Just in time for New Year's -- the time when many of us resolve to give up bad habits -- the Environmental Protection Agency has put the Chesaepeake Bay on a "pollution diet."  Will this resolution stick better than most of our morning-after vows?

This massive reducing plan - 200 pages, 800 pages of appendices and 3,100 pages of responses to public comments - calls for Maryland, the District of Columbia and the other five states in the bay's 64,000-mile watershed to cut back by 20 to 25 percent on the amounts of nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment getting into the water.  

Though they're often called pollutants, nitrogen and phosphorus are really nutrients, essential for plants to grow and thrive.  The bay would be practically lifeless if it was totally devoid of any nutrients.  But like a person who eats too much, a water body gorging on nutrients gets out of whack, with massive algae blooms and "dead zones" in the water where oxygen levels have dropped below what fish and shellfish need to survive. 

Ergo, the diet.  EPA gives the states 15 years to do what's needed to make those reductions, though Maryland, vowing to lead the way, has pledged to do its share by 2020.

A decade or more may seem like a long lead time, but these pollution reductions won't be easy, because they'll require costly upgrades of sewage treatment plants, replacement of household septic systems and determined efforts to cut back on the amounts of animal manure and fertilizer washing into local streams, rivers and ultimately the bay.  Maryland alone estimates it could be required to spend upwards of $10 billion more over the next decade.

Even with the long lead time, the task seems daunting, unrealistic, even preposterous to some.  Farmers, developers and some local and state officials are restive, particularly in upstream states far from the bay.  Members of New York's congressional delegation, many of them Democrats, had appealed to EPA to hold off on requiring pollution reductions their constituents weren't sold on.

But this day has been a long time coming.  Ann Swanson, executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Commission, reminded me that the state, local and federal "partners" in the long-running bay cleanup effort agreed more than a decade ago to go with a legally enforceable EPA-imposed pollution diet if their mostly voluntary and cooperative efforts to that point failed to reduce nutrients enough by this year.  They didn't come close, just as most goals and deadlines have been missed since the bay restoration effort began 27 years ago.

As activist and former state senator Gerald Winegrad notes, something like 90 percent of the bay's waters are considered impaired and fail to meet federally mandated water quality standards.  Environmentalists argued successfully in court that that represents a continuing violation of the federal Clean Water Act, and EPA agreed to consent decrees requiring it to put the bay on a pollution diet, bureaucratically known as a "total maximum daily load."

Reaction to EPA's final plan varied.  Environment Maryland echoed the assessment of EPA officials that it represented a historic effort - as North America's largest estuary, it's also the largest water body in the nation ever put under a single restoration plan.

"It's hard to imagine a better New Year's resolution than providing clean water to our families and communities," said Environment Maryland's Tommy Landers.  He called Maryland's cleanup plan "promising," pointing to the state's vow to revise standards for how much phosphorus farmers can put on their crops, which could curtail the use of poultry manure as fertilizer on the Eastern Shore.

(BTW, the Shore's poultry industry produces upwards of a billion POUNDS -- not tons -- of manure annually. I resolve to check my facts more carefully on deadline in 2011 after getting the two confused in today's print story.)

But diets only work if you stick to them, changing hard-to-break habits.  And it remains to be seen if the latest, seemingly toughest cleanup plan ever produced for the bay will do more than consume mountains of paper to print it.

As an example, although Maryland's bay cleanup plan has been widely regarded as the most ambitious and thorough of any in the region, a number of key pledges in there are conditional or delayed a year or more.  Though the state faces a looming $530 million shortfall in its efforts to upgrade the largest sewage treatment plants around the bay, officials put off acting to close that gap until 2012, the year before the funds start to run out.

Environmentalists aren't the only ones anxious about such delays.  Tom Farasy, president of the Maryland State Builders Association, said his industry supports an increase in the $30 annual "flush fee" levied on all homeowners in Maryland to cover sewage plant upgrades.  Builders also want to see every county and municipality in the state required to raise funds to retrofit storm drains and invest in other measures to control polluted runoff from city and suburban streets and parking lots.

Such a position might seem self-serving, as builders have long complained that their share of the bay's pollution is tiny compared with farmers and older communities built before any runoff controls were required.  They want to avoid being subject to even more costly runoff controls on new development or redevelopment.

But sewage plant upgrades and urban storm drain retrofits are cornerstones of Maryland's plan to clean up its portion of the bay.  The O'Malley administration has pledged to get 70 percent of its needed pollution reductions by 2017 and all of them within a decade.  The bill for that has to be paid by someone, and the work won't begin until funds are there to pay for it.  Local government, already threatened with having to pick up teacher pension costs, is likely to buck any state or federal requirement it spend more on pollution controls.

"It's going to be a really incredible political challenge, because obviously money is scarce," agrees Swanson, the longtime bay commission director.  "This will require a lot more expense," she adds.  Without "the luxury of extra money" to spend to accelerate pollution reduction efforts, she argues, "What we need to do is invest monies we do have in the smartest way possible."

Winegrad and Swanson have both been involved in the bay restoration effort since its beginning.  The veteran former legislator from Annapolis says he finds it hard to be optimistic, given the history of failed cleanup plans and promises.  

Swanson acknowledges the effort's shortcomings, but retains a sense that progress is being made.  The pollution diet and cleanup plans finalized this week couldn't have been written 15 years ago, she says.  Scientists have improved their understanding of the bay and its problems and how to fix them since then.

