Some B'moreans are about to get a chance to take their recycling to a new level, as Howard County is set to begin collecting food scraps that until now had to be trashed, such as banana peels, egg shells and even old pizza boxes.

Almost 5,000 residents of Elkridge and Ellicott City are being asked to participate in the pilot, which begins in September, The Baltimore Sun's Jessica Anderson reports. If it takes hold and spreads, the county hopes to turn more than 20 percent of its landfill waste into re-usable lawn and garden compost, and save a bundle on disposal costs.

Nationwide, less than 3 percent of the 34 million tons of food waste generated each year is recycled, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Food waste makes up about 14 percent of the nation's trash and is second only to paper, which is far more commonly recycled.

County officials claim - and independent experts seem to agree - that Howard will be one of the first communities on the East Coast to recycle food scraps.

They'll be following in the footsteps of crunchy West Coast places like San Francisco and Seattle, of course. But the residents of B'more's western suburb may soon have a legitimate reason to brag - about their recycling, rather than their civility - on the green bumper stickers so many sport on their cars and vans.

And if it catches on in Howard, why not the rest of the metro area and Maryland? 

(Page family in Ellicott City composts food scraps at home now. Baltimore Sun photo by Barbara Haddock Taylor)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

An Anne Arundel County judge has ruled an environmental group may view records on farmers’ compliance with a state pollution law, but only after key information has been deleted.

Circuit Court Judge William C. Mulford II ordered the Maryland Department of Agriculture to redact any information identifying individual farmers from documents it is releasing concerning “nutrient management plans,” which spell out how much animal manure or chemical fertilizer is being spread on fields to grow crops.

The Assateague Coastkeeper had filed a Public Information Act request last year seeking a variety of records on Worcester County farms, including their compliance with a 1997 law requiring them to have and follow plans for limiting how much fertilizer they use so it won’t pollute the Chesapeake Bay.

The Maryland Farm Bureau went to court to block the state from releasing the information, which it argued was confidential under the law. In a July 14 order, Judge Mulford declared that the state may disclose if farmers are complying, but must redact any information that might be in the plan, including the farm’s size and what it grows.

Jane Barrett, director of the University of Maryland environmental law clinic, which represents the Worcester group, said she was still studying the order and had not decided whether to appeal.

Posted by Kim Walker at 6:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Chesapeake Bay
        

Poultry industry groups are rejecting criticism in a new report that says modern chicken production practices are degrading the Chesapeake Bay and other waters around the country.

The National Chicken Council and U.S. Poultry & Egg Association released a statement saying the criticism of the industry in the Pew Environment Group's report, "Big Chicken," is "terribly misplaced" and reflects the group's bias against the poultry industry.

The Delmarva Poultry Industries Inc. issued a statement saying the report "contains little new information and shows that Pew is not aware of the many positive steps taken by Delmarva’s chicken community in the last decade or longer."

The Delmarva poultry industry's share of bay pollution is a fraction of what the report says, according to the DPI statement.  It cites a Maryland report saying chicken manure is responsible for just 6 percent of the nitrogen getting into state waters and contends, based on another report, that urban and suburban runoff are bigger sources of the nutrients causing the bay's dead zone.

To see the statements in full, go here and here.

Meanwhile, on a related front, an industry consultant has reiterated its attack on the Environmental Protection Agency's computer analysis used to impose a baywide "pollution diet" requiring reductions in nutrient and sediment releases to water from farms and other lands within the six-state watershed.

Limno Tech, in a report commissioned by the Agricultural Nutrient Policy Council, says there are big  differences between how computer models used by EPA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture assess land use and the number and effectiveness of conservation practices adopted by farmers.

The American Farm Bureau Federation, which filed a suit joined by other ag groups to overturn EPA's bay pollution diet, publicized the consultant's critique.  Federation President Bob Stallman said, “It is clear to us that the EPA’s TMDL water regulations are based on flawed information.” 

To see the report, go here.

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation issued its own statement countering that "technical differences" between the two government cmputer models were being used to fight needed cleanup of the bay.  "While agriculture has made some progress reducing polluted runoff, it is still falling short of the mark, and conservation efforts need to increase substantially," said CBF senior scientist Beth McGee, if the states and federal government are to meet their latest 2025 deadline for doing everything that's needed to restore the bay's water quality.

(2007 Baltimore Sun photo by Doug Kapustin)

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

A new report says the industrialization of poultry farming over the last several decades is a major source of pollution fouling the Chesapeake Bay and other waterways around the country.

