Big Oil Undermining Climate Change Science in the Classroom

Let’s talk about the education system in Texas. This might seem a bit specific but the fact is, what happens in Texas, does NOT stay in texas. Many societal trends that take place first in Texas find their way into many other states rather quickly. While this sums up so many things we are currently dealing with, let’s focus on the impact of the oil and gas industry on the curriculum of Texas elementary and high school students. 

Now, why would the oil and gas industry care about what kids are learning in school? The same reason advertisers dedicate whole departments to targeting kids. The younger you lock in a group of people as supporters, the better for the longevity of your product. In this case, we are talking about the education of future voters and even political participants. It is in the best interest of oil and gas to ensure that they are viewed favorably by the next generation to maintain their foothold in the energy world. Particularly as the amount of bad press coverage due to increasingly obvious climate change caused disasters, rises. 

How do they even have the ability to inform curriculum though? Simple. In places like Texas where the oil and gas industry contributes heavily to education funding, their people sit on the boards. They make up committees and provide consultants who propose changes and modifications to the textbook language. They “recommend” the best way to introduce oil and gas based energy and make a blatant effort to downplay the role of big oil in contributing to climate change. They tie funding to an adherence to their recommendations and expect to be taken seriously when it comes to the language used in textbooks as they are a main source of funding for the creation of those textbooks. 

You might say, ok, but that’s just Texas. Why do I care what they print? It sounds like those textbooks may just reflect what the Texan population already believes about climate change. First, even if that were true, the continuation of detrimental concepts and beliefs being perpetuated through the public school education system in the largest state in the US is always going to be a concern for us all. Texas has around 40 electoral votes meaning Texas, by itself can provide almost 15% of the votes needed to elect a president. What Texans do and think will impact the rest of us. Secondly, Texas is one of the largest producers of textbooks in the country! Meaning, what they put into those books might be exactly what your 5th grader gets in their classroom in Vermont. 

Bottom line? Be vigilant. There are programs around the country that promote the idea that oil and gas either aren’t really contributing all that much to climate change or even that climate change “isn't so bad.” It doesn’t take a psychology degree to imagine the impact teachers parroting big oil might have on the next generation of Americans. Big oil has certainly run the numbers and decided it is worth the millions of dollars invested in industry-shaped education. 

Resources:

Subverting Climate Science in the Classroom - Scientific American

The ABCs of Big Oil: Why the Fossil Fuel Industry Infiltrated Schools

Pipeline to the classroom: how big oil promotes fossil fuels to America's children | Oklahoma | The Guardian 

Turn Off the Plastic Tap!

So, as we’ve all been existing this last week, one theme keeps coming back again and again. The overwhelming amount of plastic waste in this country and globally. Statistics like, 50% of emissions are coming from the top 10% of wealthy individuals globally. Or, the truly shocking news that among everything else, the USPS is about to buy a huge fleet of their classic truck model that we’ve recently learned gets about 8 miles per gallon of gas. This, in the face of all the efforts to reduce the use of fossil fuels. Not a great choice when there are definitely other options available. When a public service doesn’t seem to be making an effort to change, it can be really disheartening as it seems to suggest that our government is not backing up their words with actions. Can you imagine the impact it would have in the other direction if all USPS trucks were transitioned to electric? Additionally, bathtub analogies about turning off the plastic tap abound. The idea is so straightforward that a very small child could understand the premise. If you haven’t seen one of these illustrations (check out the video below), basically, in order to stop an overflowing bathtub from dousing your space, you’d first turn off the tap. While interested and innovative, a lot of the suggested climate change fixes are more like attempting to bail water out of the flooding tub without turning off the tap. Impossible, impractical, irrational. Everything a successful plan should not be. We need to stop plastic waste at the source. The number of things that must be plastic is much shorter than the list of things that can be plastic or are cheaper when plastic.