Indeed, the bay has been one of the most studied ecosystems in this country, if not the world.  So the test is, can all the science that's been brought to bear here motivate politicians and their constituents to do what's needed to restore the bay's water quality?

"If the Chesapeake Bay cannot meet its (diet), I doubt we can meet it anywhere," Swanson says.  "I think we can meet it, but we have to try."

The challenges start anew in 2011, as the states are required to submit a second set of cleanup plans by June spelling out how pollution reductions will be parceled out at the local level.  Already, the Maryland Association of Counties is asking that that deadline be pushed back, to give local officials more time to figure out what's expected of them and how to pay for it.

Meanwhile, by the end of next year states must also show if they met two-year cleanup "milestones" they set in 2009. 

'It is clear .. that the hardest work is still to come," said Chesapeake Bay Foundation President William C. Baker.   He added that it would be essential for EPA to continue to play the tough-cop role, imposing consequences if states fall short.

Howard Ernst, a critic of the bay foundation, seems to agree with Baker on this point.  Ernst, a political science professor at the Naval Academy and author of two critical books on the bay cleanup, suggests the diet will only work if EPA sticks to its pledge to punish the states - by blocking permits needed for new industries and growth, for instance - if they fall off the pollution-reduction wagon.  That won't be easy, either, as EPA has never gone to the mat in that way with states before.

"Like all New Year's resolutions," Ernst emailed, "the EPA's success should not be measured by the initial goal of their Chesapeake Bay diet, but by their resolve when the hunger pains begin."

(Baltimore Sun Photos:  Top - Fishing Creek, 2007, by Doug Kapustin; Middle - Watermen clean oyster bars off Annapolis, 2008, also by Kapustin; Bottom - Gov. O'Malley and EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson in Annapolis, 2010, by Amy Davis)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

With its crab population rebounding and water quality slightly better, the Chesapeake Bay is showing signs of improvement, the region's leading environmental group says, but the estuary remains seriously impaired and needs a strict pollution "diet" to ensure its restoration.

The Annapolis-based Chesapeake Bay Foundation upped the estuary's overall health score by three points in its latest "state of the bay" report, while warning that it remains in critical condtion, barely above a failing grade.

"That the bay is getting better is a huge development, but sadly not the whole story," William C. Baker, the foundation's president, said in a release accompanying the report. "Dead zones, fish kills and water contact advisories are constant reminders of how far we still must go."

The report comes as the Environmental Protection Agency prepares to release its final "pollution diet" for the bay, requiring Maryland and the rest of the six-state region to curtail the nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment getting into the water from sewage plants, farms and urban and suburban lands. The EPA's draft "total maximum daily load," as the diet is known, has stirred anxiety and anger among farmers, developers and some state and local officials, who fear the costs of cleanup may stifle growth.

The foundation's report says the EPA's action occurs at a watershed, as eight of 13 indicators of the bay's health have improved since 2008, with the dramatic recovery of the Chesapeake's blue crab population leading the way. Other significant gains came in planting of trees along water ways to buffer pollution, and in the continued flourishing of underwater grasses, vital habitat for fish and crabs.

Water clarity, dissolved oxygen and oysters also improved slightly, but remained marginal at best, the foundation's report notes.

"We are at a tipping point," the foundation's Baker said.  "If EPA stands firm, and the states deliver on their commitments, the bay will become resilient and beautiful."

(Aerial view of Chesapeake tidal marsh, creek, forest and farmlands. Photo by Jane Hawkey, IAN Image Library ian.umces.edu/imagelibrary)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Maryland Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin may have lost one big fish - his Chesapeake Bay cleanup bill - amid partisan wrangling as Congress wraps up for the year. But he did succeed with another, less sweeping environmental measure he sponsored that will require the federal government to pay local fees for controlling storm-water pollution.

The bill, which now heads to the president's desk, was prompted by recent legal decisions that failed to require federal agencies to pay for efforts to reduce pollution washing off the roofs and pavement of their facilities.   Courts have routinely held that federal property is exempt from state and local taxation.

But Cardin noted that communities across the country are being stuck with the costs of treating pollution from civilian and military federal buildings and land.   The biggest dispute is in Washington, D.C., seat of the federal government, where unpaid local storm-water fees have piled up to $2.4 million.

The Maryland Democrat's bill drew bipartisan support, and one of its cosponsors was Sen. James M. Inhofe, R-OK, with whom Cardin had sparred early on over his Chesapeake bill.  In this case, though, Democrats and Republicans alike seemed to agree.

"At stake has been a fundamental issue of equity," Cardin said in a statement, which went on. "polluters should be financialy responsible for the pollution that they cause, including the federal government."

(Baltimore Sun photo by Jed Kirschbaum)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

The Chesapeake Bay bill supported by environmentalists and opposed by farmers and developers apparently has missed its last chance of passage this year - and maybe for some time, if ever.

Bay Daily blogger Tom Pelton reports that Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid has given up on seeking a vote on an omnibus lands and waterways bill that included the Chesapeake legislation pushed by Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin, D-Md. An aide to Reid told Pelton that the measure failed to garner the 60 votes needed to override a threatened filibuster by Republican senators.