"Big Chicken," released Wednesday by the Pew Environment Group highlights how poultry production has increased and become more concentrated, taking an environmental toll.  And despite heavy government subsidies to farmers to reduce runoff of animal manure from their fields, the report argues tighter limits are needed - including a cap on the density of birds being raised in places like the Delmarva Peninsula.

Nationwide, the number of broiler chickens raised annually has soared 1,400 percent in less than 60 years, the report says, while the number of farms raising birds has dropped by 98 percent in the same time. The growth in production is driven by rising consumer demand for what the group says has become the most popular meat in the United States. The average American today eats 84 pounds of chicken a year, the report notes, more than twice what each consumed in 1970.

But the increase - and increased density of growing operations - has had environmental impacts. Farms raising 605,000 birds a year - twice what they did 25 years ago - are producing millions of tons of manure, which overwhelm the ability of limited local croplands to absorb all the fertilizer, the report's authors say. Growers in Maryland and Delaware alone, they note, produce enough waste to fill the U.S. Capitol dome nearly once a week.

"Industrial production means industrial levels of pollution," says Karen Steuer, Pew's director of government relations.

 The chicken "litter" produced by all those farms - a mixture of manure and wood shavings left behind after each flock is trucked to the processing plant - is widely used on Delmarva to fertilize corn, soybeans and other crops.

Farmers have been required to follow "nutrient management plans" that supposedly prescribe only as much nutrient-rich fertilizer as the crops can consume as they grow, but studies have found buildups of nitrogen in ground water and phosphorus in soils, where it can make its way to waterways and the bay. 

And the Pew report notes that a recent assessment by the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that almost every acre of farmland in the Chesapeake watershed that's fertilized with animal manure needs better management of that waste. According to Environmental Protection Agency estimates, 19 percent of the excess nitrogen and 26 percent of the excess phosphorus responsible for the bay's massive oxygen-starved dead zone this summer comes from animal manure in the watershed - including cows and hogs as well as chickens.

Government efforts to reduce manure-related pollution haven't been enough so far, the report's authors contend. Despite EPA rules requiring discharge permits for large chicken farms, it's unclear how many actually will be subject to tighter regulation. And the ones bearing the burden of those rules are growers - often individuals and families who go deeply into debt for buildings and equipment to raise the birds under contract to poultry companies, with no guarantee of help.

The Pew report calls for making poultry corporations like Salisbury-based Perdue share the cost and legal responsibility for proper management of the manure. 

"Here in Baltimore you're paying a sewer tax," Steuer said, referring to the fee paid by utility customers and septic tank owners alike. "Everybody's paying across the board," she added, "except (the poultry companies)."

The Washington-based environmental group also want tighter monitoring and regulation of manure hauled away from chicken farms for use on croplands elsewhere.  And it advocates imposing an overall cap on the density of birds that can be raised in areas like the Delmarva where there's already a great concentration of them.

The report is likely to draw praise from other environmental groups, who've long argued that the poultry industry has not fully addressed its pollution of the bay.  At least one group, though, qualified its endorsement. Doug Siglin, Washington lobbyist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, praised the report for "shining a light on the fact there are too many chickens and too much chicken manure" for the bay.

But Siglin said he considers it politically unrealistic to push for a cap on chicken density or for holding poultry companies accountable for the growers' waste. Those proposals have been raised before, he said, and beaten back by industry supporters. Instead, the Annapolis-based environmental group favors seeking more federal aid for farmers and the industry to find alternative uses for the manure, such as burning it for fuel or converting it to pellets for shipment and use in lawn or garden fertilizer.

Pew's findings and recommendations can be expected to draw a hostile reaction from farmers and the poultry industry, who argue they have made great strides - voluntarily and under orders - to reduce their environmental impact. Some probably will point to the recent bankruptcy of Allen Family Foods on the Delmarva as evidence the industry is in a fragile state and cannot bear the costs of additional cleanup mandates.

But Pew's Steuer disputes the comparison. "Allen didn't go out of business because of environmental regulations," she said. "It went out of business because of the (increasing) price of corn" often fed to the birds.

To read the full report, and see more graphics, go here.

(Eastern Shore chicken house, 2008 Baltimore Sun photo by Jed Kirschbaum; graphics by Pew Environment Group)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

The Vans Warped Tour music festival takes the stage today at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, but the bands have already picked up some new fans in Baltimore with their picking at dirt instead of guitars - helping Monday to turn an old school parking lot into a garden and play area for students and the surrounding Hampden community.

