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Wildfire smoke is hurting pregnant moms and babies. Can California cities protect them?

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Thursday, October 6, 2022

This story is published collaboratively with the California Health Report as part of the Equitable Cities Reporting Hub for Environmental Justice, an initiative led by Grist and Next City. Tania Pacheco-Werner put on her walking shoes. She was halfway through her first pregnancy and had just been diagnosed with gestational diabetes. Her doctor’s advice? Stay active. But Pacheco-Werner lives just outside Fresno. It was summer, and well over 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The air outside was also thick with wildfire smoke from nearby forest fires — an increasingly common occurrence due to climate change. The expectant mother wanted to do everything right, but was getting conflicting advice. On the one hand, she needed to walk and stay active to prevent complications from gestational diabetes; on the other, public health messaging about wildfires told her to stay inside and reduce her exposure to the smoke. So, what did she do? Pacheco-Werner went to Walmart. Every day, her husband drove her to the nearby superstore so she could walk around and exercise indoors where the air felt cool and clean thanks to air-conditioning and filtration. Her doctors hadn’t instructed her to come up with this solution. In fact, her doctors never advised her about the potential effects of wildfire smoke on her pregnancy. But Pacheco-Werner holds a PhD in medical sociology, is the co-director of the Central Valley Health Policy Institute, and also serves on the Board of the California Air Resources Board for the San Joaquin Valley. She had been closely following a growing body of scientific literature about the impacts of wildfire smoke on preterm birth and adverse birth outcomes. Thanks to her own research, Pacheco-Werner knew to buy an air filter to make her home safer for herself and her baby. She knew that finding a safe space to exercise was important for a healthy pregnancy. But looking at the cloud of smoke hanging over Fresno, Pacheco-Werner suspected many other pregnant people were also in danger. Those most at risk were likely the people living in substandard housing, a problem tied to historically exclusionary policies in the region. As research increasingly shows how wildfire smoke and poor air quality hurt pregnant people and the children they carry, cities across California are working to curb these effects through ventilation centers and weatherization programs. In Fresno, where the air quality is routinely some of the worst in the country, the city and its residents are grappling with how to keep up with the increased risk of severe wildfire smoke. Since the beginning of the 20th century, the bulk of Fresno’s affordable housing —and, in turn, its low-income populations and many people of color — have been located on the city’s west side. Government policies codified housing discrimination in the 1930s with “residential safety maps” that aimed to help investors decide which areas were “safe investments.” They marked the “least desirable” neighborhoods in red, which became the basis for the term “redlining.” In many instances, Black people living in these redlined neighborhoods were denied home loans altogether. West Fresno was one of these redlined districts, and the homeowners there have been feeling the repercussions ever since. The idea that present-day health problems can be traced back to redlining is not new, nor is it exclusive to wildfire smoke. In a 2020 study by the UC Berkeley–UC San Francisco Joint Medical Program, researchers found that historically redlined areas of eight cities in California — including Fresno — have “significantly higher rates of emergency department visits due to asthma.” The study analyzed several factors that might contribute to health problems in redlined areas, including emissions from highways, which are found more frequently near low-income neighborhoods. The study also briefly noted that, under racially exclusionary housing practices, Black families lacked access to well-constructed housing. “Areas that were redlined have been shown to have houses that are of poor quality,” says Rachel Sklar, a post-doctoral researcher at the UC San Francisco’s Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment. Sklar is trying to understand the links between redlining and birth complications for pregnant people in California. She explains that, because older houses tend to have older windows, poor-quality insulation and no air conditioning (requiring inhabitants to open windows), these homes likely also harbor more air pollution, including wildfire smoke. That means residents of these homes might face higher rates of pollution exposure. A 2005 study from the University of California Berkeley analyzed housing characteristics that may lead to “leakage” of air pollution into the home. The study found that older and smaller houses tended to have more leakage than newer and larger ones, which are more likely to have weather-stripped windows and incorporate modern building techniques. Another study, from 2001, found that there could be a tenfold difference in leakage between the homes with the best air tightness and those with the worst. Air pollution of all types is a problem for these “leaky” homes. But as wildfire smoke increases in both severity and intensity in places like Fresno, public health messages are failing to address inequalities in housing standards. According to a report titled “Wildfire Smoke: A Guide for Public Health Professionals” compiled by the Environmental Protection Agency, “the most common advisory during a smoke episode is to stay indoors, where people can better control their environment.” However, the authors explained that the effectiveness of staying indoors as a strategy “depends on how well the building limits smoke from coming indoors.” The authors acknowledged that access to air conditioning is helpful to reduce indoor smoke, but many low-income households don’t have access to it. A firefighter attacks on brush fire on third day of Fairview Fire in 2022. Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images “In very leaky homes,” the report found, “outdoor particles can easily infiltrate the indoor air, so guidance to stay inside may offer little protection.” In the summer of 2018, when Pacheco-Werner was pregnant, the county of Fresno issued a health advisory about the wildfire smoke and extreme heat. In this advisory, the county advised “people with existing respiratory conditions, young children, and the elderly” to “remove themselves” from smoke. The California Department of Public Health, or CDPH, has issued similar warnings in summer months, urging people living near wildfires to “stay indoors if possible.” While the CDPH notices do state that pregnant people like Pacheco-Werner are especially vulnerable, no alternatives are given to account for variations in indoor air quality or access to filtered air. Exposure to dangerous levels of wildfire smoke has increased significantly over the last decade. This is true for most of California and much of the western United States, but Fresno has been hit particularly hard. According to the air quality tracking website IQAir: “Smoke that travels from wildfires throughout the state often reaches the Fresno area and worsens the city’s already poor air quality, often increasing air pollution levels significantly.” Researchers are studying the impact of Fresno’s poor air quality on children, including those exposed prenatally. The Children’s Health & Air Pollution Study is a collaboration between Stanford University and UC Berkeley that has published numerous studies assessing the effects of various sources of air pollution on children’s health, including a 2020 review of the effects of wildfire smoke. The authors cited a single day in 2018 when over 1 million school children in California had classes canceled due to wildfires. Children are particularly susceptible to smoke, they wrote, because they tend to spend more time outside, breathe more air relative to their body weight, and are still growing and developing. The researchers advised that ventilation and filtration be improved in all buildings in which children spend time. They also noted that children’s risk of health problems due to wildfire smoke doesn’t just start when they head off to school: Problems can arise while they’re still in the womb. Researchers have recently sought to better understand the effects of wildfire smoke on pregnant people. In 2021, Stanford researchers, led by Sam Heft-Neal, published a study that linked wildfire smoke to preterm births across California. Heft-Neal and his team were able to demonstrate that every additional day of smoke exposure was linked to an increased risk of preterm birth, concluding that nearly 7,000 “excess preterm births” in California could be attributed to wildfire smoke exposure in the study’s five-year period. Preterm birth is typically defined as birth before 37 weeks of pregnancy. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, babies born prematurely are at risk of a variety of health complications, including breathing problems, feeding difficulties, vision and hearing problems, and developmental delays. Additionally, one-third of infant deaths across the state are related to prematurity. In the United States, the average rate of preterm births is one in 12. But there is a stark divide along racial lines, especially for pregnant people in Fresno County, home to the highest rate of preterm births in California. At least in part due to societal inequities and institutional racism, Black people in Fresno County are nearly 75 percent more likely to have a preterm birth than white people. This statistic led researchers, health experts, physicians and community members to launch the California Preterm Birth Initiative to conduct and fund research on racial disparities in birth outcomes while centering BIPOC lived experiences. According to the Fresno County Department of Public Health, in 2020, the preterm birth rate for white pregnant people in Fresno County was just under 9 percent, but the rate for Black pregnant people was approximately 13.5 percent. For Hispanic pregnant people, like Tania Pacheco-Werner, it was 10 percent, though Hispanic preterm births make up the highest total number in Fresno County, at 821 reflecting the area’s large Hispanic population. Of the total 1,378 preterm births in Fresno County in 2020, 59.5 percent of them were Hispanic. Linking preterm birth rates to wildfire smoke exposure is complicated, Kendalyn Mack-Franklin of the California Preterm Birth Initiative explains. People of color in Fresno have reported a number of variables that contribute to their high rates of preterm birth, from lack of access to prenatal care, to racism within medical facilities. Environmental exposure likely played a role before the significant increase in wildfire smoke too, since redlined