That’s the bottom-line, though,  isn’t it? Plastic is cheap. You go to the store and you want a soda. You could buy a 20oz for, say, $1.50 or you could buy a 12oz glass bottle for $2.99. Which are most people going to buy? We’ve incentivized buying the plastic option to the point that it's all vulnerable communities can consistently afford. So, where is the root of the issue? Though large corporations bear a lot of the weight when it comes to making biodegradable and eco-friendly alternatives, they are motivated mainly through our consumerism. Companies aren’t going to produce a product for which there is no demand. But I recycle, you might say. Well, if you live in the US, you should know that the amount of plastic actually recycled has dropped below 6%. We aren’t saying don’t try but a lot of the stuff you think is being recycled may still be ending up in the landfill. So, if you can, when you can, buy a reusable alternative. Support companies that are making big moves towards reusable products. Most of all, we need to  get on the same page as a country and vote to support climate change savvy legislation. Customer demand is gradually making a change but with the right regulations we can make sweeping changes to the landscape of commercial production. We are already finding microplastics in our lungs and in our blood. What more will it take for us to work together to pull the plug on plastic waste? We have the innovations. Use them. 

Resources: 
Companies Moving Towards Zero Plastic

Light It Up!

Eureka!

The iconic symbol representing a good idea is getting a permanent upgrade.

Thomas Edison was the first to successfully patent a functional and marketable incandescent lightbulb in the 1800s and we’ve been relying on this technology for the last 150 years. The basic principle of incandescent light is that light is produced from heat. In this case, heat is passed through a very tiny filament in the vacuum created by the bulb until that tiny filament begins to glow, producing light. This is why a light bulb is warm to the touch, even after it’s been turned off. Without the glass surrounding the bulb, the filament, often made from tungsten, would oxidize in the open air and burn right up. Additionally, 90% of the energy used to light an incandescent bulb is emitted as heat, which, unless it is being used as a candle warmer or other heat-centric device, is quite a big waste. Even so, while alternatives like the fluorescent light bulb may have taken over the commercial scene, incandescent bulbs are still the least expensive option upfront for most residential settings.

That being said, LEDs are steadily rising in popularity as more people understand the advantages of their long-term value. LED light bulbs might be a little more expensive but they outlast incandescent bulbs lasting 50,000 to 100,000 hours. For comparison, an incandescent bulb typically lasts about 1,200 hours, if that. LED bulbs are wildly more efficient at producing light from electricity, taking much less energy to produce the same amount of light. They don’t use heat to produce light which saves a ton of energy but instead use electroluminescence.

Fig. 2 - Summary of Benefits

Electroluminescence is basically the production of light by a controlled flow of electrons, in this case, through the diode. Without getting too technical, the diode is a semi-conductive material designed to facilitate the production of photons and produce light from excited, moving electrons. This whole process means that a standard LED bulb can create the same amount of light without the loss of energy through heat emission and with a much smaller level of overall energy expenditure. This is good news for the United States’ plan to decrease total carbon emissions. In fact, the Biden administration estimates that changing over to LED lights would save consumers around $3 billion dollars collectively in just one year. It then comes as no surprise that incandescent light bulbs are officially being phased out of use. In theory, this will cut our carbon emissions by 222 million metric tons over the course of the next 30 years. That’s enough energy to power 43 million homes or 90 million cars for an entire year. 

One crazy thing about this change is that we had all the necessary information to make it half a decade ago, but we abandoned the plan before it could save us millions in dollars AND harmful emissions. Isn’t it great that we are now back on track for this simple move toward energy efficiency?

Resources:

https://www.lampsplus.com/ideas-and-advice/how-an-led-light-bulb-works/

Geothermal Energy: Heat It Up!

So by now you’ve probably gathered that as a global community, we are all trying to make the move towards cleaner, more sustainable sources of energy. Hydro energy and solar energy are pretty self-explanatory. We’ve already talked about kinetic energy, a very cool innovation using the movement of a multitude to power common amenities.  One type of energy that's been around in some form for ages but seems to get a bit less screen time is geothermal energy. Geothermal energy is a renewable energy source that uses the heat continuously produced within the earth’s core to generate energy.

