive parts of the fields into prairie strips, bands of
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prairie grass that store carbon and require no fertilizer. They
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were counting on twenty thousand dollars a year from the
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now canceled Climate Smart grant program, but it never came.
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It's hard to take risks on your own, Johnson said,
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that's where federal support really helps. In Southeast Iowa, sixth
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generation farmer Levi Lyle mixes organic and conventional methods across
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two hundred ninety acres. He uses a three year rotation,
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extensive cover crops, and a technique called roller crimping flattening
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rye each spring to create a mulch that suppresses weeds,
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feeds the soil, and reduces fertilizer needs. Quote the roller
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crimping of cover crops is a huge, huge opportunity to
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sequester more carbon, improve soil health, save money on chemicals,
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and still get a similar yield, Lyle said. Despite mounting
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research about corn's climate costs, industry groups or pushing for
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legislation to pave the way for ethanol based jet fuel,
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researchers warned that producing enough ethanol based aviation fuel could
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prompt another one hundred fourteen million acres to be converted
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to corn, or twenty percent more corn acres than the
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US plants. For all purposes, The result, said University of
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Iowa professor and natural resource economists Sylvia Secci, would be
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essentially to enshrine this dysfunctional system that we created. And
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now we have an article from the Atlantic electricity should
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be free at noon and two other ideas for lowering
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electricity costs. This is by Leah Stokes, December third. Electricity
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prices are becoming an outsized issue in American politics because
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they themselves are legitimately outsized compared with the cost of
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consumer goods, which have been rising rapidly over the past
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few years. Electricity prices are climbing even faster and estimated
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thirteen percent nationwide since twenty twenty two. This year, roughly
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half of household making less than fifty thousand dollars struggled
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to pay their electricity bills. In California, where the rise
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has been particularly steep, rates have essentially doubled over the
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past decade. When electricity was first commercialized, utilities were allowed
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to operate as monopolies for one main reason to deliver
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lower cost For a century, it worked. Companies spread the
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fixed cost of growing the system across their locked in customers,
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and prices dropped precipitously. In eighteen ninety, a kilowatt hour
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was nine dollars and forty eight cents on average nationwide
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in today's dollars. By nineteen fifty it had dropped to
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forty one cents, and by nineteen ninety to twenty one cents.
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But recently, this century long trend has reversed. In many states,
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utilities are failing to keep prices low. Prices arising for
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many reasons, not all of which apply in every state.
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In some states, data centers are pushing uprates. In others,
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wildfire costs are showing up on bills. Despite what President
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Trump has argued, higher prices have little to do with
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the country's move toward clean energy. If anything, Trump's One Big,
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Beautiful Bill Act has made it harder to invest in
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the cheapest ways of building new solar, wind and batteries.
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Ignoring those technologies will make electricity only more expensive in
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the years to come. If regulators, policymakers, and utility executives
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actually want to lower prices, they will have to deal
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strategically with both the clean energy boom and climate change
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is strain on the electricity system. Clean energy is cheap energy.
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Building a large scale solar or wind project costs less
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than a new gas plant, and solar and wind require
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no fuel to operate rate, making each additional kilowatt hour
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essentially free. When combined with batteries, these projects can now
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operate like traditional power plants, providing power on demand. In
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places with a lot of solar, including California, some installations
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are producing more energy than is being consumed, so some
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power is being wasted. If people shifted more of their
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electricity use toward the middle of the day, the grid's
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overall costs would go down because demand would decrease in
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later hours, when prices are the highest, and the easiest
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way to nudge people towards using that midday powers to
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make it cheaper or even free. Like California, Australia has
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an enormous amount of solar. The country's Climate Change and
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Energy Minister just announced that starting in July, electricity suppliers
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will be required to offer at least three hours three
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free hours of midday power. In some regions. This will
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give people a reason to change their electric I'm sorry.
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This will give people a reason to charge their electric vehicles,
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use heat pumps to pre cool and preheat their homes
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in water, and store more clean electricity in batteries. When
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cheap energy is abundant later in the day, when the
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system relies on dirtier and more expensive energy sources, people
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will likely demand less power, reducing costs for everyone. Plenty
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of places in the US could try this too. The
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states with the most solar, including California and Texas, are
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already wasting about ten percent of their solar energy, but
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utilities and regulators have done little to set electricity prices
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lower during the day. The closest anyone has come is
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in California, where as part of a regulatory proceeding San
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Diego Gas an Electric are greed in September to create
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a lower cost period from ten AM to two PM.
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In the long run, as solar and wind supply more
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and more of Americans power, aligning electionletricity rates with clean
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energies availability could allow the grid to operate more cheaply.
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If the first clear way to cut electricity bills is
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strategically lowering prices for customers, the second is strategically cutting
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back profits for utilities even as consumers bills rose. California's
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Pacific Gas and Electric, for example, reported record profit two
24:25
point four to seven billion dollars last year. North Carolina's
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Duke Energy had profits north of four billion dollars. Legislators
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could trim these profits directly by more closely aligning utilities
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guaranteed rates of return with their actual costs. Such adjustments
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would also limit utilities endless quest for more infrastructure. Right now,
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a utility could make tens of millions of dollars on, say,
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putting a transmission line underground, because those that operate as monopolies,
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that is, most of them, can charge customers for almost
25:02
every dollar spent expanding the transmission and distribution system plus
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a profit, so more spending equals more profits, a perverse
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incentive called gold plating. One solution is to have states
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build the transmission system instead. A new law in California
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will pilot this idea, using a fund to publicly financed transmission.
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This will not only reduce utility profits, lowering electricity bills,
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it will also make electricity cost less regressive by shifting
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the burden from lower income people onto the wider tax base.
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A third way to lower prices is to take the
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cost of climate impacts out of electric bills. As wildfires
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rip across the West, their damages are being borne by
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utility customers. This is a major reason that costs in
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California are so high. Take one example, the twenty seventeen
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Thomas fire created two point four billion dollars in liabilities
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for southern California. Edison, which sparked the fire. Its customers,
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myself included, are now on the hook for two thirds
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of those costs. The company, like PG and E, posted
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record profits last year. If companies aren't charging ratepayers for
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fire damage, then they might be charging them for the
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anticipated cost of fires. In Utah, the legislature passed a
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law that allows Rocky Mountain Power to proactively collect revenue
26:35
from customers for a fire fund. In Colorado, regulators approved
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a one point nine billion dollar plan to harden against
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future wildfires, jacking up bills by ten percent. Other climate
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impacts are increasing electricity rates too. Hurricane prone places like
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Florida are also hardening their grids, driving rate increases. The
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climate's scientist Andrew Desler has estimated that Texas's electricity prices
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were sixteen percent higher in twenty twenty three because of
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the demand driven by climate change induced heat waves. Theema's
27:13
recent decision not to cover the utilities damages for a
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brutal ice storm in Michigan, which may have been more
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likely because of climate change, could mean that rural customers
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will be playing paying forty five hundred dollars each to
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cover the bill. Passing on these climate costs to rate
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payers is not the only way of dealing with them.
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Hawaii's legislature decided to limit the local utilities liability for
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the deadly Maui fires and use state funds to compensate survivors.
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Policymakers can also keep utilities for making a profit on
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wildfire mitigation and other grid hardening costs, as California has
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recently done. Well, that's going to be all for today's
27:56
Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader is Kelly Taylor.
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Now stay tuned for further programming on RADIOI