(10-20) 02:31 PDT San Francisco (AP) --

California has saved about $56 billion in electricity costs and created 1.5 million jobs over 35 years by using energy more efficiently than other states, according to a new study.

The report released Monday by an economist at the University of California at Berkeley found that state policies that boost energy efficiency aren't just good for the environment, they're also good for the economy.

"Energy efficiency is very good for real incomes, purchasing power and job creation," said the study's author, UC Berkeley economics professor David Roland-Holst. "Energy efficiency has really helped us stimulate the economy."

Roland-Holst analyzed the economic impacts of government policies enacted since the early 1970s that have made California the country's most energy-efficient state. California was among the first states to create energy-efficiency standards for new homes, buildings and household appliances such as refrigerators and washing machines.

The average Californian now uses about 40 percent less electricity than the average American. That means the $56 billion that Californians would have spent on electricity between 1972 and 2006 could be spent on goods and services that create more jobs than energy, most of which is imported from other states and countries, according to the study.

The report, entitled "Energy Efficiency, Innovation, and Job Creation in California," also analyzed the economic impacts of a recently proposed plan to reduce California's greenhouse gas emissions over the next 12 years to achieve aggressive targets set by the California Global Warming Solutions Act.

The UC Berkeley study estimated the state's plan to reduce the greenhouse gases, which include measures to cap emissions and increase energy efficiency standards, could create 400,000 new jobs and increase household incomes by up to $48 billion annually by 2020.

"If the country can follow California's example, it will have a dramatic effect on our future emissions and energy independence," Roland-Holst said.

Enviro Group Lawsuits, Cost Concerns, Climate Regulation Uncertainty Cited As Major Obstacles To Grid Improvements

Denver, CO - A new study released this week highlights what experts have been saying for years: the U.S. faces significant risk of power brownouts and blackouts as early as next summer that may cost tens of billions of dollars and threaten lives.

The study, "Lights Out In 2009?" warns that the U.S. "faces potentially crippling electricity brownouts and blackouts beginning in the summer of 2009, which may cost tens of billions of dollars and threaten lives."

"If particularly vulnerable regions, like the Western U.S., experience unusually hot temperatures for prolonged periods of time in 2009, the potential for local brownouts or blackouts is high, with significant risk that local disruptions could cascade into regional outages that could cost the economy tens of billions of dollars," the report warned.

U.S. baseload generation capacity reserve margins "have declined precipitously to 17 percent in 2007, from 30-40 percent in the early 1990s," according to the study. A 12-15 percent capacity reserve margin is the minimum required to ensure reliability and stability of the nation's electricity system. Compounding this capacity deficiency, the projected U.S. demand in the next ten years is forecast to grow by 18 percent, far exceeding the projected eight percent growth in baseload generation capacity between now and 2016.

The study, which can be downloaded here, estimated that the U.S. will require about 120 gigawatts (GW) of new generation just to maintain a 15 percent reserve margin. That will require at least $300 billion in generation and transmission facility investments by 2016.

"The facts presented in this study should stimulate a call for action by policymakers everywhere. Our nation's electricity system is clearly in trouble and we need to take rapid steps as soon as possible to remedy the situation," said Bob Hanfling, Chairman of the non-profit NextGen Energy Council, which conducted the study. "This isn't the first study to come to these conclusions, and it won't be the last. We hope it illuminates current policy debates, from those on climate change to resource development to infrastructure build-out to national security. We also hope it will sound the alarm for every elected official, policymaker, business leader and citizen concerned about the future prosperity and security of our nation."

The study also identified the primary barriers to getting new power plants and transmission lines built. Chief among these is the "opposition of well-funded environmental groups that oppose and file lawsuits against virtually every new infrastructure project proposed."

Other obstacles include opposition to natural gas production, which is needed to fuel the growing reliance on natural-gas fired power plants; challenges associated with putting more intermittent renewable power sources on the grid; regulatory uncertainty associated with climate change policy development; reluctance by state regulators to approve rate increases related to the imposition of new environmental or climate-related regulation; and the relatively shorter-term approach to resource planning and acquisition that industry has been forced to adopt because of all of the above factors.

Among its other findings were these:

• The U.S. will require more than 14,500 miles of new electricity transmission lines by 2016. Regions represented by the Florida Reliability Coordination Council (FRCC) and the Northeast Power Coordinating Council (NPCC) may require less than 400 miles of new transmission lines, while the Southeast Reliability Council (SERC) may require nearly 2,300 miles. The Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) may require nearly 7,000 miles.
• Substantial increases in wind turbine orders, and new wind capacity, has been slowed by a worldwide turbine shortage and local opposition to wind projects. Since wind generation is expected to grow substantially throughout the U.S., the integration of intermittent resources into the bulk power system is becoming increasingly complex and difficult.
• While renewable energy proponents, and some elected officials, are saying that the U.S. needs to only add renewable power facilities such as wind farms, the annual capacity factor of wind generators is typically about 25 - 35 percent. However, the probability that wind generators are available at their rated value during annual peak periods is only between 5 - 20 percent and varies greatly from year to year and region to region. Wind cannot be considered a reliable baseload capacity resource.
• Rapidly increasing demand for steel and copper has caused spot scarcity of the resources required to manufacture key electrical components, and this commodity demand has increased the theft of critical system components. Manufacturers have attempted to eliminate excess inventories and capacity to increase productivity of their assets, but they are reluctant to add more capacity until they can be certain about future industry investments.