One of the earliest examples of geothermal energy use that you might be familiar with is the heating of greek and roman baths. France was one of the first countries to use an installed heating system and the largest geothermal district heating system is in Reykjavik, Iceland. Idaho is thought to be the first place where geothermal heating was used for residents of the US and today over 80 countries around the world use this type of clean energy for household, commercial or industrial use. 

Geothermal heating is incredibly efficient, about 400%, meaning for every unit of energy used to power the system, about 4 units of power are supplied. For this reason, a geothermal heat pump is roughly about 300% more efficient than the best gas pump on the market. Additionally, though drilling into the earth does still release a certain amount of greenhouse gasses, the difference between it and burning fossil fuels is  significant. If 100,000 residential units replaced conventional residential units, over the 20 year lifetime of a typical residential heating unit, it would be equal to 58,700 cars being removed from the road or 120,000 trees planted.* 1.1 metric tons of carbon equivalents would never be released. 

This is also a consistent source of energy. Although you can exhaust a thermal field, they can normally be used for 20 to 30 years and like a water well, redrilling is sometimes a possibility. Also, leaving a geothermal field for a period of time may allow for regeneration.  Well maintained thermal fields have lasted for decades longer than this average and some currently in use have been operational since the early 1900s. 

If you decide to use a thermal pump to heat your home, you should be prepared for a higher initial cost. The system commonly costs between $18k and $30k though it’s estimated that this system pays for itself in 2 to 10 years depending largely on where you are in the US and the efficiency of the heat exchange for your locations. The system also requires some amount of land as the design requires digging into the earth’s surface to access the consistent underground temperatures.

While initially expensive, this unit will ultimately pay for itself and because it is better for the environment, you may also be eligible for some level of government tax benefit. It is definitely an investment but hopefully as technologies continually improve, the availability of this option will become more and more accessible to the general public. 

  Resources:

*Geothermal Heat Pumps: Environmental Benefits and Efficiency 

Geothermal Energy: Advantages & Disadvantages (2022) | GreenMatch 

A Note on Climate Justice

If you haven’t heard of climate justice, you may be wondering what justice has to do with climate change? We are all hurt by climate change and the slow death of our planet caused by our own mismanagement so what exactly is climate justice? The use of the word justice suggests that there is someone responsible for the wrong being done. There are actors that are doing wrong to another and there is a need for a balancing of the scales. This idea makes some uncomfortable because there is a suggestion of culpability and an opportunity for accountability. Let’s take a look. 

When we look at the impact of climate change and what areas of the world are suffering the most from the extreme conditions of global warming, we often see that some of the areas most impacted are contributing the least to emission. On a smaller, but no less important, scale, within the same countries there is a large disparity between the impact of climate disasters on those who are middle and upper class, and those with lower incomes or no incomes at all. For example, when hurricanes or tornadoes hit, those who can afford insured homes will bounce back faster than those who lack coverage or are moving from shelter to shelter. For this reason, climate justice speaks to a situation that goes beyond saving our world from burning up in the next decade or so. It speaks to the disparities in disaster resources, medical care, and more. It includes the question of, how do we protect those who are already the most vulnerable in our communities from environmental issues we’ve all contributed to. 

Some try to view climate change as an issue in isolation as they believe considering the larger picture may cloud the urgency of the current climate crisis. However, this does tend to suggest that the equally urgent situation of those who are currently without clean water, medical care, shelter and adequate food, does not deserve the same urgency. It ignores the fact that millions are currently dying right now often because those who are responsible for the highest levels of global warming emissions are also responsible for stripping their homelands of all their valuable resources, leaving the surrounding communities with nothing. 

Many would say that the interwoven nature of these issues requires an equally integrated solution as attempting to solve global warming in isolation will ultimately be less of a true solution, and more of a stop-gap measure. It’s been suggested that when a culture is built on squeezing the most out of the many while the few prosper while simultaneously never investing back into the foundation that made them great, you have an unsustainable cycle that will ultimately break down. Climate change then discusses exactly how we should tackle the problem of climate change from its core to the current crisis, including protecting the most vulnerable communities around the world. What do you think is the most necessary change to balance the scales between high emission countries or the wealthy and the most vulnerable countries and communities? Comment below!

