Nuclear waste

Just a twitter thread, but some interesting thoughts here. The author says that there just isn't much nuclear waste to deal with, making it not much a problem. Too bad mostly people don't think very rationally about nuclear energy: although the damages are much worse from coal, they are more incremental while the nuclear meltdowns that have happened a few times really capture people's imaginations.

Beef or fish?

I'm cheating, I'll admit, combining two posts that are only tangentially related. However, what do we think can replace the giant beef industry? While it's not in any danger, one thing taking a few acres of land in a way that wasn't done before is aquaculture. This video is produced by a news organization in North Carolina and is somewhat propaganda-esque promoting local businesses, but I still think it's interesting. Much of NC is lowlands, and more of the state may be available for this kind of business going forward.

Meanwhile water is an issue in the arid southwest, where lots of land is devoted to cattle ranching. Flows down rivers are down about 17% (alternate source) and irrigation used to grow alfalfa for animal feed all over. Basically that's repackaging water, which is a tough sell in places like the southwest. 

While the land and water aren't comparable, the food produced might be....

Natural gas

For a long time, advocates have praised natural gas as being "better than coal." That's still true: no argument from me! However, that's a pretty low bar. Coal creates all kinds of pollution from mining and burning it, and the impact on climate change is also large. So gas is better, right? Well, maybe.

First, extraction. While coal mining has a pretty bad reputation, researchers have also tied natural gas extraction to deaths of people near drilling sites and downwind. 

Second, emissions. An eight year study of gas emissions in the Boston area found that emissions were much higher than predicted by known usage patterns. This suggests that gas might be seeping out around pipelines, but more ominously in homes. 

On a semi-related note, in addition to the climate change impacts of air pollution, a study in India finds that smog hurts children's cognitive and academic performance. While pollution in India is likely worse than it is here, all damage is cause for alarm... and consider that 30 minutes with a two stroke leaf blower emits more carbon than a trip from Texas to Alaska in a pickup truck. Another study in Chile finds that particulate matter (a kind of air pollution) is associated with a small but significant increase in emergency room visits.

Finally, an interesting chart shows the sources of greenhouse gas emissions: about 3/4 are from energy, at least as of 2016.

Again, gas is definitely better than coal, but hopefully that isn't the comparison we continue to make. Remember, renewable sources are more than economic in many places: bringing them in makes profits and helps the environment. 

Rethinking the importance of food miles

A new article in Nature claims that the supply chain is responsible for a fairly large share of the emissions associated with food- as much as 19%, but the figure is 36% for vegetables and fruits. This runs counter to the more established wisdom from writers like historian James McWilliams that food miles matter little. This 2010 NYT editorial by Stephen Budiansky says that transportation accounts for 14% of the total energy consumed by the American food system. Clearly one big factor is exactly what counts in each number: are we including processing? Are we including transportation for the inputs such as fertilizer? (Not sure, but it seems like the Nature article might be.) 

As usual, Hannah Ritchie at Our World in Data provides an array of helpful stats, concluding that "eating local only slightly reduces your emissions." For a more general summary, Tamar Haspel has some words of wisdom: think first about your diet and second about where food comes from, and keep in mind that salad is silly. Not many calories or nutrients there: just more of a crunch experience for the global rich like many of us here in Baltimore.