The study also presented a survey of political developments and trends that amount to "structural political barriers being erected to system reliability." It pointed to the fact that "environmental activist groups" are now:

• T Suing to block the construction of virtually every single baseload coal-fired power plant, in spite of advanced environmental technologies these plants would deploy.
• Gearing up to block construction of any baseload nuclear power plants across the West.
• Suing or protesting virtually every proposed lease on public lands in the Rocky Mountains for natural gas drilling.
• Working to slow or stop the completion of the two main multi-year, stakeholder-based transmission corridor processes that both Democrats and Republicans in Congress approved as part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005.
• Pushing for additional endangered species designations, which will make siting and construction of both power plants and transmission lines difficult.
• Pressuring government leaders to limit access by larger, baseload technologies to the region's high-voltage transmission grid and, instead proposing to artificially favor non-baseload, intermittent power facilities that will (at some point) further stress the reliability of the entire Western grid.

SOURCE: NextGen Energy Council

As fossil fuel prices rise, as oil insecurity deepens, and as concerns about climate change cast a shadow over the future of coal, a new energy economy is emerging in the United States. The old energy economy, fueled by oil, coal, and natural gas, is being replaced by one powered by wind, solar, and geothermal energy. The transition is moving at a pace and on a scale that we could not have imagined even a year ago.
         
Consider Texas. Long the leading oil-producing state, it is now also the leading generator of electricity from wind, having overtaken California two years ago. Texas now has nearly 6,000 megawatts of wind-generating capacity online and a staggering 39,000 megawatts in the construction and planning stages. When all this is completed, Texas will have 45,000 megawatts of wind-generating capacity (think 45 coal-fired power plants). This will more than satisfy the residential needs of the state’s 24 million people, enabling Texas to feed electricity to nearby states such as Louisiana and Mississippi.
         
After Texas and California, the other leaders among the 30 states with commercial-scale wind farms are Iowa, Minnesota, Washington, and Colorado. And other states are emerging as wind superpowers. Clipper Windpower and BP are teaming up to build the 5,050-megawatt Titan wind farm, the world’s largest, in eastern South Dakota. Already under development, Titan will generate five times as much electricity as the state’s 780,000 residents currently use. This project includes building a transmission line along an abandoned rail line across Iowa, feeding electricity into Illinois and the country’s industrial heartland.

Colorado billionaire Philip Anschutz is developing a 2,000-megawatt wind farm in south central Wyoming. He already has secured the rights to build a 900-mile high-voltage transmission line to California. With this investment, the door will be opened to developing scores of huge wind farms in Wyoming, a wind-rich state with few people. Another transmission line under development will run north-south, linking eastern Wyoming’s wind resources with the fast-growing Colorado cities of Fort Collins, Denver, and Colorado Springs. Wind-rich Kansas and Oklahoma are looking to build a transmission line to the U.S. Southeast to export their wealth of cheap wind energy.
         
California is developing a 4,500-megawatt wind farm complex in the Tehachapi Mountains northwest of Los Angeles. In the east, Maine—a wind energy newcomer—is planning to develop 3,000 megawatts of wind-generating capacity, far more than the state’s 1.3 million residents need. Further south, Delaware is planning an offshore wind farm of up to 600 megawatts, which could satisfy half of the state’s residential electricity needs. New York State, which has 700 megawatts of wind-generating capacity, plans to add another 8,000 megawatts, with most of the power being generated by winds coming off Lake Erie and Lake Ontario. And soon Oregon will nearly double its wind generating capacity with a 900-megawatt wind farm in the wind-rich Columbia River Gorge.

Wind appears destined to become the centerpiece of the new U.S. energy economy, eventually supplying several hundred thousand megawatts of electricity.

Solar power is also expanding at a breakneck pace. The nation’s wealth of solar energy is being harnessed by using both photovoltaic cells and solar thermal power plants to convert sunlight into electricity. For solar cell installations, California, with its Million Solar Roofs plan, is far and away the leader. New Jersey is also moving fast, followed by Nevada.

The largest U.S. solar cell installation today is a 14-megawatt array at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, but photovoltaic electricity at the commercial level is about to go big time. PG&E has entered into two solar cell power contracts with a combined capacity of 800 megawatts. Together, these plants will cover 12 square miles of desert with solar cells and will have a peak output comparable to that of a large coal-fired power plant. Solar power plants are appealing in hot climates because their highest output coincides with the peak demand for air conditioning.

Solar thermal plants that use mirrors to concentrate sunlight on a vessel containing a fluid—heating it to 750 degrees Fahrenheit to generate steam and produce power—have suddenly become an enormously attractive technology. The United States has the world’s only large solar thermal complex, a 350-megawatt project completed in 1991. But as of September 2008 there are 10 large solar thermal power plants under construction or in development in the United States, ranging in size from 180 megawatts to 550 megawatts. Eight of the plants will be built in California, one in Arizona, and one in Florida. Within the next three years, the United States will likely go from 420 megawatts of solar thermal generating capacity to close to 3,500 megawatts—an eightfold jump.

Along with wind and solar, geothermal energy is also developing at an explosive rate. As of 2008 the United States has nearly 3,000 megawatts of geothermal generating capacity, 2,500 of which are in California. Suddenly this too is changing. Some 96 geothermal power plants now under development in twelve western states are expected to double U.S. geothermal generating capacity. With California, Nevada, Oregon, Idaho, and Utah leading the way, the stage is set for the massive future development of geothermal energy.

