The Peach Report

Wanted: Climate change-based novels with a strong dose of story, vivid character development, a strong theme, and setting or atmosphere. Climate change focus alone may not be sufficient.

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In a new story for Chemical & Engineering News, I report that installing anaerobic digesters in rural China could significantly reduce greenhouse emissions.

The fuel generators, called anaerobic digesters, rely on microbes that break down animal or human waste inside airtight, underground tanks that are typically between 6 and 10 m3 in size. They produce biogas, which is composed largely of methane. The biogas travels through pipes into the home, where people burn it for cooking, lighting, and heating.

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[The researchers] found that compared with traditional fuels, anaerobic digesters would produce as much as 54% less warming over 20 years. The researchers detected methane leaks in less than 10% of digesters, but they calculated that even leaky systems would cut warming compared to traditional fuels, by 35 to 42% during the same period.

I didn’t have room to include these details in the story, but to set up your own biogas generator, you’ll need:
1) Waste from about two large animals (that amount will provide enough fuel to cook for a family)
2) Water
3) Warm temperatures. The microbes inside an anaerobic generator produce more methane when it’s hot. But some Alaskan scientists have found some cold-loving microbes that could make biogas production efficient even in chilly climates.

Read the rest.

In one of my favorite scenes from “The Simpsons,” Homer Simpson argues with his daughter, Lisa, about the meaning of a recent snowfall.

HOMER: Gee, Lisa, looks like tomorrow, I’ll be shoveling 10 feet of global warming.

LISA: Global warming can cause weather at both extremes, hot and cold.

HOMER: I see. So you’re saying warming makes it colder. Well, aren’t you the queen of crazy land! Everything’s the opposite of everything!

(Homer dances, twirling and waving his arms.)

HOMER (singing): La de da de da. I’m Lisa Simpson! La de da de da!

LISA (muttering): Really? Really?

I had the privilege of watching this scene and many others as I conducted research last month for my new story for The Yale Forum on Climate Change & The Media, “‘The Simpsons’ take on climate change.” The story is an analysis of how “The Simpsons” has portrayed climate change during its 20-year run.

“The Simpsons” is so popular that its characters serve as a common language through which society discusses the world, said Turner, the “Planet Simpson” author, in a recent interview. Many Americans — and indeed many people around the world — know the meaning of “D’oh!,” “Don’t have a cow, man” and “Mmm … donuts,” even if they don’t remember that the phrases originated with the series.

Because of its popularity, the show reaches a larger audience than many journalists and scientists, said Tim Delaney, author of “Simpsonology” and professor of sociology at the State University of New York at Oswego. Meanwhile, its humorous approach may disarm viewers who would otherwise dismiss messages about the environment. “Funny is funny,” he said. “Everyone can laugh at it.”

Read the rest.

In a new story for Chemical & Engineering News, I write about a new study showing that 85 percent of our energy demand could be avoided.

[T]he Cambridge team used a model … to follow energy flow from raw fuels through their use in transportation and in the production of heat and light. The researchers added data on conservation from design changes and current energy consumption to calculate how much energy the world could save.

They found that implementing the best available design improvements to passive systems in every building, factory, and vehicle would reduce world energy demand by 73%. When they added potential gains from some energy-efficient active systems such as light bulbs, appliances, and engines, they calculated that as much as 85% of energy demand could vanish.

In reporting the story, I spoke with Kornelis Blok, a professor of sustainable energy at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. To address climate change and energy shortages, “all the analysts agree that the number-one option is energy-efficiency improvement,” he told me. The challenge, though, is in achieving that potential.

The story.

Sorry, Stephen Colbert.

In a discussion with guest Nicholas Kristof in July 2009, Colbert expressed fear that “lady pee” — which can contain estrogen from oral contraceptives — is the cause of sexual defects in aquatic animals.
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In a new story for Chemical & Engineering News, I report the findings of a just-published study on climate change and transportation.

For France, the road to climate protection may require a closer look at planes, trains, barges, and automobiles. In a new analysis, researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology find that France could cut greenhouse gas emissions by shifting freight transportation from roads to rails and inland waterways (Environ. Sci. Tech., DOI: 10.1021/es9025529).

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In France, nuclear reactors—which do not emit greenhouse gases—produce 80% of the country’s electricity. So cutting emissions in the transportation sector is critical to France’s climate change policy, says Troy Hawkins, one of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology researchers.

Read it.

My new story for Environmental SCENE, on the bacteria that munch oil and how people can encourage them to flourish:

Researchers have long known that adding nutrients, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, to a contaminated area stimulates bacteria to degrade the oil more quickly than under natural conditions.

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Now, researchers at the Environmental Protection Agency and the University of Cincinnati have demonstrated that adding nutrients to contaminated sediment has the potential to speed clean-up even at sites where most of the oil has already degraded.

The rest.

I just had a new article published at the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media on how the best digital storytellers are covering climate change online. Here’s a taste.

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Powering A Nation, July 31, 2009 – Since 2001, U.S. energy companies have proposed more than 150 new coal plants. But a loose network of environmental activists, aided by uncertain economic conditions, has forced plans for more than 100 of the plants to be abandoned. Dozens more are clogged up in the court systems. (The rest.)

CHAPEL HILL (The News & Observer, July 8, 2008) – Soaring gas prices are driving some of North Carolina’s visiting nurses off the road. Others are refusing to take on new patients. The trend, service providers warn, could increase health care costs and force critically ill patients to leave home.

Naisha David, a nurse’s aide at Good Health Services in Raleigh, said she no longer accepts cases in Cary, Fuquay-Varina or Apex.

“Gas is just so high that you can’t afford to travel the distance, even though we may love what we do,” she said. (The rest.)