The measure would have held bay states legally accountable for their cleanup plans and offered more federal money to control storm-water pollution. It had the ardent support of some environmental groups, notably Pelton's Chesapeake Bay Foundation, though other activists contended the bill had been watered down to appease opponents.

Agriculture interests were not mollilfied, however, and lobbied hard to block the measure, warning senators from other regions that the bay measure would expand federal regulatory power and impose economic hardship on their states' farmers.

UPDATE:  Cardin said in a telephone interview that he intends to try again next year, though he acknowledges the Republican takeover of the House makes it much less likely any legislation will pass boosting the federal government's regulatory authority.

Cardin said he'd made efforts to win over farmers by incorporating into his legislation elements of a competing House bill backed by agricultural groups.  He'd also dropped codification of the "pollution diet" that the Environmental Protection Agency is drawing up for all the bay states to follow.  

Yet farmers still were worried about being held to enforceable pollution control standards,  even though Cardin contended his bill left control of the cleanup in local hands, not Washington's.

"I think everybody understands you need accountabiliy," Cardin said. "As long as it's local and fair to all stakeholders, I think we would have support from all sectors, including agriculture."

The Maryland Democrat said he believes he'll still have enough support in the Senate to pass his bay bill.  In the House, though, he predicted that the new GOP majority would be a tough sell for any measure expanding federal authority - not to mention increasing federal funds for controlling storm-water pollution.

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Talk about good news-bad news: A new study finds that sea level isn't rising in the Chesapeake Bay as fast as it is elsewhere, but the region's land is sinking so rapidly it more than makes up for it.

After reviewing satellite measurements and tide gauge data, researchers at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science concluded that absolute sea level is rising only about 1.8 millimeters a year in the bay - less than a tenth of an inch. That's just a little more than half the annual average sea-level rise of 3.1 millimeters that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change figured is happening globally.

But tide gauges from Baltimore to Norfolk show relative sea-level rise of 2.9 to 5.8 millimeters a year - more than is seen anywhere else along the East Coast. The difference must reflect local land subsidence, the VIMS scientists say. The bay region is gradually sinking because of shifts in land resulting from the melting of polar ice caps after the last Ice Age, a comet striking near the mouth of the bay millions of years ago, recent local ground-water withdrawals and other factors.

Overall, the study confirms what scientists have been saying for some time, that land subsidence accounts for about half the sea level rise seen in the Chesapeake.   The research, lead by VIMS' John Boon, was underwritten by the Army Corps of Engineers Norfolk District and reviewed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and by the Maryland Geological Survey.

The scientists say from the data they analyzed they couldn't tell for sure whether sea level rise in the bay is accelerating, as global-warming models predict it will worldwide. But the bad news, they note, is that the bay's already rapid relative sea-level rise shows no signs of letting up.

(Bay Bridge from Sandy Point State Park.  2009 Baltimore Sun photo by Jed Kirschbaum)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

The frigid weather this winter will bring higher utility bills to many Maryland households, but residents can now apply for low-cost loans to beef up their homes' insulation and heating systems.

The Maryland Clean Energy Center this week launched the Maryland Home Energy Loan Program, under which qualified applicants can borrow up to $20,000 to plug air leaks, seal ducts and replace aging furnaces, among other things.

To qualify, a resident first must get a home energy audit. The loans need not be secured by the applicant's home. The interest rate is 6.99 percent - which the center says is half what commercial banks charge on most unsecured loans.

The loan program, offered in partnership with the Maryland Energy Administration, is underwritten with federal stimulus funds. It's aimed at helping the state achieve its twin goals of reducing energy use 15 percent by 2015 and of cutting carbon-dioxide emissions 25 percent by 2020.

To apply or learn more, go here.  Or call 301-738-6280 or email loans@mdcleanenergy.org

(Energy auditor checking for drafts in Lauraville home.  Baltimore Sun photo by Amy Davis)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 1:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

The prolonged controversy over cleaning up chemical contamination at Fort Detrick in Frederick appears to be nearing an end - even if the cleanup itself may not be.

The Environmental Protection Agency announced late last week that it has signed an agreement with the Department of Defense to continue assessing and cleaning up the fort's Area B, a 400-acre undeveloped tract on the base where chemical, biological and radiological agents were tested and buried from the 1940s until 1970.  Toxic solvents trichloroethene (TCE) and tetrachloroethene (PCE) dumped there contaminated the ground water, and spread to neighboring residents' wells.

The Army took years to study and investigate the problem, and has been cleaning up the contamination for nearly a decade now.  But the military resisted signing a legally binding agreement with EPA after the agency put Detrick on its Superfund priority cleanup list in 2008.  Maryland elected officials brought pressure on the Pentagon to yield.

Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin, D-MD, who'd pressed for quicker action from the Pentagon, issued a statement calling the agreement "overdue."  He emphasized that the pact ensures civilian regulators at EPA will have final say on what the Army must do to clean up the site, and what further efforts might be needed to investigate and deal with other possible contaminants at the fort.  The Frederick Gazette and News-Post reported on the deal.

(Moon-suited workers clean up hazardous wastes at Fort Detrick, 2003)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

A Baltimore landlord has been jailed for failing to comply with repeated orders to fix lead-paint risks in all his rental units.

Cephus Murrell was ordered Wednesday by Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge W. Michel Pierson to be held in the detention center until he had either remediated three rental units with lead-based paint in them or relocated the tenants to safer housing.