The new energy economy will be powered largely by electricity from renewable sources. Electricity will light, heat, and cool buildings. As we shift to plug-in hybrid cars, light rail transit systems in cities, and high-speed electric intercity rail systems like those in Japan and Europe, our transport system will also be powered largely by electricity.

It is historically rare for so many interests to converge at one time and in one place as those now supporting the development of renewable energy resources in the United States. To begin with, shifting to renewables increases energy security simply because no one can cut off the supply of wind, solar, or geothermal energy. It also avoids the price volatility that has plagued oil and natural gas in recent decades. Once a wind farm or a solar thermal power plant is built, the price is stable since there is no fuel cost. Turning to renewables will also dramatically cut carbon emissions, moving us toward climate stability and thus avoiding the most dangerous effects of climate change.

The shift also will staunch the outflow of dollars for oil, keeping that capital at home to invest in the new energy economy, developing national renewable energy resources and creating jobs here. At a time of economic turmoil and rising joblessness, these new industries can generate thousands of new jobs each week. Not only are the wind, solar, and geothermal industries hiring new workers, they are also generating jobs in construction and in basic supply industries such as steel, aluminum, and silicon manufacturing. To build and operate the new energy economy will require huge numbers of electricians, plumbers, and roofers. It will also employ countless numbers of high-tech professionals such as wind meteorologists, geothermal geologists, and solar engineers.

To ensure that this shift to renewables continues at a rapid rate, national leadership is needed in one key area—building a strong national grid. Although private investors are investing in long-distance high-voltage transmission lines, these need to be incorporated into a carefully planned national grid, the electrical equivalent of President Eisenhower’s interstate highway system, in order to unleash the full potential of renewable energy wealth.

And, finally, this energy transition is being driven by an intense excitement from the realization that people are now tapping energy sources that can last as long as the earth itself. Oil wells go dry and coal seams run out, but for the first time since the industrial revolution we are investing in energy sources that can last forever. This new energy economy can be our legacy to the next generation.

HARRISBURG, Pa. — Pennsylvania has begun a major effort to cut electricity use, requiring the state's 11 utilities to not only stop power usage from rising, but to cut it starting in 2011.

Legislation that Gov. Ed Rendell signed Wednesday requires the utilities to cut annual electricity usage by at least 1 percent by May 31, 2011, based on usage estimates made by state regulators, who can take into account a major anomaly, such as an unusually hot summer or a substantial surge in demand from a new user, such as a factory.

To ensure that utilities take the task seriously, the new law allows up to $20 million in penalties for failure to meet the benchmarks for electricity usage cuts.

"That certainly should get the companies to look at what's been going on around the country and adopt some of the more successful programs," said Sonny Popowsky, the state's utility consumer advocate and a supporter of the new law.

Utilities will have to find ways to get people and businesses to use less electricity on the hottest summer days, when electricity is the most expensive. That could include enrolling the owners of homes and office buildings in a program to temporarily switch off hot water heaters or air conditioners.

To cut electricity usage at all other times, utilities will have to get more fluorescent lamps into light sockets to replace less efficient incandescent bulbs.

They will have to figure out how to entice people to insulate their homes to save electric heat and replace old, energy-sucking refrigerators and other appliances with newer, more efficient models.

Electricity usage in the Pennsylvania and the United States grows at a rate of about 1 percent to 2 percent annually.

By May 31, 2013, utilities have to cut usage by at least 3 percent, as well as slash 4.5 percent from electricity usage during the 100 highest-use hours of the year.

Utilities said they are still in the early stages of developing proposals for how they will approach the mandate and did not want to speak about their specific plans.

They acknowledge that the law will force them to adopt new usage-reduction tactics beyond a raft of education programs they have, including Web sites that dissect each residential customer's electric usage and how to reduce it.

"It's a big number. It's going to take some changes in terms of what we do and what we've done in the past, but it's not an insurmountable number," said Scott Surgeoner, a spokesman for FirstEnergy Corp., the Ohio-based power company that owns Pennsylvania Electric Co., Pennsylvania Power Co. and Metropolitan Edison Co.

By July 1, each utility must file a plan with the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission to achieve the cuts. The commission must hold a public hearing on each plan and has about four months to approve or reject them.

The electricity conservation efforts will be expensive, and utilities can bill rate payers for that cost, up to 2 percent of their revenue from 2006. Utilities must be able to show that savings from the plans will pay their own cost — at least — within 15 years.

Regulations to reduce harmful air emissions from large ocean-going ships were unanimously adopted Friday by the International Maritime Organization, the United Nations specialized agency responsible for improving maritime safety and preventing pollution from ships.

Effective as of July 1, 2010, the new plan will require ships to use low sulfur fuel in designated Emission Control Areas - first reducing permissible sulfur levels to 1.0 percent in 2010 and then dropping the permissible sulfur level to 0.1 percent in 2015.

By 2020, ships will be required to use fuel with no more than 5,000 ppm sulfur, a 90 percent reduction from today's global cap.

This is an Emission Control Area sulfur level advocated by California, the U.S. government, the European Commission and others to address air quality issues in near-shore population centers.

A cargo vessel enters the Port of New York and New Jersey (Photo courtesy World Shipping Council)

Nitrogen oxides and particulate matter, or soot, also will be more strictly controlled.