neighborhoods in Fresno are closer to freeways and pollution-emitting industrial zones. “Preterm birth has a lot of confounding variables,” Mack-Franklin says. “It’s very difficult to say that it’s for one particular reason, unless that reason is  In 2019, the California Legislature approved the Wildfire Smoke Clean Air Centers for Vulnerable Populations Incentive Pilot Program. The program, administered by the California Air Resources Board, will build a system of clean air centers by funding ventilation system upgrades in schools, community centers, senior centers, sports centers and libraries. Funding will be divided between California’s three air quality districts (Bay Area Air Quality Management District, San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District and South Coast Air Quality Management District) and the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association which oversees all 35 local air quality agencies across the state. In the San Joaquin Valley District, applications for funding opened on Aug. 17. Clean air centers are one way to tackle the problem of indoor air quality, but to Rachel Sklar, housing is still at the center of smoke’s disproportionate effects on low-income people of color. “The problem is that people have no choice but to live in poorly maintained homes,” she sats. Sklar adds that while coastal cities like those in the Bay Area might routinely have better air quality than inland regions, low-income residents of those cities are being pushed inward to places like Fresno as their housing costs become untenable. In her most recent paper, published Aug. 28 in the International Journal of Gynecology & Obstetrics, Sklar calls for housing policy reform, writing, “The rapid population growth in inland areas with high fire risks, as well as the disproportionate share of low-income black and Hispanic people that are migrating to these areas and experiencing the downstream health effects of living in those areas must be addressed.” While redlining and residential safety maps may technically be relics of the past, Sklar notes that today’s housing crisis is pushing low-income people to “sub-optimal living situations where their health is going to be affected.” “Who would think that urban housing policy would have anything to do with preterm birth rates?” says Sklar. “Well, you wouldn’t, unless you connect the dots.” The remains of a home that burned are left abandoned on July 04, 2022 in Fresno, California. Spencer Platt / Getty Images Air quality districts around the state are starting to realize the importance of healthy air in homes and have piloted a variety of incentives to find solutions, though improvements in air quality are often one of many benefits of energy-focused programs. The Fresno Economic Opportunities Commission has a weatherization program aimed at helping homeowners and renters cut down on energy costs and prepare their homes for extreme weather by weather-stripping doors, caulking windows and gaps, insulating exterior walls, and repairing and replacement ducts. “Of the residents served within the past year, 56 percent lived in homes 50 years or older,” says Fresno EOC Energy Manager Matt Contrestano. “In addition, almost 23 percent of the homes assessed were deferred services due to the condition of the home including structural, electrical, plumbing, sewage and water leaks or clutter and pest infestation issues.” In 2021, Fresno EOC’s Transform Fresno project, which focuses on downtown, Chinatown, and southwest corners of Fresno, provided energy-efficient upgrades to 12 homes; in 2020, they reached 34 homes. According to Contrestano, these programs help residents by reducing utility bills, maximizing energy efficiency, and allowing each resident to live in a healthier and more comfortable environment. In 2021, Santa Barbara County Air Pollution Control District launched a program to give hundreds of free air purifiers to residents in the towns of Guadalupe and Casmalia. This year, the San Joaquin Valley District followed suit, approving a similar program to give 1,500 families free in-home air purifiers to mitigate the in-home risks of wildfire smoke exposure. Despite the grueling summer months, Pacheco-Werner had a healthy pregnancy and carried her baby to full term. But her son, now 4 years old, has developed asthma, which has been difficult for Pachecho-Werner’s family to manage. There’s no way to know if his asthma is related to the wildfire smoke his mother breathed in when he was growing in her womb. This past spring, Pacheco-Werner became pregnant again, and she worried that she’d have to endure another summer of hot, smoky weather. So far, the pollution has been moderate, but Pacheco-Werner ended up facing another challenge: Her second baby was born preterm, at 36 weeks. Although she and the newborn are recovering well, Pacheco-Werner is concerned he too will develop asthma like his brother. Even so, Pacheco-Werner is well aware of the privilege that her fluent English and health insurance afford her. But as a Mexican immigrant who spent much of her life in Fresno’s “most impacted neighborhoods,” she continues to use her personal experiences to inform her research on the relationships between neighborhoods and health, fighting for every Californian to have equal access to clean air. “When we don’t pay attention to inequality,” she says, “it affects us all.” This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Wildfire smoke is hurting pregnant moms and babies. Can California cities protect them? on Oct 6, 2022.