Murrell, who according to court records lives in Catonsville, has been the subject of repeated enforcement actions over the past several years by the Maryland Department of the Environment accusing him of not taking required actions to reduce the risks of tenant children being poisoned by ingesting dust from lead paint in their rental units. The state fined him $20,000 in 2007 and signed a consent decree requiring him to fix 52 properties owned by him or C. Murrell Business Consultant Inc.

Pierson found Murrell in contempt of court in June for not complying with an amended consent decree, with eight units still not repaired. In October, the judge ordered Murrell to jail, but stayed his incarceration to either clean up the remaining untreated units or move the tenants elsewhere. But state officials said this week that Murrell had yet to present the required certification that he'd dealt with three remaining occupied units.

Under a 1994 state law, landlords with rental units built before 1950, when lead paint was widely used,  must register their properties with the state and take steps to reduce the chances of youngsters being poisoned.  Ingesting even tiny amounts of lead dust or paint chips can damage young children's developing brains and nervous systems, causing lasting learning and behavioral problems.

Ruth Ann Norton, executive director of the Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning,  welcomed the judge's action, saying Murrell had a long history of noncompliance. 

"He has continually thumbed his nose at Maryland's law to keep kids safe," Norton said.  She also said tough enforcement was needed against repeat violators because while most landlords in the state "do the right thing," there is a "core of owners that just will not follow the law and do not get into compliance."

Murrell could not be reached for comment, nor could his lawyer.  But a woman who identified herself as a tenant or former tenant emailed today that had helped "many, many children and adults" and said that he had "allowed lots of people to move in with out paying security deposits."

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 11:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

It seems the tax-cut deal that Congress just approved will do more than put more green in everyone's pockets - it may help keep our landscape green, too.

The American Forest Foundation, a nonprofit group that champions the cause of private owners of woodlands, had warned that millions of acres of forest would be at risk if the deal didn't pass and the estate tax reverted to 2001 levels.

Relaxing the estate tax was one of the deal's more controversial provisions, as many Democrats complained it was an unwarranted sop to the wealthy.  But the forest foundation argued that a huge chunk of America's forests are in family hands, not the government's or some big corporation's.  And, it said, many private forest owners live relatively modestly, with incomes under $100,000, even if their woodlands are worth millions. 

The group warned that if something wasn't done to ease the inheritance tax burden, many of those privately owned forests would have to be chopped up and sold when the owners died.  And with an estimated 15 percent of owners 75 years or older, a significant chunk would be at risk of changing hands soon.

So under the deal that Congress sent to President Obama to sign, the estate tax rate will go from 45 percent to 35 percent (instead of back to 55 percent as it was in 2001), and the threshold for having to pay any tax at all would be raised from estates worth $3.5 million to those exceeding $5 million.

Of course, simply easing the tax burden doesn't guarantee that forestlands will be preserved.  A 2006 U.S. Forest Service survey found that owners of nearly a quarter of the forested lands planned to sell some or all in the near future, and that only a tiny fraction of the woodlands are in conservation easements or certified as being managed sustainably.

The forest foundation agrees that relaxing the estate tax isn't the ultimate solution.  It says Congress should increase incentives for owners to keep their land forested.  It notes there's legislation pending in both chambers that would allow heirs to defer payment of any estate taxes on inherited forestland as long as it's kept intact and managed sustainably.

(2002 Baltimore Sun photo by Amy Davis)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Some sea turtles rescued from dangerously cold waters off New England are spending the rest of the winter in a safe, warm place at the National Aquarium.

Five endangered Kemp's ridley sea turtles have been recuperating in tanks in Baltimore since being flown here Dec. 2 from Boston, the aquarium reports. The animals were rescued by the New England Aquarium, but the staff there has been overwhelmed treating more than 200 sick and weak sea turtles stranded along the East Coast in an epidemic of "cold stunning."

Every year, some sea turtles get caught in frigid waters in the Northeast before they can migrate south, and experience a kind of hypothermia called "cold stunning." The turtles become lethagic, emaciated and vulnerable to illness. This year, rapid temperature drops along the Atlantic coast have led to widespread turtle strandings - and a massive animal rescue effort in response.

The New England Aquarium's rescue facility has been struggling to handle the influx, and in recent weeks has begun transferring turtles once they've been stabilized and are less in danger. The five turtles flown to Baltimore weigh between two and five pounds, the National Aquarium says, and will most likely spend the next six to eight months here recovering their strength before being returned to the wild.  Another five are scheduled to be flown in by Civil Air Patrol volunteers early next week.

Jen Dittmar, stranding coordinator for the National Aquarium, said in a statement that the Baltimore facility is helping deal with the cold-stunning crisis by nursing some back to health so the New England veterinarians can focus on the animals in critical condition.

"We are thrilled that we can do our part in giving these turtles a chance at survival," Dittmar said.

To read the National Aquarium's blog post about its rare patients, go here.

(Kemp's ridley getting a checkup. Photo courtesy National Aquarium)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 6:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

In a bid to make Bmore greener, the city is expanding its tryout of locally produced, cleaner-burning biofuels to heat municipal buildings.

The Board of Estimates has approved an agreement to spend up to $1.3 million over the next year to test 440,000 gallons of vegetable-based fuel in the boilers of three city facilities - the Back River wastewater treatment plant, Eastern health center and the Pimlico fire and training complex.  The fuel is to be supplied by New Generation Biofuels, which has a production plant in South Baltimore. 