New engine standards will cut NOx emissions by 20 percent and will apply to new engines and to existing engines, as certified low-emission kits become available, beginning in 2011.

Speaking following adoption of the MARPOL Annex VI amendments, IMO Secretary-General Efthimios Mitropoulos hailed the achievement as "a monumental decision in IMO's history, a decision that proves, once again, that the organization is focused, united and relevant as the international body capable of dealing with all items on its agenda, an organization that sets global standards in a global environment."

The revised measures are expected to have a significant beneficial impact on the atmospheric environment and on human health, particularly the health of people living in port cities and coastal communities.

The World Shipping Council, representing over 90 percent of the global shipping capacity, supports the issuance, ratification and implementation of the IMO's new international vessel air emissions standards established by the International Maritime Organization.

"From Los Angeles to Hamburg to Tokyo, the liner shipping industry has recognized the need for new, environmentally effective, international regulations for vessel air emissions, particularly SOx, NOx and particulate matter emissions," the World Shipping Council said in an April statement after the new regulations were outlined by the IMO.

The World Shipping Council and its liner shipping member companies endorsed the U.S. government’s proposal on this subject to the IMO in June 2007.

The U.S. government proposal also received the endorsement of the California Air Resources Board, a number of U.S. environmental interests, the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association, the American Association of Port Authorities, and various individual ports concerned about vessel air emissions.

The main changes to the MARPOL Annex VI Regulations for the Prevention of Air Pollution from Ships agreed by the IMO's Marine Environment Protection Committee will see a progressive reduction in sulfur oxide, SOx, emissions from ships, with the global sulfur cap reduced initially to 3.50 percent, from the current 4.50 percent, effective from January 1, 2012.

Then the sulfur cap will be progressively reduced to 0.50 percent, effective from January 1, 2020, subject to a feasibility review to be completed no later than 2018.

A cargo vessel passes under San Francisco's Golden Gate bridge. (Photo courtesy World Shipping Council)

The limits in sulfur Emission Control Areas will be reduced to 1.00 percent, beginning on July 1, 2010, from the current 1.50 percent, and will be further reduced to 0.10 percent, effective from January 1, 2015.

Progressive reductions in nitrogen oxide, NOx, emissions from marine engines were also agreed, with the most stringent controls on engines installed on ships constructed on or after January 1, 2016, operating in Emission Control Areas.

The new regulations will allow for an Emission Control Area to be designated for SOx and particulate matter, or NOx, or all three types of emissions from ships, subject to a proposal from an IMO member country.

The proposal would be considered for adoption by the IMO, if supported by a demonstrated need to prevent, reduce and control one or all three of those emissions from ships.

In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency will submit an application to the IMO for sulfur Emission Control Area status for U.S. coastal areas, the agency said in a statement Friday.

Ocean-going vessels dock at over 100 U.S. ports. The EPA says more than 40 of these ports are in metropolitan areas that do not meet federal air quality standards.

"Massive reductions in air pollution from these large ships will help 87 million Americans living in areas around ports that don't meet air quality standards breathe cleaner air," said Margo Oge, director of the EPA Office of Transportation and Air Quality. "Pollution emitted by ships along the U.S. coastlines and waterways can move inland where it worsens air quality."

The EPA now will advance a domestic rulemaking action under the Clean Air Act to implement the new IMO standards.

When fully implemented, the new standards will help reduce harmful emissions by 80 percent or more from large diesel ships, including those that are foreign-flagged operating in U.S. waters

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2008. All rights reserved.

The shift to a low-emission, low-carbon world is introducing high-value business opportunities

There’s something awfully sexy about the idea of jet fuel derived from Blenheim sewerage. Or a city powered by a generator submerged in the Kaipara Harbour. Or extracting plastic from the prunnings of a Rotorua pine forest.

Clean technology is very sexy. But is it a reality? Well, yes—all the above are real projects by real New Zealand companies, reflecting a worldwide explosion in clean tech investment.

“Just as thousands were drawn to California and the Klondike in the late 1800s, the green energy gold rush is attracting legions of modern day prospectors in all parts of the globe,” says Achim Steiner of the United Nations Environment Programme.

All parts of the globe that is, except New Zealand, where investment in clean tech is comparatively pathetic compared to the sums sucked into property, farming or traditional infrastructure. Indeed, it’s a measure of how insignificant that is that no one, neither government nor private enterprise, has bothered to count it.

Several initiatives signal a change.

Last year, Pure Power, a fast growing, Asia–Pacific clean energy company, made two strategic investments in New Zealand. It took a 19.9 percent stake for $3 million in Aquaflow Bionic Corporation, the Blenheim-based biofuel company. It also paid $6 million for 100 percent of BioJoule, the wood-waste project headed by Genesis R&D’s Jim Watson (see ‘Big Jim’ in this issue for a detailed profile). Pure Power’s plays are the first real investments in New Zealand by an overseas clean tech specialist. David Milroy, the founder of Pure Power, says there’s every reason to expect New Zealand to produce world class clean tech companies—and attract foreign investment. For one thing, the demand for alternative energy technology is growing faster than it can be supplied. “The demand for energy is rising like a ramp … every potential idea needs to be explored.” He also was impressed with the engineering and ingenuity downunder. Jim Watson and the BioJoule team now form a core part of his research arm.