The project at the Academy for College and Career Exploration on West 36th Street was organized by Blue Water Baltimore, the watershed advocacy group, to fight the storm-water pollution that is fouling the harbor and the Chesapeake Bay. Organizers estimate that the nearly three-quarters of an acre open space should soak up at roughly 900,000 gallons of rainfall a year that otherwise would wash oil, dirt and nutrients into storm drains and the nearby Jones Falls.

The project cost roughly $65,000, mainly for materials, heavy equipment and technical expertise. Those costs were covered by a grant from the Chesapeake Bay Trust and funds from the city paid by developers who needed to mitigate their construction along the bay waterfront around the state. The labor of some 250 volunteers, including students, neighbors and local environmental activists, leveraged that money in a big way.

Blue Water Baltimore plans more such "pavement to prairie" projects at local schools.  Check here to learn more.

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

Back from a week at the beach, what did I miss? Wind farms, snakeheads and more dead zone news, it seems. Didn't manage to miss the blistering heat, though.  But it was about five degrees cooler at the shore than in B'more, according to the weather reports - which were about all the news I regularly consumed on my vacation.

Constellation Energy belatedly celebrated the completion last winter of Maryland's first commercial wind power facility on Backbone Mountain in Garrett County, The Sun reported. The ribbon-cutting drew a handfull of protesters complaining that the 28 massive turbines kill bats and mar the scenic ridgetop vistas there.

A mature, egg-bearing northern snakehead was caught in the Rhode River south of Annapolis, which Sun outdoors writer Candus Thomson suggested may have happened because low salinity in the Chesapeake Bay allowed the invasive fish to escape from the Potomac River where it's proliferated the last several years.

The heavy spring rains that produced that low salinity are also responsible for producing one of the bay's largest "dead zones" on record, The Washington Post reminded us over the weekend.  But if there's a silver lining to that sign of the bay's continued woes, the low salinity may also be keeping away the stinging nettles that drive swimmers out of the water at Sandy Point State Park, the Annapolis Capital points out.

In other energy news, I see that Baltimore Gas Electric's "PeakRewards" program for reducing electricity consumption on hot days produced an angry backlash, as residents had their air conditioners cycled off by the utility for hours during the 100-degree heat wave central Maryland experienced on Friday. Wonder if that'll give a black eye to energy conservation and efficiency programs, which most experts have said are the best and quickest ways to curbing greenhouse gases and lowering power bills. I haven't signed up for Peak Rewards, but did my part manually to conserve power over the weekend by bumping my thermostat up a bit to 78 degrees.  

And now that I'm back, I also see an op-ed today in the Sun arguing that big wind projects are a costly way to produce electricity and do little to reduce climate-warming greenhouse gases.  And there's a similar complaint from Hagerstown, where the Herald-Mail reports state Sen. Christopher Shank, R-Washington County, is questioning the lease of state land to build a $70 million solar farm near three state prisons there.  That deal is slated for a vote by the state Board of Public Works on Wednesday.

(Baltimore Sun photos: Constellation's Criterion wind project in Garrett County, by Jed Kirschbaum; northern snakehead collected from Rhode River, by Candus Thomson)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Timothy Wheeler is at the beach this week -- vacation, not assignment. But here are a few recent articles worth pointing out in case you missed them:

• Endangered Hellbenders -- aka snot otters -- get new exhibit at Maryland Zoo. Are

• A former Navy destroyer will soon be sunk off the coast of Maryland to create the largest artificial reef on the Eastern Seaboard.

• University of Maryland College Park students are creating a green house that conserves water for its Solar Decathlon entry.
• Constellation marks the launch of its Maryland wind farm.

 Baltimore Sun photo of a Hellbender by Karl Merton Ferron

Posted by Kim Walker at 6:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: News
        

Who says stream cleanups can only be done in spring and fall? The Jones Falls is due for a little tidying Saturday (July 16), organized by Baltimore Youth Environmental Response and the city's Office of Sustainability.

Volunteers are to meet at 1 p.m. at 1813 Falls Road, just outside Baltimore Bicycle Works. Bags, gloves and refreshments will be provided. And around 2:30 p.m., they'll wrap the cleanup to discuss future goals and activities for the youth-led environmental group. You can RSVP and learn more about RSVP on Facebook.

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 8:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Legislation seeking to reconnect kids nationwide with nature and educate them more about the environment has resurfaced in Washington - this time with at least a trace of bipartisanship.

Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) announced they are introducing the "No Child Left Inside Act," which would provide federal assistance to states to develop and carry out environmental literacy plans. Cosponsors include Maryland's two Democratic senators, Barbara Mikulski and Ben Cardin.

Companion legislation is being reintroduced in the House, where the bill's champion, Rep. John Sarbanes, D-MD, had tried in vain to get it passed in the last Congress.

The announcement comes shortly after Maryland's state Board of Education decided to make environmental literacy a high school graduation requirement.

A coalition of more than 2,000 environmental and other groups has thrown its support behind getting national legislation, but a lack of Republican support has stalled it so far.

“Research shows that hands-on, outdoor environmental education has a measurably positive impact not only on student achievement in science, but also in reading, math, and social studies,” Sarbanes said in a statement. He said federal help is needed because many schools have been forced by budget shortages to scale back or eliminate environmental education programs.

“This will help the American K-12 education system foster innovation and interest in science, technology, engineering and math (the ‘STEM’ fields), which is crucial to keep our workforce competitive in rapidly emerging world markets,” said Kevin Coyle, vice president for education and training at the National Wildlife Federation.

For more on the bill, go here.

(Baltimore Sun photo)

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

Hundreds of people flocked to the Maryland Department of the Environment yesterday, but not for the usual reasons.

Instead of applying for permits or responding to pollution violation notices, they were there for a more upbeat reason - to promote and learn about new ways to control pollution washing off city and suburban streets and parking lots.

More than 360 people registered for the department's first-ever "Clean Water Innovations Trade Show." Three dozen exhibitors were on hand to tout everything from green roofs and floating wetlands to the latest in storm-drain retrofits.

State Environment Secretary Robert M. Summers said the expo grew out of a forum on sustainability held by Gov. Martin O'Malley earlier this year. The state is applying new storm-water pollution control regulations on all new construction and redevelopment, and is beginning to require better controls in existing communities as well.

Summers asserted in remarks to the assembled vendors, local officials and others that the state is a leader in sustainable growth, in less-polluting development techniques and the green economy. But he also acknowledged "a lot of challenges going forward," including regulatory and technical hurdles.

The latter point was seconded by Erik Dalski of Highview Creations, which has installed green roofs in New York and Boston and is branching into Maryland and the Washington area now. One of the company's more interesting projects in these parts is a green roof planned for a new barn near Annapolis.

Dalski said there seems to be "a lot of red tape" here governing green infrastructure, and local officials he's met with still seem hesitant to try new things like green roofs.

Summers suggested such red-tape complaints ought to ease under a recent initiative announced by O'Malley to streamline regulations and "fast-track" permitting.

(Barry Chenkin, founder of Aquabarrel, discusses his products at Clean Water Innovations Trade Show at MDE headquarters. Photo by Jay Apperson, MDE's Office of Communications)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 11:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

While the news out of Washington is dominated by the political stalemate over the debt limit, the Republican-led House has been busy trying to limit federal environmental regulations.

The House voted 239 to 184 Wednesday to bar the Environmental Protection Agency from imposing water-quality standards over a state's objections. The measure also would prohibit the federal agency from objecting to pollution discharge permits issued by a state.

The "Clean Water Cooperative Federalism Act" was prompted by backlash to EPA imposing nutrient-pollution standards in Florida and limiting mountaintop coal mining in Appalachia, but it drew support from others chafing over federal mandates.

Maryland's two Republican House members, Reps. Roscoe Bartlett and Andy Harris, voted with the majority. The state's five Democrats opposed it, and Rep. John Sarbanes warned that if the House-passed bill became law, it could undermine prospects for cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay.

According to a Sarbanes aide, the bill would take away EPA's ability to object if a state sets water-quality standards that federal regulators do not believe are protective enough of human health or fish and other aquatic life. So if one of the six states in the Bay watershed set a water-quality standard that EPA feared would undermine the "pollution diet" it recently set for restoring the Bay, the agency would be powerless to force the state to revise it.

Likewise, stripping EPA of permit oversight would take away the federal government's leverage to see that states don't sacrifice clean water for favored industries, the aide said. EPA has on several occasions objected to what it believed were lax permits approved by Bay region states, and the agency has said it would use that permit override power if states didn't stick to the bay diet, bureaucratically known as a "total maximum daily load."

The bill stands little chance of passing the Democrat-controlled Senate, and EPA officials have indicated they'd advise the President to veto it if it did get through.

The clean-water bill is the tip of the regulatory rollback House members are pushing. Earlier this week, environmental activists said that nearly two dozen bills and "riders" to spending legislation had been proposed to limit federal regulation of coal ash and hazardous air pollutants, or to expand federal protection of endangered species.

An effort to block the phase-out of inefficient incandescent light bulbs got a majority vote in the House this week, but failed to get the two-thirds margin needed to pass it on an expedited basis under House rules.  Those who contend - wrongly, according to critics - that the federal government is about to ban all incandescent bulbs have vowed to try again under regular House procedures.

The standards adopted in 2007 with support industry and signed by President Bush, phase out starting next year the inefficient incandescent light bulbs that we've been using for more than a century and require new bulbs to use 25 to 30 percent less energy. Opponents of the "light bulb ban" have argued consumers should have the freedom to buy standard bulbs if they want to.

But defenders have pointed out that there are more light bulb choices now than ever - including high-efficiency incandescent bulbs, as well as energy-sipping compact fluorescent and light-emitting diode (LED) ones.  Supporters of the phaseout say that even if the new bulbs cost a bit more up front, they save consumers $100 to $200 a year through lower electricity bills.

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
        

A study released today estimates there are 22,600 "clean" jobs in the Baltmore area, but the growth here of employment in green energy, conservation and environmental services is trailing the nation as a whole.

The Brookings Institution reports that the region's "clean economy" jobs grew by 2.6 percent annually from 2003 to last year, ranking Baltimore 76th among the nation's 100 largest metro areas. Maryland overall fared somewhat better, with a 3.1 percent growth that ranked it 29th among states.

Report co-author Mark Muro told The Baltimore Sun's Jamie Smith Hopkins that the Baltimore area clean economy is dominated by slower-growing, mature industries such as waste management - which actually lost jobs in recent years, according to the report - and has fewer jobs in clean technology, which is showing rapid growth nationwide.

The Washington think tank contends that the clean economy offers great prospects for boosting employment and income without needing additional years of higher education, but that it won't realize its potential without a more focused national effort.

To see the report and more, go here.

(Workers insulating pipes to reduce home energy use. Baltimore Sun photo)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 8:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

When we talk about old-growth and virgin forests, we often think of the massive redwoods and sequoias out West. The eastern United States was heavily logged in the 19th and early 20th centuries, so that the trees we see in this part of the country today are relative youngsters - decades rather than centuries old.

But not everywhere. Remnants remain of the forests that practically blanketed the East when European settlers arrived. Some are on steep slopes, in deep ravines or other remote, hard-to-reach places. Others are relatively easy to get to.

One's right here in Maryland - about 40 majestic acres of largely untouched eastern hemlocks and white pines at Swallow Falls State Park, near Oakland in Garrett County.

Joan Maloof, a biology professor at Salisbury University, has made a career of studying trees and forests. She's passionate about old growth and is working now to develop a network for protecting them. She's written a first-person guide to some of these overlooked pockets of biodiversity and wonder.

Among the Ancients, Adventures in the Eastern Old-Growth Forests takes the reader to one stand in each state east of the Mississippi River. Maloof recounts their history and the people who've fought to preserve them, and she details their current condition. Some are pristine, others threatened and abused. Maloof reflects in her chapters on the values of forests.

"Imagine an organism that can live three times longer than the longest-lived human," she concludes in her chapter on Swallow Falls. "We need to recognize that in trees, and honor it."

She gets personal as well, describing how the old woods touch her and shape her own outlook on life. Her visit to Cook Forest State Park in southwest Pennsylvania, for instance, makes her imagine she's one of the seven dwarves in the cartoon classic "Snow White."

She writes: "...the chipmunks were scampering along beside me, the birds were chirping and hopping on the trail in front of me, and patches of moss were glowing green from teh slender beams of light that made their way through the canopy far overhead. I felt almost as if I had been drugged. I was so filled with joy I had a cheek-splitting grin on my face."

If you'd like to meet the author, Maloof will give a reading at the Barnes & Noble at 1819 Reisterstown Road in Pikesville on Wednesday (July 13) at 7 pm.  To hear her now, tune in here to listen to an interview public radio's Marc Steiner did with her recently.  And you can read more of Joan Maloof's insights and observations on her blog here.

(Cover photograph courtesy Ruka Press)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
        

It's not just the heat, or the humidity - it's the bad air. Experts are forecasting "code red," or seriously unhealthy, levels of smog or ozone pollution today in the Baltimore area.