"Today, Baltimore took a great step twoards becoming a more energy efficient and sustainable city," Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake said in a press release announcing the deal.

The city's been testing biofuel from New Generation for the past year, and found it burned much more cleanly than heating oil.   Ted Atwood, director of the city Department of General Services, said the alternative fuel produced far less air pollutiion  - no sulfur or particulate emissions, and greatly reduced nitrogen oxide emissions - an important consideration in a metropolitan area that still suffers bouts of unhealthful smog every spring and summer.

The biofuel, made from vegetable and soybean oil, is no more expensive than heating oil, according to Michael P. Cook, energy chief for the city's general services department.  The biofuel provides just 70 percent of the heat value when burned as does fuel oil, but it's also priced 30 percent less.

Should this next year of testing prove out, the city would put out to bid a contract to switch more city buildings to biofuels, Atwood said.  

City school officials also are separately testing biofuel at a pair of their schools - Franklin Square Elementary and Woodholme Elementary.

Schools, it seems to me, are an especially appropriate places to test this fuel, since when I first checked it out last year (see photo at left) it looked like Elmer's glue. 

And it had a sweet, alcohol odor besides.  If any of that aroma survives burning it in a boiler, staying warm probably never smelled sweeter!

(New Generation Biofuels production plant in South Baltimore; a sample of the fuel.  2009 Baltimore Sun photos by Jed Kirschbaum.)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 1:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Ever wonder where's the justice in how environmental protections are applied?  Here's your chance to ask.  Obama administration officials and environmental leaders plan to convene the first-ever White House forum on environmental justice Wednesday, and the public is invited to tune in and participate online.

"Green" jobs, "clean" energy and adaptation to climate change will be among the topics covered at the day-long session, which will generally focus on ensuring a clean, healthy environment for all, including poor communities.  Top administration officials slated to speak include Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson and Attorney General Eric Holder.

The proceedings will be streamed online live at http://www.whitehouse.gov/live  And there'll be a live question-and-answer session at 12:50 p.m. EST. Members of the public can pose queries via the White House Facebook page, http://apps.facebook.com/whitehouselive

For more on environmental justice, in Maryland and elsewhere, go here.

(EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson announcing her agency's finding that climate-altering greenhouse gases are a threat to human health, December 2009.  AFP photo)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 5:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

As giant wind turbines start generating power atop the highest ridge in western Maryland, they raise questions anew about what price we're paying, environmentally, for our energy choices.

The towering windmills, visible for miles around, represent "green," renewable energy of the future to many.  But they've become lightning rods for debate about their impact on wildlife and on scenic mountain vistas.

Increasingly visible, too, is the extraction of coal, one of Appalachia's oldest energy sources. We get half or more of our electricity from coal-burning power plants, but the fossil fuel is a major contributor to climate change, and the ash left over from burning it poses disposal challenges.  Though mining is down from historic levels in western Maryland, surface mines have grown in the past decade and crept closer to towns such as Frostburg.   A new underground mine near Grantsville also prepares to tunnel under the Casselman River, home to such remarkable but rare species as the hellbender salamander.  Many of the region's streams still suffer from acidic water draining from old abandoned mines.

The biggest buzz these days, though, is coming over prospects for tapping previously unexploited natural gas reserves locked in Marcellus shale deposits underlying Garrett and western Allegany counties.  Hoping to cash in on a boom that's already under way in neighboring Pennsylvania and West Virginia, landowners in Garrett have leased or sold rights to drill beneath 124,000 acres, more than a quarter of the county.

But the extraction method, called hydraulic fracturing or "fracking," has proven controversial, with critics saying it's responsible for gas leaking into nearby residents' wells and for contaminating streams and ground water. Industry officials say problems have been overblown but they've tightened up operations anyway.

Regulators say they're seeing to it that current mining operations aren't adding to the region's water quality woes, and they vow to require "state of the art" environmental controls on drilling for for gas in Maryland's Marcellus shale - if any at all is permitted. 

That's not enough for some, who want legislation to ban any shale gas drilling until the state overhauls its regulations to impose safeguards.  Some also want to put a hold on any more utility-scale wind projects in Garrett - a third is in planning - until the county establishes some requirements there for buffering them from homes and decommissioning them when they're shut down. 

Read more about the state's conflicted energy frontier in The Baltimore Sun.  And check out the video of the wind turbines, some of them already spinning.

(Constellation Energy's Criterion wind project in Garrett County, Baltimore Sun photo by Kim Hairston; aerial photo western Maryland surface mine by Jim Dougherty for Chesapeake Climate Action Network)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

By now, it seems, a lot of workplaces have gotten into recycling, at least of paper. One office in West Baltimore, though, has taken the plunge into composting - turning coffee grounds, food scraps, paper and other biodegradable refuse into plant food.

A handfull of workers at the Bon Secours of Maryland Foundation started this summer by collecting office paper and old grounds from their West Fulton Street building and combining them with grass clippings and leaves in a compost bin at a nearby community garden run by Operation Reachout-Southwest, a resident-led grassroots organization.

But before long, the initiative of the "Clean and Green" crew spread.  Other staffers began bringing in scraps from the previous night's dinner, old produce and paper and other refuse from home.   Some say they're now composting at home as well.