Locally, no such specialist investment firms exist, but an encouraging move was by Cranleigh Merchant Bank, which launched the first dedicated clean tech fund, CE3, hoping to raise $250 million across New Zealand and Australia.

For example, nitrogen inhibitors have already been proven to lift productivity and reduce fertiliser needs. Only five percent of farmers currently use the technology because it’s expensive. An ETS would allow farmers to enjoy three new sources of income: increased productivity, banking carbon credits and avoiding carbon costs that are inevitable under a Kyoto regime. The report estimates the upside on such inhibitors could increase dairy farm incomes by $714 million a year and provide 1,728 new direct jobs with an annual wage value of $98.5 million. This will also cut dairy farmers’ emissions liability by $98 million a year.

A failure to implement the ETS could jeopardise the benefits. For example, “it could cost the primary industry up to 7,600 direct jobs: If the reputation and carbon-intensity competitiveness loss results in overseas consumer boycotts, a loss of five percent of primary industry sales would cost 7,600 direct jobs, and $433 million a year, and probably a similar number in indirect jobs. A one percent reputation and market share loss will cost 1,520 direct jobs and $250 million a year.”

In summary, the council warns: “A failure to pass the bill—which could delay an ETS until 2012—will continue stalling billions of dollars of investment decisions till ETS detail is settled. This will deny the country new jobs and export income. Having a price on carbon has also been factored into billions of dollars worth of investment in wind, geothermal power, and other new forms of ocean, wood-waste-based and biofuel power generation.”

The report is a landmark for one simple reason: until now, only the government has attempted to calculate the risks and return of a Kyoto-aligned economy. Now it seems the private sector is taking action. The council’s chief executive, Peter Neilsen, says the report is timely especially as the costs of implementing an ETS gets harder as time goes on. “It’s like slowing a car down from 100 kilometres per hour. Better if you can brake slowly, rather than leave it to the last second. We know we have to reduce our emissions. Better that we get started now,” he says.

These are just three bellwethers of the change. To get a sense of where the investment in clean tech is heading, here’s a snapshot from around the country. This list is by no means exhaustive. Nor is it supposed to be investment advice. But it gives you a flavour of what clean tech can offer savvy investors who want to not just save the world—but make a buck in the process.

Dr. Jacques Diouf worries that the global financial crisis will cause wealthy governments to reduce food and agriculture aid to developing countries and introduce protectionist measures to keep out their agricultural products.

"The global financial crisis should not make us forget the food crisis," Diouf said Tuesday. "Borrowing, bank lending, official development aid, foreign direct investment and workers' remittances - all may be compromised by a deepening financial crisis."

FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf (Photo by Guilio Napolitano courtesy FAO)

If aid is reduced, there could be another food crisis next year, despite the record 2008 cereal harvest which is now expected, Diouf warned at the opening of this week's meeting of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization's Committee on World Food Security.

The meeting marks World Food Day, held every year on October 16, the day the Food and Agriculture Organization was founded in 1945 as the first UN agency created to address global hunger.

"The great uncertainty now enveloping international markets and the threat of global recession may tempt countries towards protectionism and towards reassessing their commitments to international development aid," Diouf warned.

Diouf, who heads the FAO, said the organization's latest report on crop prospects and the global food situation shows grain harvests are projected to increase 4.9 percent to a record 2,232 million metric tonnes.

But still, 36 countries are still in need of external assistance as a result of crop failures, conflict or insecurity, or continuing local high prices

Diouf noted that the financial crisis, following the crisis over soaring food prices that threw an additional 75 million people into hunger and poverty in 2007, may deepen the plight of the poor in developing countries.

"Last year it was the pan," Diouf said. "Next year could be the fire."

Commodity prices are currently dropping on the expectation of good grain harvests but also because of a slowing world economy.

But this could mean a cutback in plantings followed by reduced harvests in major exporting countries, Diouf warns. Given continuing low grains stocks, record food prices could return next year - a catastrophe for millions who by then would be left with little money and no credit.

Children at the Mungano feeding centre in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo run by Caritas and supported by the World Food Programme. (Photo by Marcus Prior courtesy WFP)

"It would be unfortunate if this were to be the case and the recently mobilized political will towards enhanced international support for developing country agriculture were to evaporate," he said.

In June, governments and world leaders agreed at an FAO High-Level Conference on World Food Security that "the international community needs to take urgent and coordinated action to combat the negative impacts of soaring food prices on the world's most vulnerable countries and populations."

The Group of Eight Summit in Japan a month later confirmed the resolve of world leaders to address global food security as a top priority and demonstrated a growing political will to reverse the trend toward global hunger.

"It is vital that this momentum be maintained," Diouf said. "Unless political will and donor pledges are turned into real and immediate action, millions more may fall into deeper poverty and chronic hunger."

The number of malnourished people around the world is set to increase by 44 million to almost one billion by the end of 2008 due to the combined impact of the food and fuel price crises, according to a World Bank report presented last weekend at the annual meeting of the World Bank and its sister institution the International Monetary Fund.

Poor families around the world are being pushed to the brink of survival, causing irreparable damage to the health of millions of children, said the report, entitled, "Rising Food and Fuel Prices: addressing the risks to future generations."

World Food Programme food distribution for Horebo Camp, eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. (Photo by Marcus Prior courtesy WFP)

"While people in the developed world are focused on the financial crisis, many forget that a human crisis is rapidly unfolding in developing countries," said World Bank Group President Robert Zoellick, a former U.S. trade representative.