Air quality is expected to be bad enough today to cause even healthy people to experience shortness of breath, coughing, wheezing, fatigue, headaches, nausea, chest pain, and eye and throat irritation if exercising or working outdoors.  People jogging, biking or making any other sort of exertion may feel pain in their chest when taking deep breaths.   And people with asthma or cardiac or respiratory conditions are likely to have more severe reactions to such high ozone levels.

Authorities recommend that people avoid outdoor exercise when ozone levels are expected to hit red levels. And Clean Air Partners, a nonprofit group that attempts to educate the public about air quality, recommends that people take steps to reduce the pollution that forms ozone, by reducing driving, turning off lights and reducing electricity use and by not operating gasoline-powered lawn equipment.

If ozone does reach forecasted "red" levels, it would be the fifth time this year in the Baltimore area, compared with just two "code red" days in the region by this time last summer.

Ozone levels are forecast to reach "code orange" levels in the Washington area, with air quality still bad enough to cause discomfort and health problems for sensitive individuals. The DC area has had six "code red" days so far this year.

Unless I missed one, this is the first time air-quality forecasters have warned ahead of time that ozone would hit code red levels. They've forecast plenty of "code orange" days, only to see air quality turned out to be actually worse than expected. They've issued alerts after the fact - sometimes hours later, too late to do any good at warning people to stay indoors.

Officials at the Maryland Department of the Environment say forecasters aren't low-balling their air quality predictions. Several of those "orange" forecasts were for ozone levels to climb nearly to the red level, they pointed out, so they weren't significantly off.

Smog or ozone pollution forms when vehicle exhaust, paint fumes and power plant emissions, among other things, mix in the lower atmosphere under strong sunlight and generally windless skies.

But here in Maryland, as in most other eastern states, our air quality is a function of what people in other states are doing, not just us. State officials estimate that 50 to 70 percent of the ozone affecting Marylanders' breathing comes from out of state, borne by prevailing winds from sources to our west and south.

That long-distance pollution is why the Environmental Protection Agency last week ordered power plants in 27 states to sharply curtail their emissions of nitrogen oxide, a key smog ingredient. The rule also requires steep cuts in emissions of sulfur dioxide, a source of fine particle pollution that also impairs breathing, though year-round, not just in summer.

(2007 Baltimore Sun photo by Karl Merton Ferron)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 10:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

The task force Gov. Martin O'Malley set up to study the septic system curbs he couldn't get through the General Assembly this year held its first meeting in Annapolis today, and it quickly became clear that even another five months may not be enough time to sort out this controversial issue.

There were no fireworks, everyone was cordial during the two-hour opening session, which was devoted largely to briefings from state officials. But several task force members representing farmers and rural communities made it plain they were leery of any state action to restrict development using septic systems.

State Sen. David R. Brinkley, R-Frederick, said he thought the 28-member group ought to keep landowners' property rights in mind as it contemplates recommending any new limits on development beyond the reach of public sewers. He noted that the O'Malley administration also is weighing new restrictions on farmers' use of chemical and animal fertilizer to help clean up the Chesapeake Bay, and called it "another perceived assault on rural or agricultural Maryland."

Patricia Langenfelder, president of the Maryland Farm Bureau, said farmers are worried that curbs on the use of septic systems could devalue their land. Most are not looking to sell their fields and pasture for development, she added, but rely on the development value of the land as collateral for financing their farming operations.

Others urged the panel to look at other growth-related issues, including the looming shortfall of funding to upgrade sewage treatment plants and the need for more tax breaks or other incentives to get farmers to preserve their land.

There are 426,000 septic systems in Maryland now - including nearly one-fourth of all homes - which officials estimate are producing 8 percent of the nitrogen that's getting into area streams and polluting the bay. Each household on a septic system produces up to 10 times as much nitrogen as one connected by sewer to a wastewater treatment plant.

The governor had pushed for legislation that would bar major new developments on septic systems and would have required more costly but less polluting advanced septic systems for smaller housing developments. But farmers, developers and rural officials raised an outcry, and legislative leaders tabled the bill for more study.

The O'Malley administration has proposed curbing new devlelopment on septic systems as an add-on to a broader plan for reducing pollution fouling the bay. The state was required to come up with the plan by the Environmental Protection Agency, which has called for a 20 to 25 percent reduction baywide in nutrients and sediments getting into the bay.

