Green Energy

Impacts

As human activities - such as driving cars, clearing forests and slash-and-burn agriculture - have pumped more of these gases into the air, atmospheric concentrations have risen steadily. The concentration of carbon dioxide has reached 360 parts per million, about 30% higher than at any time since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in the mid 18^th century. Concentrations in methane have jumped more than 100%. The rapid rise in methane started more recently than the rise in carbon dioxide, but methane's contribution has been catching up fast.  Nitrous oxide levels have risen by 15%, mainly due to more intensive agriculture.

If current practices continue, carbon dioxide concentrations are expected to reach 425 ppm by 2015 and 500 ppm by the end of the 21st century - almost twice the pre-industrial age concentration of 280 ppm. Scientists worry that the global temperature will follow a similar trend.

Consider that during the last ice age when much of the world was covered by glaciers, the earth was only 3-5 degrees Celsius (5-9 degrees Fahrenheit) cooler than it is now. If, as the IPCC projects, temperatures rise by approximately 1 to 3.5 degrees Celsius within the next century, the world could be facing climatic changes of a similar magnitude. While it took several thousand years for the ice age to recede - the warming is projected to occur much more rapidly, in just two centuries. Such rapid change could potentially destabilize ecosystems and compound many of the environmental stresses the world already faces.

There are several external costs associated with conventional fossil fuel and nuclear energy sources that are not reflected in utility bills or at the gasoline/petrol pumps. The IPCC has said climate change could lead to potentially serious changes, including an increase in some regions of floods, droughts, and prolonged heatwaves. These types of extreme weather events could possibly lead to fires, pest outbreaks and radical changes to ecosystem composition, structure, and functioning. Changing weather patterns will threaten agricultural systems but could also lengthen the cultivation period for northern climates and speed the growth of some crops. Entire forests could be at risk of disappearing because they will not be able to migrate through developed areas as temperature zones move. Global average sea level has already risen between 10 to 25 centimeters over the last 100 years. The IPCC models project that with the melting of glaciers and ice caps and thermal expansion of the ocean as the water warms, sea level will rise by 15 to 95 cm by the year 2100. Coastal communities and small islands face the prospect of flooding, increasing shore erosion and stronger storm surge(s). This could also adversely affect ecosystems such as mangrove forests, and coral reefs, and also fisheries, aquaculture, tourism, human settlements and the insurance industry. Salt-water intrusion could also reduce the quality and quantity of freshwater supplies.

The displacement of flooded communities could increase the risk of various infectious diseases through the disruption of sanitation systems, storm-water drainage and sewage disposal systems. Many regions could be exposed to potentially life-threatening illnesses as warming temperatures allow the rodents and insects that carry infectious diseases to survive in new geographical areas previously too cold for them.

Air pollution from autos and power plants in megacities of developing countries have been fingered for causing chronic cough and lung related ailments in 50 million cases of children under the age of 14 worldwide. Poor medical facilities and treatment are simply compounding the situation.

The mining, transportation and distribution of fossil fuels also contribute to significant environmental degradation. 

Oil spills exact a heavy toll on marine ecosystems and livelihoods. On March 24, 1989 an oil tanker belonging to then Exxon Oil Company ran aground on the Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound, off the coast of Alaska where it spilled at least 25 to 33 million gallons of oil. The huge slick eventually spread over 10,000 square miles of Alaska's coastal seas and 1500 miles of shoreline. The spill was the most devastating in human history. It took an enormous toll on fish and wildlife and triggered delayed effects that rippled through Prince William Sound, causing an ecosystem wide collapse in 1992 & 1993 from which the Sound is still recovering. Species affected were unable to reproduce with gross stresses on their immune systems. Twelve years after the spill only two species - the bald eagle and the river otter - are considered to have fully recovered. Human communities in the predominantly fishing communities were also severely affected, as their main means of livelihood was threatened. 

Mining for coal has also taken a toll on mountain landscape where the entire tops of mountains are sheared off to allow easy access to the coal seams within. But the problem is what to do with all the excess rock and dirt. These have been dumped into adjacent valleys which might contain streams or headwaters of streams which are then buried forever under rocks and soil.

Coal must also be washed of impurities before being shipped to market. The traditional solution of what to do with the dirty wash water, has been to build slurry ponds to allow the water to stand while the coal waste particles settle to the bottom. Coal companies use a valley or hollow to build such ponds because they only have to construct one side. These dams can often exist for decades before they are filled. They act as a filter for the wastewater as it slowly passes through. In West Virginia alone, there are about 200 coal waste dams.

Collapsing dams, though infrequent are still a cause for concern. Buffalo Creek in South West Virginia saw the greatest destruction when its coal waste dam collapsed. It sent 132 million gallons of black sludge and water down the shallow Buffalo Creek valley. In a matter of minutes the 20-foot wall of sludge water literally bulldozed everything in its path for 15 miles through the narrow valley. When it was over, 125 people were dead, 1100 injured, and over 4000 left homeless. Nearly every home and vehicle was destroyed in the dozen or so small communities in the valley.

Mining engineers and coal company officials give assurance that modern dams are not built the way the Buffalo Creek dam was. In the early days many dams were simply built on top of older waste impoundments instead of solid ground, and drain pipes to prevent water from rising were often missing, allowing the dam to become saturated.

However, today's impoundments are typically much larger than the one at Buffalo Creek - some as much as 40 times larger. And although there have been no more disasters comparable to Buffalo Creek, the problems have not been completely eliminated. There have been five dam failures in West Virginia since 1977, and coal companies have been cited an average of 17 times per year for dam-related problems. Even if no lives are lost by these smaller accidents, the black sludge pollutes streams, kills fish, and damages property. Unfortunately, sludge is a necessary evil where coal is concerned. 

If all these costs were taken into account the true cost of developing, distributing and consuming conventional fossil fuels would strike us as extremely prohibitive and thoughtless.