The legacy of redlining in Fresno isn’t just linked to housing access. It also has deadly effects on air quality and preterm birth.

Read the full story here.
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South Carolina's coastal adaptation debates stir community concerns

In a bid to tackle coastal erosion, South Carolina communities and environmentalists clash over the construction of erosion control structures called groins at Debidue Beach. Daniel Shailer reports for Inside Climate News.In short:Environmental advocates argue that the construction of groins could harm the North Inlet-Winyah Bay reserve by disrupting natural sand movement.Debidue Beach residents advocate for these structures to protect their homes from increasing erosion, highlighting tensions between climate resilience and coastal development.Legal challenges and confusion over state coastal management regulations underscore the difficulties of balancing property protection with environmental conservation.Key quote:"Equity plays a huge part in this. When you look at environmental justice communities throughout the United States, you see an intentional disinvestment in those communities."— Omar Muhammad, executive director of the Lowcountry Alliance for Model CommunitiesWhy this matters:By preserving beaches, groins also support local economies that depend on tourism. On the other hand, groins can have unintended consequences. For instance, while they may accumulate sand on one side, they can also starve areas down drift of sand, leading to increased erosion elsewhere. Disparate state, local, private and federal conservation efforts are failing to protect biodiversity. Connectivity and coordination would help, say agency scientists and conservation leaders.

In a bid to tackle coastal erosion, South Carolina communities and environmentalists clash over the construction of erosion control structures called groins at Debidue Beach. Daniel Shailer reports for Inside Climate News.In short:Environmental advocates argue that the construction of groins could harm the North Inlet-Winyah Bay reserve by disrupting natural sand movement.Debidue Beach residents advocate for these structures to protect their homes from increasing erosion, highlighting tensions between climate resilience and coastal development.Legal challenges and confusion over state coastal management regulations underscore the difficulties of balancing property protection with environmental conservation.Key quote:"Equity plays a huge part in this. When you look at environmental justice communities throughout the United States, you see an intentional disinvestment in those communities."— Omar Muhammad, executive director of the Lowcountry Alliance for Model CommunitiesWhy this matters:By preserving beaches, groins also support local economies that depend on tourism. On the other hand, groins can have unintended consequences. For instance, while they may accumulate sand on one side, they can also starve areas down drift of sand, leading to increased erosion elsewhere. Disparate state, local, private and federal conservation efforts are failing to protect biodiversity. Connectivity and coordination would help, say agency scientists and conservation leaders.

New approach to lithium mining sparks environmental concerns

A lithium mining technique promises environmental benefits but raises concerns over water use and safety in Utah.Wyatt Myskow reports for Inside Climate News.In short:A test well for a new lithium mining process in Green River, Utah, unexpectedly released water and CO2, causing local concerns over water supply impacts.The direct lithium extraction (DLE) method, though potentially less damaging than traditional mining, remains unproven on a large scale in the U.S.Critics question the long-term environmental impact of DLE, especially regarding water consumption in the already arid Southwest.Key quote:"We are not opposed to lithium. We are opposed to unsustainable and dangerous appropriations of water under the false assumptions that this new technology is absolutely harmless."— Kyle Roerink, executive director for the Great Basin Water NetworkWhy this matters:As the global demand for lithium continues to surge with the transition toward greener energy sources, the industry faces the challenge of balancing the need for this critical mineral with the imperative to protect water resources and ensure sustainable practices.In push to mine for minerals, clean energy advocates ask what going green really means.

A lithium mining technique promises environmental benefits but raises concerns over water use and safety in Utah.Wyatt Myskow reports for Inside Climate News.In short:A test well for a new lithium mining process in Green River, Utah, unexpectedly released water and CO2, causing local concerns over water supply impacts.The direct lithium extraction (DLE) method, though potentially less damaging than traditional mining, remains unproven on a large scale in the U.S.Critics question the long-term environmental impact of DLE, especially regarding water consumption in the already arid Southwest.Key quote:"We are not opposed to lithium. We are opposed to unsustainable and dangerous appropriations of water under the false assumptions that this new technology is absolutely harmless."— Kyle Roerink, executive director for the Great Basin Water NetworkWhy this matters:As the global demand for lithium continues to surge with the transition toward greener energy sources, the industry faces the challenge of balancing the need for this critical mineral with the imperative to protect water resources and ensure sustainable practices.In push to mine for minerals, clean energy advocates ask what going green really means.