"The financial crisis will only make it more difficult for developing countries to protect their most vulnerable people from the impact of rising good and fuel costs," said Zoellick.

That is exactly what is happening in Zimbabwe. With more than five million Zimbabweans facing severe food shortages, the UN's World Food Programme is appealing for US$140 million to provide vital relief rations over the next six months.

If the appeal falls short, WFP warns it will run out of food in January at the peak of the crisis.

"Millions of Zimbabweans have already run out of food or are surviving on just one meal a day and the crisis is going to get much worse in the coming months," said Mustapha Darboe, WFP regional director for East, Central and Southern Africa.

"WFP can prevent this crisis from becoming a disaster but we need more donations and we need them now."

Zimbabweans from middle social income categories, such as teachers, who normally have not sought food assistance, are now gathering at food distribution points at several locations in the country to register for the WFP's vulnerable group feeding program.

The United States was the largest donor to WFP's operations in Zimbabwe in 2008, giving US$105 million, followed by the UK, which donated $18 million, and Australia with $14 million.

Released today, the World Food Programme's latest report on the highest profile food emergencies shows they are centered in Africa.

Somali women and children wait for their donated porridge to cook at the District Medical Office in Baidoa. (Photo by Peter Smerdon courtesy WFP)

In Ethiopia, rations of beans and oil have been reduced and 6.4 million people are projected to need food aid in November.

In Somalia, a ban on International Medical Corps operations in the Bakool region of south Somalia by the Islamist insurgency group Al Shabaab has curtailed the distribution of food in the region. Reports indicate that CARE International has also been banned. WFP is talking with authorities in an attempt to find a resolution.

In Sudan, the WFP will take over a food support program to 130,000 internally displaced people in Gereida, South Darfur, by the end of the year, at the request of the International Committee of the Red Cross, which has been operating the program.

On Monday, a relief team left for Yambio, Western Equatoria State to set up a refugee feeding program in support of displaced Congolese people. The UN High Commission for Refugees reports that some 5,000 Congolese have fled to Yambio, and estimates that 150 people are still crossing daily into southern Sudan.

Fleeing refugees reported violent attacks on their villages in the Democratic Republic of Congo, perpetrated by Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army.

In May, the World Bank Group created a new $1.2 billion rapid financing facility - the Global Food Response Program - to speed assistance to the neediest countries.

As of October 9, the program had approved and begun disbursing $193 million in 20 countries, including Somalia and southern Sudan.

One project totaling $7 million is pending approval, according to a statement by the bank, while an additional $651 million is being earmarked for programs in 11 countries.

The money is used to feed poor children and other vulnerable groups, provide for nutritional supplements to pregnant women, lactating mothers, infants and small children, to meet additional expenses of food imports or to buy seeds for the new season.

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2008. All rights reserved.

ROME — A United Nations food agency called on Tuesday for a review of biofuel subsidies and policies, noting that they had contributed significantly to rising food prices and the hunger in poor countries.

With policies and subsidies to encourage biofuel production in place in much of the developed world, farmers often find it more profitable to plants crops for fuel than for food, a shift that has helped lead to global food shortages.

Current policies should be “urgently reviewed in order to preserve the goal of world food security, protect poor farmers, promote broad-based rural development and ensure environmental sustainability,” said a report released here on Tuesday by Jacques Diouf, the executive director of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.

In releasing the report, the United Nations joined a number of environmental groups and prominent international specialists who have called for an end to — or at least an overhaul of — subsidies for biofuels, which are cleaner, plant-based fuels that can sometimes be substituted for oil and gas.

In a devastating assessment released this summer, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development concluded that government support of biofuel production in member countries was hugely expensive and that it “had a limited impact on reducing greenhouse gases and improving energy security.” It did have “a significant impact on world crop prices” by helping to raise them.

“National governments should cease to create new mandates for biofuels and investigate ways to phase them out,” the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development concluded in its report. The organization includes European countries, the United States, Canada, Japan and Australia.

Still, Willy de Greef, secretary general of EuropaBio, a biotechnology industry group, said the world possessed the land and agricultural ability to produce enough food and fuel through subsidy programs.

“Of course these policies have to be developed with high quality sustainability criteria,” he said. But he added that that should include consideration of the fact that biofuels could help reduce poverty. “The development of biofuels will in fact create new revenue options for farmers all over the world, including poor farmers,” he said.

In the past eight years, as oil prices and concerns about carbon emissions have increased, a number of countries, including the United States, and the European Union have put into place subsidies and incentives to energize the fledgling biofuel industry.

As a result, the production of biofuels made from crops that could also be used for food increased more than threefold from 2000 to 2007, the Food and Agriculture Organization said. Support to encourage biofuel production in Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries amounted to more than $10 billion in 2006, the organization said.

But a host of studies in the past year concluded that the rush to biofuels had some disastrous, if unintended, consequences for food security and the environment. Less food is available to eat in poor countries, global grain prices have skyrocketed and precious forests have been lost as farmers have created fields to join the biofuel boom, the studies said.

Worse still, specialists say, so much energy is required to convert many plants into fuel that the process does not result in a savings of carbon emissions. The O.E.C.D.’s report said only two food-based fuels were clearly environmentally better than fossil fuels when considering the entire “life cycle” of their production: used cooking oil and sugar cane from Brazil. Sugar cane is far easier to convert to biofuel than most other crops.

Already this year, the European Union has stepped back from its target of having 10 percent of Europe’s fuel for transportation come from biofuel or other renewable fuels by 2020.

Last month, the European Parliament suggested that only 5 percent come from renewable sources by 2015, and that 20 percent come from new alternatives “that do not compete with food production.”

Mr. Diouf of the Food and Agriculture Organization stopped short on Tuesday of suggesting that the world end biofuel subsidies. Rather, he said they should be revised to direct the benefits to developing nations.

Organized environmental crime is a serious and growing threat across the world, according to a new report by the undercover Environmental Investigation Agency. The London-based NGO today presented its report to a United Nations meeting on transborder organized crime in Vienna with an urgent call for action.

The report warns that environmental crime generates tens of billions of dollars in profits for criminal enterprises every year, and it is growing.

EIA campaigns director Julian Newman said, "Our report shows how organized criminals are looting the planet for a quick profit. It is time for the international community to step up and meet this threat head on."

An investigator examines a leopard skin in Nagchu, Tibet Autonomous Region, China, August 2005. (Photo by Debbie Banks courtesy EIA)

Environmental crimes are illegal acts which directly harm the environment, and include the illegal trade in wildlife, smuggling of ozone-depleting and global-warming substances, illicit trade in hazardous waste, illegal fishing, illegal logging and the associated trade in stolen timber.

EIA, which has exposed environmental crime using undercover methods for 24 years, says its recent experience indicates environmental criminals are becoming more organized, building up networks to operate across international frontiers and using sophisticated techniques to move illegal goods around the world and launder the proceeds.

The report, "Environmental crime - A Threat to Our Future" was presented to the fourth session of the UN Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, UNCTOC, at an event organized by EIA.

Antonio Mario Costa, executive director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, spoke at the launch of EIA's report.

"At a time when climate change and environmental sustainability are such high priorities, it is shocking to think that there are criminals profiting from the destruction of our planet. This is not a victimless crime. On the contrary. Since we share one planet, damage to the environment anywhere in the world hurts us all," said Costa.

Environmental crime is often perceived as victimless, yet in reality all of us are affected, EIA says. These crimes lead to deforestation and habitat destruction, depriving communities of their livelihoods; cause ecological problems such as flooding; foster corruption and bad governance; and contribute to climate change, and at the same time generate tens of billions of dollars in profits for criminal enterprises.

Addressing delegates to the UNCTOC conference today, Costa linked organized crime with many forms of environmental destruction.

"At a time of great concern about climate change," he said, "let's recognize that organized crime is an environmental threat, from mafia control of garbage disposal and the dumping of hazardous waste, to the destruction of primary forests, illegal logging and the trafficking of endangered species."

"Above all organized crime is also an economic issue," Costa said, "it exploits resources like blood diamonds, precious metals, or by bunkering oil. Piracy and banditry disrupt trade and prevent aid delivery."

Most of all, organized crime is a development issue, said Costa, citing reports on corruption in Africa, the Caribbean, Central America and the Balkans, that show "a correlation, even causality, between weak rule of law and weak economic performance."

Saying that the UN system needs to train more skilled people to fight corruption, Costa and Interpol chief Ron Noble today announced the joint establishment of the International Anti-Corruption Academy.

The new academy will open next autumn in Laxenburg just outside Vienna, specializing in anti-corruption education, research, and professional training.

Indonesian customs officers inspect a seizure of smuggled cylinders of ozone-destroying CFCs produced in China. Tanjung Priok port, Jakarta, Indonesia, 2004. (Photo by Julian Newman courtesy EIA)

The EIA hopes it will make a difference in combating organized environmental crime, which is often linked with corruption.

The EIA report states, "Individuals in corporate or official positions of authority and power view environmental crime as a chance to cash in."

Examples of this can be found in the case studies of the EIA report, "signing and forging import and export certificates; facilitating the transport of illicit goods and 'turning a blind eye' are all examples of the institutionalized corruption described."

"Far more serious, and yet just as common," says the EIA report, "is the complicit, longterm involvement of individuals from the police, army, government and intergovernmental organisations. Cocooned by familiar bureaucracies, weak legislation and poor enforcement, corrupt officials can thrive through environmental crime. Furthermore, corruption may be preventing the true cost and extent of environmental crime from being properly assessed or effectively addressed."

Although many international bodies such as the UN General Assembly, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the World Customs Organization have recognized environmental crime as serious and transnational, EIA believes it is not taken as seriously as other forms of organized crime because countries lack the political will to provide the resources to carry out enforcement.

The EIA is urging governments, police forces, customs and United Nations agencies to recognize environmental crime as a serious time-critical problem, and work together to mount a "substantial, committed and sustained global response."

Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2008. All rights reserved.

English honey is unlikely to feature on Christmas menus this year as supplies run out.

Honey dripping from a bee as the honeycomb is lifted out of the beehive

Combined with another wet summer - which prevented the bees gathering pollen - it has resulted in a honey shortage.

Stuart Bailey, chairman of the UK's biggest producer, Rowse Honey, said: "Supplies continue to dribble through and we might have enough for another six weeks or so but I expect it to be gone before Christmas."

Amateur beekeepers in England produce about 3,000 tonnes annually but the bulk - 80 per cent - is distributed to family and friends or sold at the garden gate or at farmers' markets.