"Co-workers who at first thought we were crazy started saying, 'I didn't know it was that easy,'" says Erika McClammy, the foundation's director of housing and neighborhood revitalization and head of the effort to raise employees' green awareness.

"I was surprised at how man things we use can go back to the earth,'' says Latera Wallace, a Bon Secours employee.  "I spend so much money every year buying topsoil and mulch for my mother who gardens, when I could have saved money by creating compost just from things around the house."

With the compostable materials being brought in, the workers added more bins in the garden, and a couple months ago took it to the next level with "vermiculture," adding worms to speed the composting.

Buoyed by their success, McClammy and others have made presentations about composting to various community groups, hoping to expand the practice throughout Southwest Baltimore where the foundation works. 

"I compost because in Southwest Baltimore many people do not understand the link between the environment and how to live healthy in an urban community," explains Joyce Smith, a community leader and garden volunteer.

McClammy even hopes to rope Bon Secours Hospital into composting eventually.

"Healthy food, healthy people, healthy planet - it's all related," she says.

(Thanks to former Sun colleague Tanika Davis of the Hatcher Group and Erika McClammy of the foundation for the info, quotes and photos in this post.)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

For those who love oysters - and if we want to save the Chesapeake Bay, we should all care about these shellfish with their gooey grey insides - the Bay Journal has published a terrific series about the push to bring them back by "farming" them.

Time was when folks the world over associated the Chesapeake with oysters. Watermen in Maryland and Virginia hauled in millions upon millions of bushels of the bivalves every year, and eateries across the nation featured what was then the bay's signature seafood on their menus.

Oysters have fallen on hard times since then, as has the bay. Overharvesting in those seeming days of plenty, habitat loss and now diseases peculiar to the bivalves have ravaged the Chesapeake's population and decimated a once-thriving fishing industry. Their decline has hurt the bay, because oysters filter the water and helped keep it clean.  Many believe replenishing the bay's oysters, with their filtering capacity, is key to restoring the bay.

So now, after a decades-long slump, Maryland is trying to reverse the oyster's fortunes.  Breaking from a longstanding focus on sustaining the state's traditional wild fishery, officials have set aside large areas of the bay and its rivers as sanctuaries, putting them off limits to commercial harvest and replanting them with hatchery-reared oysters.  The hope is they'll survive the lingering diseases and thrive - and help clean up the bay's water quality. 

At the same time, the state is offering to help the state's watermen shift into raising their own bivalves, rather than continuing to rely on the remaining public waters to make a living. Aquaculture is a brave new world for them, fraught with challenges and risks, but not a completely untested path, as neighboring Virginia has long encouraged private oyster cultivation in its portion of the bay.

A handfull of pioneers have taken the plunge, and the Journal series just completed by Rona Kobell recounts the struggles and successes they've had.   To read the first two parts, go here and here.

As someone who lives for eating oysters, I'm grateful she's told their tales - and just a little jealous that she found a way to spend so much time around my favorite food.   Her series is well worth the read, and food for thought, even if oysters are not your idea of a tasty meal.  Perhaps the efforts of hardy individuals like these, when enough follow their lead, can make a difference in bringing back oysters - and the bay.

(Oysters grow in floats at Choptank Oyster Co. in Cambridge.  2007 Baltimore Sun photo by Glenn Fawcett) 

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Baltimore's new "plastic bag reduction" ordinance finally kicked in this week, almost without a peep. But clearly not everyone's on board yet.

Since Tuesday, all merchants in the city have been barred from putting customers' purchases in plastic bags unless they first ask if the flimsy sacks are wanted.

Supermarkets, restaurants and other places that sell food also are required to provide recycling bins on premises for any plastic bags they do give out.  And as an alternative, they must offer to sell customers re-usable shopping bags.

As of Wednesday, 1,058 food dealers had registered online to keep using plastic bags under the conditions set by the new ordinance.  That's less than a third of the 3,500 establishments licensed by the city health department to sell food.

Still it's an improvement over the snafus that botched the law's original start three months ago. City officials didn't get the online registration system set up until shortly before the ordinance was to take effect on Sept. 1, and many merchants complained they hadn't been able to log in so they could legally keep giving out plastic bags.  Others said they simply didn't know anything about what they were supposed to do.   An embarrassed City Council was forced to delay the law's startup.

Since then, City Hall has set up registration and even posted online the signs merchants are supposed to download and post in their stores and eateries advising customers that plastic bags are available only on request.  And the response has been smoother, if still not entirely happy.

"We're up and running," says City Councilman James B. Kraft, one of the chief architects of the plastic bag law.  Kraft, who represents Southeast Baltimore, says it's taken effect mostly "under the radar" - without much fanfare or fuss.

It's a relatively calm start to a compromise ordinance hammered out after prolonged and fierce debate, with environmentalists pushing to ban plastic bags outright or discourage their use by imposing a nickel fee on each. 

But the city's supermarkets and other retailers mounted stiff resistance, and ultimately prevailed in getting City Council to let them continue using plastic bags as long as they ask first and offer to recycle them. 

"I've not had a negative contact about this in the last 30 days," Kraft says, though he has fielded some querulous calls from merchants who didn't understand their options under the law.

One of those was from an executive with P.F. Changs, the Asian restaurant chain, Kraft relates.  But the caller hung up relieved after learning the establishments are exempt from the law because they only uses paper bags for carryout or leftovers.