But some said the issue goes beyond just the bay to the continuing toll low-density development is taking on Maryland's farmland and forests.

"This is far more important than just meeting our nitrogen reduction goals," said Russell Brinsfield, director of the University of Maryland Center for Agro-Ecology. He noted that if state planners' projections are correct, nearly one-fourth of the state's remaining agricultural lands could be lost to development in the next 25 to 30 years. "If we aren't careful about how we grow," he added, "we're going to leave to the next generation a Maryland quite different from the one I knew" growing up.

Del. Maggie McIntosh, chair of the House Environmental Matters Committee and of the task force, said the group would meet twice a month in an effort to craft legislative and policy recommendations by Dec. 1, which she called a "mammoth task." But the Baltimore city Democrat said the task force needs to sort through the tangle of issues around septic systems, sewage plants, rural economies and land preservation and "look at how we grow in a sustainable way in Maryland."

To learn more about the task force and track its work, go here.

(Septic tank on new home in Baltimore County, Baltimore Sun photo by Kim Hairston)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 12:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Chemical plant security is getting the once-over in a summit that starts today in downtown Baltimore.

Nearly 700 industry and government experts are expected for the two-day conference at the Baltimore Hilton Hotel, which is co-sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security and the Chemical Sector Coordinating Council, an industry group.

Thousands of plants and other facilities that make or store hazardous chemicals have undergone safety and security upgrades since the terrorist attacks in 2001, and the industry has cooperated with the federal government in a new round of screening with an eye to improving safeguards even more, according to Larry Sloan, CEO and president of the Society of Chemical Manufacturers and Affliiates. He said industry is currently awaiting the go-ahead from the federal government to act on improvements proposed at facilities that have been screened under the latest review. "We're concerned about the slowness of the pace," Sloan said, of the government's response.

"They want to get moving on it, they want to get their systems implemented," added Ryan Loughlin director of chemical and energy solutions at ADT Security, a panel moderator at the summit.

The importance of staying on top of chemical security was emphasized earlier this year when a 20-year-old Saudi attending community college in Texas was arrested and accused of plotting terrorist attacks. According to The New York Times, he came to the attention of federal authorites after a North Carolina chemical plant reported the student had placed suspicious orders for materials that could be used to make a bomb.

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 8:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Scientists are predicting that this summer's oxygen-starved "dead zone" in the Chesapeake Bay will be unusually bad - fueled by a wet spring that washed a heavy dose of nitrogen into the bay from the Susquehanna River and other tributaries.

Donald Scavia, a University of Michigan aquatic ecologist, who makes annual forecasts of "dead zone" sizes in the Chesapeake and Gulf of Mexico, thinks the amount of bay water with little dissolved oxygen in it will be the largest since 2003 and the sixth largest ever recorded.  See the UMich forecast here.

Nitrogen - from sewage plants, fertilizer washing off land and vehicle and power plant pollution falling out of the sky - is one of the key drivers of the bay's hypoxia, or low-oxygen condition. The amount getting into the bay has increased significantly since the 1950s, Scavia says, and this year's estimated load is the highest in more than a decade. Not surprising, since river gauges measured unusually strong spring flows down the Susquehanna - the single biggest water source for the bay.

Scavia's prediction tracks with the preliminary forecasts of bay scientists, who a few weeks ago foresaw a "moderately large" volume of water with no oxygen in it at all from spring into mid-July. If conditions don't change, they predicted this summer's dead zone could be the fourth largest in the past 26 years.

(Note that the Michigan and Maryland scientists are measuring slightly different things. Scavia tracks "hypoxic" water, which still has a little oxygen in it but not enough for fish and shellfish to do well, while the Maryland-based group has focused so far only on the truly "dead zone," anoxic water with no oxygen at all in it for crabs and other critters to breathe. Eco-Check, the Maryland-federal scientific partnership, has yet to issue its prediction for the broader hypoxic zone in the bay.)

Variations aside, the general forecast is tor a rough summer for striped bass, blue crabs and oysters, points out Beth McGee, senior scientist with the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.  When oxygen levels in the water drop, fish and shellfish become stressed.

Some might wonder why the bay's dead zone can still be so bad given the billions of dollars spent on cleanup - this past fall, for instance, Maryland farmers planted a record number of acres in "cover crops" to soak up excess nitrogen in their fields that would otherwise wash into the bay in spring.  McGee points out such efforts take years to influence water quality; much of the nitrogen from farm fields gets into the bay via ground water, she notes, and can take a decade or more to seep out into surface streams.