Resources:

This is just how unfair climate change is

https://www.carbonbrief.org/experts-why-does-climate-justice-matter

Set to have 15 disaster a day by 2030 article

Remember the Bees?

Fig. 1: This is a bee. Hopefully future generations will get to see one in person.

We’ve talked before a bit about bees when we discussed neonicotinoids and adulterated honey but let’s take a moment to talk specifically about what we are doing to bees. Over the last few decades, the global bee population has dropped by about 30%. In the last five years we’ve heard of beekeepers losing more than half their hives to mites and pesticides year over year. We now spend hundreds of millions of dollars transporting bees around the country throughout the year to pollinate our crops. During this rotation, some keeps are losing as much asd 75% of their colonies. Millions and millions of bees at a time when the bee population is at its lowest. There are already places where we have begun manually pollinating in place of the bees but that is not feasible for the world’s crops. 

We are dumping millions into robotic bees and tiny drones, pollination guns and mechanical pollinators but what if we just tackled the core issue of this problem. Namely, the toxins we are spraying on our food!! We’ve talked about Monsanto before but they are not the only company that insists on spraying their crops with chemicals and pesticides that destroy local bee populations. They are simply one of the largest. Bees travel within a 1-2 miles radius of their home. Sometimes they can travel as far as five miles but they mostly make their home near a consistent food supply. When a beekeeper is located near to a big ag grower and they spray their plants with pesticides, the bees will still try to pollinate those plants. They will not die immediately but will bring the pesticide back to their colony. Scientists have tested the impact of neonicotinoids and found that it negatively impacts the bees that survive by affecting their mating, fertility, ability to navigate home and more even when diluted 8 million times. 

Pesticides, limited, clean food sources and mites are the main reasons we are looking towards a future that might be without bees. This is such a simple solution when you consider the consequences of doing nothing. The below video gives a picture of the international situation. Please take a look! We need to act now as the U.S. is the main producer for a number of the world’s agricultural crops. Is a world without bees really the future you want?

How you can help save the bees.

The MORE Act: What you need to know!

Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act

The MORE Act was passed in the US House of Representatives this month, winning by less than 20 votes. Here are the highlights of what this bill is supposed to do:

The bill starts out by saying that the criminalization of cannabis has disproportionately impacted minority groups, particularly people of color, by incarcerating them more often (650% more often, in fact) and for 13.1 percent longer sentences, while at the same time, noting that less than one fifth of cannabis business owners are minorities with less than 4% identifying as black. Also, entering into the legal selling of cannabis is stacked against small business owners with licensing fees and applications to become a legal seller costing as much as $700,000. This makes it staggeringly difficult for smaller businesses to really engage in this market. In short, minorities and the less wealthy have less access to the benefits of this legal market and also take the brunt of the harm done. 

Additions to the bill since 2020 note that enforcing cannabis prohibition laws costs taxpayers approximately $3.6 billion a year and that one out of every four deportation cases was based on the simple possession (for personal use) of cannabis.

The next big finding at the beginning of this law was basically that most of the states have altered their state laws regarding cannabis in some way despite the federal criminalization. It is already a billion dollar industry and as more and more states join the group allowing freer use, the projected sales are almost double the billions previously seen. 

The bill goes on to talk about the decriminalization of cannabis, the striking of cannabis for the list of schedule 1 drugs (the most dangerous categorization of drugs currently which includes drugs like heroin, etc. ), and the process by which those incarcerated by federal law can seek expunged convictions and hearings. There is also a dilated change in terminology changing “marijuana” and “marihuana” to “cannabis.”

As expected, there is a long section about new taxes on the importation of cannabis and the production and sale of cannabis. Probably a third of this bill is about the new taxes which I’m sure surprises no one. There is an excise tax and an occupational tax. Both carry monetary penalties if not paid and even the possibility of jail time with a 2 year cap. Based on everything stated within their own findings, this does seem a little counterintuitive but when compared with the 15+ year sentences an individual could get now, it may be a step in the right direction. 

The rest of the bill, with the exception of the very end, deals with the fees, taxes, tax exemptions and penalties for not complying with the tax and other regulations. The very end describes several studies to be conducted to report the impact of the legalization of recreational cannabis. This bill is called the Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act but only time will tell if it is truly a well-crafted bill that will tackle the challenges caused by the inclusion of cannabis in the war on drugs or if it will simply become a mechanism for the polarization of minorities to happen in a different way while the government reaps an additional profit. Even with its possible flaws, this bill will only make it into law if the Senate doesn’t squash it as expected. What would you like to see happen? Let us know below!

Resources:

The More Act (full text)

The More Act (Official Summary)

Plastic on Plastic for Lunch

We’ve all seen the pictures of plastic waste floating in our oceans. We know that this has a tremendously detrimental impact on aquatic life. It even damages the structure and landscape of the ocean itself. From human waste bioproducts to industrial runoff to general garbage, we pollute one of this earth’s greatest resources with little to no restraint. The ocean is so large, our garbage can’t really make that much of a difference, right? Wrong. What happens when you throw garbage and excrement in the same place that you get your food, year after year? You get sick. Though the heavy metal and PFAS contamination are both consequences of this process, today we are taking a look at micro- and nanoplastics. 

Microplastics range in size from about 0.1 μm to 5 mm particles. Particles with a diameter less than 0.1 μm are considered nanoplastics. When trash accumulates in the ocean, it is broken down by abrasion and friction, wildlife and the combination of wind, sea and sand.  Of the 380+ million tons of plastic waste produced every year, less than 10% of it is recycled and at least 10% of it will end up in the ocean. Though some of it will end up washing back up onto land, some of this trash will break down and will contaminate the ecosystem it was introduced into. Fish, mussels, and other aquatic creatures will absorb or eat some of these plastics and this will introduce a wide and varying range of chemical and physical contaminants. Some of these particulates become so small that, to the human eye, it may seem as if they’ve dissolved into the salty brine of the sea. 

Now, we get about 60 billion kgs (which is something like 66 million tons) of food from the sea every year. We also use about 270 million metric tons of salt each year and while not all salt comes from the sea, a solid percentage of it does and this all poses an obvious issue. About 90 percent of sea salt has been found to contain some level of nanoplastics and we eat both! It’s very likely we use our microplastic salt on our microplastic-filled seafood! Though the hope is that we will all care about the environment enough to want to cut back on plastic pollution for the sake of reduction itself, the idea that the trash you discard without care may very well make its way back into your diet should give you pause. Recently, nearly 200 countries signed a global plastics treaty to reduce global plastic waste. This is the first global treaty of its kind and it is our hope that this will be a real step in the direction of creating a cleaner, sustainable future. One where at minimum we are no longer eating plastic. 

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/03/210310132335.htm

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/acs.est.9b04535/suppl_file/es9b04535_si_001.pdf 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-46417-z.pdf 

https://particleandfibretoxicology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12989-020-00358-y

Ractopamine: An Issue Near and Far

If you are keeping an eye on global food news, you might have heard about the impacts of Ractopamine on the import and export trade from the US to Taiwan. Right now, the US is allowed to supply Taiwan with pork but the Taiwanese people are not happy about it. Why, when the US is one of their biggest allies? Ractopamine. Ractopamine is a food additive that is given to pigs shortly before they are slaughtered to increase their growth and lean meat production. The pigs mature in a shorter amount of time and thus require fewer resources meaning, in short, that this additive saves pork suppliers money. However, this benefit comes at a steep cost. Ractopamine has caused more illness in livestock than any other additive used in the US. It has a significant impact on pigs, causing cardiovascular issues as well as musculoskeletal, reproductive and hormonal issues. Additionally, it has been documented to drive up the stress level in animals and cause “downer” syndrome.  The drug works by maintaining that high level of stress and inducing rapid muscle production. As one might imagine, this impacts the quality of the meat and even changes the flavor. It is no surprise that these complications often lead to death. 