"If you just switch to paper bags, you don't have to do anything - you don't even have to register," acknowledges Beth Strommen, manager of the city's Office of Sustainability.

Indeed, businesses that switch to paper bags don't have to post signs, recycle, or file reports every six months with City Hall on bag usage, as do merchants still giving out plastic.

Though not required to, about 45 businesses have emailed or telephoned to report they're switching from plastic to paper merchandise bags, Strommen says.  But it's likely many more have opted for paper over plastic.

Melvin Thompson, legislative director with the Maryland Restaurant Association, says he believes most city eateries are switching to paper, if they haven't been using it already.

"We primarily use bags only for those rare occasions where people may want a doggie bag or for our customers who order carryout," Thompson says.  Restaurants typically don't use nearly as many bags as a supermarket or even a corner grocery.   Thus, even though paper bags tend to cost a little more than plastic bags, Thompson adds, "for restaurants, it's just easier to swithc to paper bags, and that's what most of them have done."

Jeffrie Zellmer, lobbyist with the Maryland Retailers Association who helped write the law, says he believes that the chains and large stores that sell food have all registered so they can keep using plastic bags.  Requiring them to recycle the bags is no big deal, he adds.

"We were doing it anyhow," he says.  Still, he adds, the new law may not be noticeable instantly at every checkout counter. "It'll take some time to phase in (training) with the checkers to ask if they want plastic."

Violaters can be fined $250 for a first offense and up to $1,000 for a third offense in six months.  But Strommen indicated city officials plan to ease into enforcement, to give merchants time to get used to the new requirements. 

City health inspectors will be checking on compliance with the plastic bag law during routine visits to food dealers, she said, and apparent violators will get a warning letter or postcard.  Businesses likely will get a similar warning if consumers call 311 to complain they're not obeing the law.

Kraft says he expects it'll take a while to get corner grocers and other small businesses to fall in line with the new law.

"We're dealing with this as something that's going to take time," acknowledges Strommen.  "We're going to have to figure out ways to continue outreach."  But rather than fining merchants, she adds, "what we want is for them to educate people that they don't need a bag all the time."

For Kraft, the real measure of the law's success will be if the reporting required of food dealers over the next two years shows a drop in plastic bag use.  He originally wanted to ban them as a way of cutting down on the number of errant flimsy sacks trashing Baltimore's harbors, streams and trees.

Even if many merchants switch to handing out paper bags, Kraft says he'd consider that a victory of sorts, because they're easy for residents and businesses to recycle.  The city's single-stream recycling program, however, can't handle the plastic bags, so merchants using them now need to make their own arrangements to recycle. 

Noting that merchants had pressed for a chance to show that a voluntary approach can reduce bag use and litter, Kraft says it's on them now to step up.

"If it works and results in a significant reduction, I think the program will continue," he says. "If it doesn't, we'll have to look at alternatives."

(AP file photos)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 6:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

A St. Mary's County grade school's getting a high-tech, green present this month - solar energy panels to help light up the classrooms and inspire young minds.

School and county officials are to hold a "groundbreaking" Dec. 13 for installation of the 500 kilowatt system at George Washington Carver Elementary School in Great Mills.  The 2,200 photovoltaic panels are expected to generate 667,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity in the first year - which is about 80 percent of the power the school uses, according to a release from Standard Solar, the Rockville-based company involved in the project.

Solar energy's got a reputation for being pricey up front, and this system's worth an estimated $2.5 million, according to a release from the county school system.  It's costing the county virtually nothing to install, though, thanks to a $500,000 grant from the Maryland Energy Administration and a power purchase agreement under which the capital costs are paid back over 15 years.   School officials say they'll be paying below current market rates for the electricity generated by the panels, so overall it'll save county taxpayers money.  The state grant, by the way, is part of MEA's Project Sunburst, which is using federal stimulus funds to put solar energy systems on public buildings.

It's another pioneering step from a school system that's getting comfortable with going green.   Last year, St. Mary's opened a new school in California appropriately dubbed Evergreen Elementary, which features photovoltaic panels, a small wind turbine, a green roof and two large cisterns for capturing rain water to flush the toilets.  Building the school to Gold LEED standards wasn't just for show, either - school officials said they would use the green features as teaching tools throughout the curriculum.

In like educational fashion, there'll be a real-time monitoring system put in the lobby of Carver so students, teachers, parents and staff can track the school's energy use and see how the solar system is performing.  What a bright idea!

(Solar array atop Rockville Arena, installed by Standard Solar; photo courtesy Standard Solar)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Miller's Court already has gotten plenty of props here in Baltimore for providing affordable housing for teachers, but now the former tin-can factory in Charles Village has earned national recognition as a model of "smart" and green building.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency named the $21 million redevelopment as one of five projects receiving its annual "Smart Growth Achievement" awards. 

Originally built in 1874, Miller's Court was reclaimed from drug dealers and squatters and converted into apartments for teachers and offices for nonprofit groups.

Besides offerng relatively low-cost housing in a walkable urban setting close to shopping and other amenities, the building also was rehabbed to be easier on the environment.  Its developers are seeking LEED gold rating from the U.S. Green Building Council for its location and its features, such as large windows to reduce daytime lighting, enhanced air ventilation filters, less toxic paints and adhesives, and a greenhouse. 

