[Biofuel] Closing of Maine mill sets back paper industry's biofuel effort - The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram
http://www.pressherald.com/2014/08/14/old-town-pulp-mill-shuts-down-lays-off-180/ Closing of Maine mill sets back paper industry’s biofuel effort The shutdown idles 180 employees at Old Town Fuel and Fiber, which other pulp and paper companies hoped would be their model for producing butanol. By J. Craig Anderson Staff Writer Wednesday’s closure of the Old Town Fuel and Fiber mill is a setback for the Maine pulp and paper industry’s efforts to break into biofuels production, industry representatives said. The mill, owned by New York-based private equity firm Patriarch Partners, has ceased operations indefinitely and furloughed about 180 employees. While pulp remained the mill’s core business, it was the only facility in Maine experimenting with the production of biofuel on a commercial scale. The company released a statement Wednesday evening announcing the closure: “Effective immediately, all Old Town mill operations will be indefinitely suspended. The impact of foreign competition and our competitive position due to high wood and energy costs have made it difficult to sustain operations at this time. All employees not needed for securing the facility will be furloughed. During this idled period, ownership will be pursuing options to secure the long-term viability of the facility.” John Williams, president of the Maine Pulp and Paper Association in Augusta, said the news came as a surprise. “Under the current ownership, I thought they were doing pretty well,” Williams said. Old Town’s pilot project to produce butanol from the cellulose in wood fiber offered other mills “a lot of hope for the future,” and the shutdown is likely to delay Maine’s foray into the growing biofuels industry, he said. The pulp and paper industry still employs 7,000 Mainers and is as productive as ever, Williams said, but there is an understanding that mills will have to diversify to remain viable. “It’s an industry that is struggling,” he said. In February, the Great Northern Paper Mill in East Millinocket shut down and laid off 212 workers. The mill’s owner said the closure was a temporary measure aimed at restructuring operations and lowering production costs, but it has yet to reopen. The mill in Old Town primarily produced wood pulp for the paper manufacturing industry. It employed 195 people, of which 180 are being furloughed, said Everett Deschenes, the mill’s director of market pulp and fiber. The Old Town mill had initiated a pilot program in 2008 to produce “biobutanol,” supported by a $30 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy. The project was a collaboration with the University of Maine, which has done extensive research on how to distill fuels from wood. Butanol is a motor fuel that can be used in place of gasoline without any engine modifications. Bill Mayo, Old Town’s city manager, released a statement Thursday morning thanking Lynn Tilton, founder and CEO of Patriarch Partners, which bought the former Georgia-Pacific mill in November 2008 for $19 million. The private-equity firm manages a portfolio worth more than $8 billion, which includes a paper mill in Gorham, New Hampshire. Mayo also thanked the mill’s employees. “The city has faced this situation before and we will keep moving forward,” Mayo said. “The city will work with the mill and state officials to try and find a new buyer and keep Old Town moving forward in a positive direction.” In the meantime, the state Department of Labor said in a news release that it has scheduled a program to help workers affected by the mill closure. “The department’s Rapid Response program assists workers facing job losses due to downsizing or closures,” Gov. Paul LePage said in the release. “The Rapid Response team is reaching out to help these workers.” The session is scheduled for 2 p.m. Tuesday at USW Local 80, Union Hall, at 354 Main St. in Old Town. Williams said every paper mill job creates another three to five jobs in related businesses. According to the Maine Forest Products Council, forest products such as pulp and paper contribute $8 billion a year to Maine’s economy – about $1 out of every $16 of the gross state product. Additionally, Maine’s pulp and paper exports generate about $650 million in revenue each year, the council said. ___ Sustainablelorgbiofuel mailing list Sustainablelorgbiofuel@lists.sustainablelists.org http://lists.eruditium.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel
[Biofuel] The Crushing Effects Of Radiation From The Fukushima Disaster On The Ecosystem Are Being Slowly Revealed | Business Insider
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/the-serious-biological-effects-of-fukushima-radiation-on-plants-insects-and-animals-is-slowly-being-revealed-2014-8 The Crushing Effects Of Radiation From The Fukushima Disaster On The Ecosystem Are Being Slowly Revealed Chris Pash Today at 5:50 AM A range of scientific studies at Fukushima have begun to reveal the impact on the natural world from the radiation leaks at the power station in Japan caused by an earthquake and tsunami in 2011. Biological samples were obtained only after extensive delays following the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant meltdown, limiting the information which could be gained about the impact of that disaster. Scientists, determined not to repeat the shortcomings of the Chernobyl studies, began gathering biological information only a few months after the meltdown of the Daiichi power plant in 2011. Results of these studies are now beginning to reveal serious biological effects of the Fukushima radiation on non-human organisms ranging from plants to butterflies to birds. A series of articles summarising these studies has now been published in the Journal of Heredity. These describe widespread impacts, ranging from population declines to genetic damage to responses by the repair mechanisms that help organisms cope with radiation exposure. “A growing body of empirical results from studies of birds, monkeys, butterflies, and other insects suggests that some species have been significantly impacted by the radioactive releases related to the Fukushima disaster,” says Dr Timothy Mousseau of the University of South Carolina, lead author of one of the studies. Common to all of the published studies is the hypothesis that chronic (low-dose) exposure to ionizing radiation results in genetic damage and increased mutation rates in reproductive and non-reproductive cells. One of the studies documented the effects of radiation on rice by exposing healthy seedlings to low-level gamma radiation at a contaminated site in Fukushima Prefecture. After three days, a number of