Supermarkets and shops rely on a few dozen big commercial honey farms for their supplies of English honey but there is much less available this year.

Rowse, who have a third of the market in the UK, had hoped to supply supermarkets with 250 tonnes but Mr Bailey thinks it may be only half that amount.

"It has been a terrible, terrible year possibly the worst for 28 years. Bee numbers are down again and the weather has been so bad it has prevented them from foraging. We will be lucky if the total honey crop this year amounts to 2,000 tonnes," he said.

About 30,000 tonnes of honey is consumed annually in the UK and 90 per cent is imported - mainly from Argentina, Mexico, and Hungary.

But the decline in bee numbers is a worldwide problem, particularly in North America where the fruit growing areas of California and Florida have been especially hard hit by so-called colony collapse disorder. The result has produced shortages and pushed up costs by as much as 60 per cent.

Prices are still comparatively low because of competition between the big High Street supermarkets with honey marked down as a loss leader.

Despite a bumper harvest for English apples this year, thanks to a warm frost-free Spring and a wet summer, there are fears that fruit production will also be affected by the dearth of bees.

Bees pollinate an estimated 90 per cent of the apple crop, 30 per cent of the pear crop and much of the soft fruits such as strawberry and raspberry.

Adrian Barlow, chief executive of English Apples and Pears, said: "We are currently in the midst of English apple season. The threat to the honeybee is a huge concern as without bees to pollinate orchards, there would be a real risk of apple shortages in the future."

The apple-dependent cider industry is also worried. Martin Ridler, orchard controller for Gaymers Cider, said: "We need beehives in orchards because we rely on honeybees to pollinate apple blossom in Spring.

"You can hope for insects and the wind to help but honeybees guarantee pollination."

Next month the British Bee Keepers Association (BBKA) which represents amateurs and has about 12,000 members, will be lobbying Parliament and handing in a petition to Downing Street demanding that more money is spent on research into the diseases thought to be responsible for decimating bee populations.

And more than 100 MPs have signed an early day motion called for the Government to take the problem more seriously.

The BBKA claims that bees are worth £165m to the economy because of their vital role in crop pollination and wants £8m spent on research over the next five years.

Initially the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) earmarked only £200,000 for research into bee diseases but found an extra £90,000 after admitting that there had been "significant" colony losses across the country.

Rowse Honey has pledged £100,000 over three years towards research.

Defra is drawing up a new strategy for bees but it is unlikely to be published until next Spring. The parasitic varoa mite, viruses, pesticides, a shortage of nectar caused by changes in farming practices, and even stress have been suggested as the main reasons for the bee decline.

Not long ago, Hummers hulked down city streets, angling for social status and house-sized parking spaces. The grasslands once considered “the country” morphed into exurbs where families longing for a McMansion of their own could choose between blue and beige. Ever-expanding malls restocked their Made in China lines quicker than any middle American Paris Hilton wannabe could say “Charge it.”

A well-heeled class of liberal Cassandras perched atop recycled soapboxes warned us against such folly. But their appeals landed mostly on deaf ears, plugged up with Bluetooth headsets, corporate jingles, and MP3 downloads.

Fast-forward to the present day. SUVs sit alone on America’s sales lots, looking like wide-eyed dinosaurs witnessing their own extinction. The New York Times recently reported that the decades-long migration from cities to suburbia is ebbing toward reversal. Despite the Bush administration’s tax-break bribe, the consumption slump slouches toward thrift, sending shivers down Wall Street’s spine.

In less than a year, record oil prices have accomplished what only tireless environmental activists once dared to dream. Detroit is finally coming to its senses and gunning for fuel efficiency. Not only are consumers abandoning unsustainably gigantic exurban homes that rack up astronomical heating and commuting bills, Governing reports (May 2008) that cities and counties are buying up developers’ land to use for conservation and parks. Even blue-collar supermarkets like Safeway and Supervalu are, according to Sustainable Industries (May 2008), bolstering their organic offerings to capture penny-pinched high-enders eschewing pricey natural food stores.

No one likes a recession. The truth is, though, that most of us need to be jolted out of a fossil-fueled consumerist binge that’s gobbling up the planet. While the latest downturn hurts, America has much to gain from it, not the least of which is sanity—a break from the soul-numbing, environmentally devastating addiction to ever more stuff.

Citizens can leverage today’s experience into meaningful policy changes. Take, for instance, much-needed investment in public transportation infrastructure. According to the American Public Transportation Association, Americans registered nearly 85 million more public transit trips in the first quarter of 2008 than in the same period last year. Bike shops are doing record business as well, Foreign Policy online reports (June 2008). Each of these new converts can help push for better public transportation networks and bike-sensible urban planning. The poor may finally gain some allies, too. Perhaps, opines Salon (April 18, 2008), “skyrocketing costs of food and gas will make us stop for two seconds to consider how impossible it is to feed a family these days on our laughable minimum wage.”

The country has seen a national character correction before. During World War II, folks turned sacrifice at home into car sharing, growing 30 to 40 percent of the country’s vegetables in their yards, and recycling every scrap of metal, rubber, nylon, and wool they could lay their hands on, down to sheared skirt hems and pant cuffs. Today’s war has the majority sacrificing little more than its faith in the current president. Our self-propelled salvation won’t be for the love of country, it seems, but for the love of coin.

It’s not a noble cause, but it’ll do.