The building at Howard and 26th streets was the work of developers Donald and Thibault Manekin with Seawall Development Co. 

UPDATE: The developer's at work on Union Mill, a repeat of its award-winning project.  It's a rehab of an old stone mill in Hamden into more teacher-discounted apartments and offices, promising "the latest in environmentally sustainable green design."

(View from Miller's Court apartment; photo courtesy EPA)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 1:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

Cap & trade may be a dead letter in Congress, but the carbon-dioxide emission auction set up by Maryland and other northeastern states to combat climate change has yielded millions of dollars for cleaner and more efficient energy - all without destroying the region's economy, as critics have claimed it would if applied nationwide.

I'm reminded of that by today's announcement from the Maryland Energy Administration that it's awarding another $2 million in grants to local governments and nonprofits for improving energy efficiency in low- and moderate-income households. The agency's doling out 41 grants across the state for everything from home energy upgrades in Caroline County to weatherization in Montgomery County.

The money comes from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Inititiative, in which Maryland and other states have imposed caps on carbon dioxide emissions from their power plants and regularly auction off credits or permits for emissions of the climate-warming gas.

It's a market-based pollution control, giving power companies flexibility to buy and sell carbon credits so they can find the most cost-effective way of reducing their emissions. And the revenues from the auction have been plowed back into energy efficiency and renewable energy projects, though some also has been diverted to help the poor pay their utility bills.

Critics of cap & trade call it a tax scheme that'll ruin the nation's economy by raising the cost of energy, since most of our heat, light and fuel comes from burning carbon-emitting coal, oil and gas. But the auction's impact on energy costs in the northeast has been negligible. That's no doubt because the carbon-dioxide emission caps imposed by the states have been very loose and auction prices for emission credits relatively low as a result.

But the regional auction was originally set up in expection and hope that it would serve as a model for national action - which now seems unlikely, at least in the near term, with skeptics of climate change gaining seats in the November congressional elections.  As Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., said last week while attending an offshore wind announcement in Baltimore, prospects for climate legislation emerging from Congress are "going going gone."

(Civic Works members install energy-saving lightbulbs, faucet aerators and water heater blanket in 91-year-old resident's home, 2010 Baltiimore Sun photo by Algerina Perna)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

Most of the "final" Chesapeake Bay cleanup plans due from watershed states are in, and one of them already is drawing mixed reviews about whether it's filled the gaping holes seen three months ago in an earlier draft.

Two key states, though, remain to be heard from - Maryland, whose officials claimed they had submitted the best of all the states' draft cleanup plans in September, and New York, whose officials questioned the legal and scientific basis for requiring that state to join in the push to accelerate the bay restoration effort. 

The "watershed implementation plans" due from Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Delaware, West Virginia, New York and the District of Columbia are to be used by the Environmental Protection Agency in setting a "pollution diet" for the bay that's supposed to restore the estuary's degraded waters over the next 15 years or so.  EPA found serious deficiencies in most of the draft plans submitted in September.

Virginia submitted on Monday what its natural resources secretary called a "good, amended plan" for reducing bay pollution that he contended averts the need for a federal crackdown on sewage plants and farms in the Old Dominion.  Secretary Douglas W. Domenech estimated the accelerated cleanup effort would cost more than $7 billion over the next 15 years.

But environmentalists don't think it goes far enough, while farmers and builders are worried it's demanding too much of them.

Virginia's latest plan calls for more reductions in nitrogen and phosphorus from sewage treatment plants, but still relies heavily on voluntary incentives for farmers to curb pollution washing off their fields.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation said it was encouraged by the state's proposal to upgrade sewage treatment in the James River, but said the farm runoff provisions were still weak.

"Unlike the clear commitments to reductions from the wastewater sector, Virginia has not provided the same reasonable assurances from the agriculture sector," Ann F. Jennings, the foundation's Virginia executive director, said in a statement.

The Center for Progressive Reform in Washington called Virginia's latest effort "a significant improvement," but said it still lacks crucial details on costs and where the state plans to get the needed funding.  The group also questioned the state's reliance on "nutrient trading" to reduce pollution, saying there aren't adequate safeguards spelled out to make sure it result in real improvements in water quality.

Rex Springston of the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that officials with the Virginia Farm Bureau and home builders were lukewarm in their reactions to the state's new cleanup plan. 

And Scott Harper of the Virginian-Pilot reports that an EPA official called the state's 133-page plan "significantly improved," but withheld judgment on whether it was better enough to avoid any federal "backstop" actions to tighten regulation of sewage plants or farms.

Virginia's Natural Resources Secretary Douglas W. Domenech suggested in a cover letter that the state may yet propose more pollution reductions, even as he complained of "massive new unfunded mandates" being imposed "during the worst economy in generations."  A last-minute estimate provided by EPA from its computer model of bay pollution suggested the state may still have to reduce another million pounds of nitrogen, he noted.

Even without further measures, Domenech estimated the pollution reductions detailed would cost more than $7 billion.   Gov. Robert F. McDonnell is proposing to increase funding for sewage plant upgrades by $36.4 million "as a show of good faith," the natural resources secretary wrote.  But he added that the federal government would need to fill in the funding gaps.

(Marshyhope Creek, 1995 Baltimore Sun photo by Chien Chi Chang)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)