When consumed through meat, ractopamine can cause cardiovascular issues in people, driving up chronic cardiac illnesses, high blood pressure, and heart attack frequency. Additionally, research also suggests that while evidence is limited to suggest that ractopamine causes cancer, there is evidence to suggest that those who have already developed the initial stages of cancer or a small mass might see a measurable increase in cancerous growths due to the consumption of ractopamine. Put simply, though it may not cause cancer directly, it does make cancer a whole lot worse very quickly. 

The US has said that there isn’t enough evidence that ractopamine is harmful to human beings to motivate them to ban it here altogether but 160 countries around the world, including Russia, the EU, and China, disagree. Only 25 countries including the US are still allowing ractopamine to be used so freely. It is true that pork is a huge part of the meat industry and that we even treat beef and some poultry with ractopamine as well but considering that the alternative is a safer, better quality product, why might the US continue to use an openly harmful product. It’s killing the pigs and making people sick so there must be another motivation. There might be another explanation but the only one obvious to those taking note of the US’s priorities is money. Ractopamine saves time and time is money. Perhaps, we should let our policy makers know that in this case, we would like to put the health of the American people first. 

As for what to do with this knowledge as a consumer, consider switching to either an organic pork product for your cooking at home or supporting a supplier that has decided to removed ractopamine entirely from its supply line. The US is already feeling the pressure of other countries disallowing the use of ractopamine treated pork. Let’s increase that pressure and let the industry know that we don’t want this harmful chemical here at home either. As always, shop locally when you can and vote with your dollar either way! 

Check out our feature In the News Article about Ractopamine Here. 

Resources:

Consumption of meat containing ractopamine might enhance tum... : European Journal of Cancer Prevention

The Effects of Ractopamine on Behavior and Physiology of Finishing Pigs Introduction Materials and Methods

Ractopamine Factsheet

The Death of Coffee: A Global Warming Caution Sign

“Coffee is popular,” might just take the grand prize for the most understated truth of the era. Coffee isn’t just popular, it’s a global industry worth over 100 billion dollars and spanning every single continent. So popular that the myth of it being the second most traded commodity after oil was believable if not quite accurate. Coffee is definitely in the top 100 globally though and many countries owe more than 5 or even 10 percent of their economic foundation to the coffee trade. 

Roughly 2.25 billion cups of coffee are consumed around the world each day and in many ways, we’ve created a coffee dependent work cycle worldwide. Can you imagine the impact that a shortage of coffee might cause? From the agricultural pipeline to the consumer pool made up of about 15% of the world’s population, we’d be in for a miserable awakening.  It’s virtually unthinkable. Even so, a shortage might be exactly what we are heading straight for.

Coffee comes in a number of varieties and is grown all over the world with the bulk of it coming from places like Brazil and Ethiopia. These places have the combination of climate, soil type and precipitation needed to support thriving coffee variations like the very popular Arabica plant. However, in recent years, the necessary balance has been interrupted as global warning tips the scales resulting in lasting problems like coffee rust. Coffee rust is a fungus that shows up as yellow-red spots on the plant that eventually turn black and kill off the leaves and eventually the whole plant. It is horribly efficient and can wipe out entire farms of coffee plants within a few years. 

Arabica is particularly vulnerable to the fungus but plants moved to higher elevations or that are using agroforestry practices to increase the shade used to grow the plants, have seen some resistance. It is thought that global warming will continue to increase the risk to these areas of higher elevation as time goes on but these are a few ways that farmers are pushing back against the global warming threat. 

Another approach is the development of new or wild variations of coffee that are more resistant to the fungus. Right now several have been developed but are still considered lesser in quality to the more popular Arabica. They are also still susceptible to another big global warming issue: the threat of pests. The coffee berry borer is just one of the many pests that target coffee plants and though the plants can be treated, as we’ve seen in previous articles, pesticides have their own set of risks and challenges. The borer in particular seems to thrive in the rising temperatures around the world and is one more unforeseen consequence of the earth rising temperatures.

No matter what you personally believe about global warming, the challenges coffee growers are facing due to the increasing temperature averages in their regions aren’t going away. If you love your morning cup of liquid energy, perhaps it’s time to take a few personal steps to preserve it before it’s too late.