effects were observed, including activation of genes involved in self-defense, ranging from DNA replication and repair to stress responses to cell death. “The experimental design employed in this work will provide a new way to test how the entire rice plant genome responds to ionizing radiation under field conditions,” says Dr Randeep Rakwal of the University of Tsukuba in Japan, one of the authors of the study. Another team of researchers examined the response of the pale grass blue butterfly, one of the most common butterfly species in Japan, to radiation exposure at the Fukushima site. They found size reduction, slowed growth, high mortality and morphological abnormality both at the Fukushima site and among laboratory-bred butterflies with parents collected from the contaminated site. “Non-contaminated larvae fed leaves from contaminated host plants collected near the reactor showed high rates of abnormality and mortality,” says Dr Joji Otaki of the University of the Ryukyus in Okinawa, Japan. Some of their results suggested the possible evolution of radiation resistance in Fukushima butterflies as well. A review of genetic and ecological studies for a range of other species at both Chernobyl and Fukushima (Mousseau 2014) revealed significant consequences of radiation. Population censuses of birds, butterflies, and cicadas at Fukushima showed major declines attributable to radiation exposure. Morphological effects, such as aberrant feathers on barn swallows, were also observed. The authors suggest that long-term studies at Chernobyl could predict likely effects in the future at the Fukushima site. The scientists say there is an urgent need for greater investment in basic scientific research of the wild animals and plants of Fukushima. ___ Sustainablelorgbiofuel mailing list Sustainablelorgbiofuel@lists.sustainablelists.org http://lists.eruditium.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel
[Biofuel] Solar Power Gets Hot, Hot, Hot
http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/25592-solar-power-gets-hot-hot-hot [images and links in on-line article] Solar Power Gets Hot, Hot, Hot Friday, 15 August 2014 10:50 By Emily Schwartz Greco and William A Collins, OtherWords | Op-Ed With so many homeowners and businesses making greener energy choices, private utilities - along with big oil, gas, coal, and nuclear companies - see the writing on the wall. Unlike some other denizens of the fossil-fueled set, this gang isn’t beating oil wells into solar panels, retiring nuclear reactors, or embracing wind and geothermal power. Instead, these guys are trying to coax lawmakers into rigging the rules against increasingly competitive new energy alternatives. You see, the bulwarks of conventional energy are good at math. And the math is increasingly not in their favor. Solar panels are growing so affordable, accessible, and popular that sun-powered energy accounted for 74 percent of the nation’s new electric generation capacity in the first three months of this year. Wind power comprised another 20 percent, geothermal 1 percent, and natural gas plus other sources accounted for the final 5 percent. Coal didn’t even register. OK, so that first-quarter surge was kind of an anomaly because it included the inauguration of the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System, the world’s largest solar-concentrating power plant. Through a vast array of seven-by-ten-foot mirrors located on federal land along the California-Nevada border, this remarkable site produces enough energy to power 140,000 homes. Another vast utility-scale project aptly called “Genesis Solar” ramped up too. But the U.S. solar industry did install a record amount of new capacity in 2013. And once enough folks produce their own power on their rooftops and utility-scale clean energy becomes commonplace, demand for the juice generated by the dangerous and dirty oil, coal, gas, and nuclear industries will fizzle. Can you imagine the economy weaning itself off of fossil fuels by the middle of this century? That’s what Denmark has officially pledged to do. Besides, we all need to visualize this possibility. Unless most of humanity transitions to a new way of life powered by climate solutions, global warming could ultimately render the Earth uninhabitable. Can you guess who is trying to manipulate legislation to squeeze a few more years out of the dirty-energy status quo instead of helping make a requisite green transition happen? The American Legislative Exchange Council - a secretive national network known as ALEC - is stalking state capitols for just this purpose. ALEC’s lobbyists push a broad conservative agenda in statehouses through templated bills they tweak for state lawmakers. What are these bills calling for? In states like Arizona, Utah, and Oklahoma, there are efforts to essentially tax homeowners who lease solar panels. But mostly ALEC is aiming for something bigger: gutting individual state “renewable portfolio standards.” Those wonky-sounding regulations require utilities to provide a certain percentage of power from renewable sources at some set point in the future. Alternative-energy leader California, for example, has committed to drawing a third of its juice from climate-friendly sources by 2020. And who’s paying for this dirty work? Edison Electric Institute (EEI), the trade association for the 70 percent of the U.S. utility industry controlled by private companies, is behind it — according to the Center for Media and Democracy. It’s joined in this legislative attack by coal giant Peabody Energy, ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Koch Industries and other big fossil-fueled interests. It may be hard to believe, but so far, foes of systematically encouraging renewable energy growth are losing. Badly. Even in Kansas. That state’s GOP-controlled legislature refused to repeal its renewable energy standard a few months ago in a 63-60 vote. All 13 state-targeted efforts to chip away at or kill renewable energy standards have failed so far this year. Not one state rolled back its standards in 2013 either. Who could have guessed that renewable energy would be so hard to foil? Well, anyone who pays attention to all the jobs it generates. The solar industry now employs at least 142,000 people in the United States. Solar workers outnumber coal miners in this country. In Texas, solar supports more jobs than ranching and California has more solar workers than actors. Wind jobs are growing fast too. They hit a total of 80,000 last year. Sorry, ALEC. Even the reddest states can’t ignore this rising tide of green jobs. ___ Sustainablelorgbiofuel mailing list Sustainablelorgbiofuel@lists.sustainablelists.org http://lists.eruditium.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel