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 7:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

A new study confirms what bird-lovers have long believed - that horseshoe crabs are key to the health of imperiled shorebirds that drop by Delaware Bay every spring.

The research, published in the online journal of the Ecological Society of America, finds the eggs produced by female horseshoe crabs during their spawning season provide essential nourishment for red knots, which stop over on the shores of Delaware Bay during their annual migration to nesting grounds in the Arctic.

The chance a red knot will gain significant weight during its Delaware Bay stopover depends on how many horseshoe crab eggs it consumes, according to the study, which was led by scientists with the U.S. Geological Survey. Birds that don't gain enough weight before heading on toward the Arctic have a lower chance of surviving the year.

But the study also found that the birds' survival is closely tied to snow conditions when the birds get to their Arctic breeding grounds. In fact, the depth of the snow when the birds reached the end of their migration apparently mattered more than the birds' weight when they left Delaware Bay - a surprising finding, according to Conor McGowan, chief author of the study.

Researchers had expected that the less snow on the ground, the better the birds would fare, but the data showed exactly the opposite. McGowan said scientists don't have a ready explanation yet for the unexpected relationship.

The study comes amid debate over whether Maryland and other mid-Atlantic states are doing enough to rebuild the mid-Atlantic's horseshoe crab population so it can supply more eggs for the red knots, whose numbers have plummeted over the last 15 years. Conservationists want to see harvests banned altogether, but fisheries managers have defended the current limits, saying the crabs are recovering while the birds' fate depends on more than just the eggs.

The study does not look at how horseshoe crabs are being managed by state and federal authorities. But McGowan said it does confirm that horseshoe crab management is a key to conserving red knots.

"That’s one of the things we think we can control," he said, "as opposed to snow depth in the Arctic. We can’t send snow blowers up there."

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission, which oversees coastal catches, is working on developing an "adaptive" management plan for the mid-Atlantic's horseshoe crab population.  To read the journal article, go here.

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 2:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

Weeds as art? Never underestimate the ingenuity of artists!

Starting Monday, bush bus shelters on North Avenue will feature large-scale photographs of some of the oft-overlooked and usually unwanted plants growing in the cracks in the sidewalk, in the gutters and storm drains throughout the city.

The bus shelter ads are part of a public art project called Uncultivated, offering what it calls "a virtual and physical tour of Baltimore's wild plant life."

Whle many might dismiss the green growth as weeds, the artists behind this project want people to look at them in a different light, as "tiny pockets of wildness within the urban environment."

"Often these tenacious plants are referred to as invasive, as if the blame for their presence lay with the plant itself," according to the  release from Lynn Cazabon, the project's director and photographer. 

"In reality, these plant species have simply evolved to thrive in the extremely harsh environment of the city, which is perpetually effected by human-caused disruption."

The release goes on to say that "these plants communicate something very important to us, telling how the landscape of Baltimore is evolving over time due to the effects of global climate change."

The photos are linked to a website, http://uncultivated.info , which provides information on the plants in the pictures, plus a map showing where they were found in the city.  Others involved with the project are horticulturist Christa Partain and Amanda Barrett and Patterson Clark, who provided web site and logo design.

Look for the posters throughout July on North Ave. shelters between Howard and Charles streets and on St. Paul Street outside of Penn Station.  Maybe this will give all the critics of the "Male/Female" sculpture at Penn Station something else to look at and talk about.

(Photo courtesy Uncultivated)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 9:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)
        

An animal-rights group wants Maryland's new environmental education requirement to include lessons on the ills of animal agriculture and meat consumption. 

Seizing on the decision last week by the state Board of Education to make "environmental literacy" a graduation requirement for all new high school students, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals wrote to the board president urging that there be lessons on the harm done  by animal agriculture and the benefits of going vegan.

According to Tracy Reiman, PETA executive vice president, the production of meat and eggs is a major culprit in causing global climate change as well as degrading the Chesapeake Bay. She said her group would be happy to furnish school officials lesson material.

"Waste and run-off from chicken, egg, and turkey factory farms in the region have played a major role in turning vast areas of the bay into "dead zones," she wrote. She also said a University of Chicago study had found that cutting meat, dairy and eggs out of one's diet does far more to combat climate change than buying a hybrid vehicle.

(Photo: Milking parlor, Kent County farm. 2008 Baltimore Sun photo by Lloyd Fox)

Posted by Tim Wheeler at 8:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)