Stone Age People Survived a Supervolcano Eruption by Adapting to Dry Periods, Archaeologists Suggest

Humans living in northwest Ethiopia around 74,000 years ago switched to eating more fish following the eruption, a behavior that might have enabled migration out of Africa

Indonesia's Lake Toba, formed by a volcanic eruption around 74,000 years ago. In the new study, researchers uncovered fragments of glass from the eruption at an archaeological site in northwest Ethiopia, pointing to the volcano's global impacts. Goh Chai Hin / AFP via Getty Images Around 74,000 years ago, a massive supervolcano called Toba erupted in Indonesia, creating the largest known natural disaster in the last 2.5 million years. Now, an archaeological site in northwest Ethiopia, called Shinfa-Metema 1, may point to how humans adapted to the widespread changes in climate induced by the catastrophic eruption. People at this site shifted to eating more fish during dry periods that seem to be linked to the volcano, according to a study published last week in the journal Nature. “This points to how sophisticated people were in this time period,” John Kappelman, first author of the new study and a paleoanthropologist at the University of Texas at Austin, tells the New York Times’ Carl Zimmer. “This on-the-ground evidence contradicts the popular model that the ‘volcanic winter’ caused by the Toba eruption almost drove humans and our closely related ancestors to extinction,” Michael Petraglia, an archaeologist at Griffith University in Australia who did not contribute to the findings, tells the Washington Post’s Carolyn Y. Johnson. “Instead, all evidence from Shinfa-Metema and elsewhere now indicates that human populations were flexible enough in their adaptations to overcome environmental challenges, even those introduced by the Toba volcanic super-eruption of 74,000 years ago,” he adds. Kappelman’s team first came across the Shinfa-Metema 1 site in 2002. Excavations revealed fossil mammoth teeth and ostrich eggshells, as well as bones with cut marks, writes New Scientist’s Michael Le Page. Archaeologists estimate humans populated the site for five to ten years, during a time with seasonal dry periods. The researchers dated the pieces of ostrich eggshell to around 74,000 years ago, the time of the Toba eruption. And the same layers of sediment contained rocks with tiny fragments of volcanic glass, suggesting people lived there both before and after the blast in Indonesia, writes CNN’s Katie Hunt. The site had an unusually high abundance of fish compared to other Stone Age sites, suggesting that people captured more fish as waterholes shrank during the dry season. “People start to increase the percentage of fish in the diet when Toba comes in. They’re capturing and processing almost four times as much fish [as before the eruption],” Kappelman says to CNN. “It is sophisticated behavior… to fish, instead of hunting terrestrial mammals,” Kappelman tells the Washington Post. “That kind of behavioral flexibility is kind of a hallmark of modern humans today.” The researchers also uncovered 16,000 chipped rocks that could be arrowheads, suggesting the site’s inhabitants used bows and arrows to hunt. If confirmed, these artifacts would be the earliest evidence of archery, per the New York Times. Humans’ apparent adaptability at this site might shed light on early migrations, some researchers say. Modern humans spread out from Africa on multiple occasions more than 100,000 years ago, but people without African ancestry are tied genetically to a dispersal that occurred within the last 100,000 years. Previous research had suggested that early humans migrated during humid periods that offered more plants and food sources. Instead, the finding that Stone Age people adjusted to arid conditions suggests humans may have ventured out of Africa during dry periods. They could have followed “blue highways” created by seasonal rivers, moving between small waterholes as they depleted each one, according to a statement from the University of Texas at Austin. Rachel Lupien, a geoscientist at Aarhus University in Denmark who did not contribute to the findings, tells the Washington Post that she isn’t convinced by this theory yet. Comparing the short-term climate at Shinfa-Metema 1 to the climate in other locations, or across thousands of years, overlooks other variables that contribute to climate and rainfall, she says to the publication. “Of course this new work doesn’t mean that humid corridors were not still important conduits for dispersals out of Africa, but this work adds credible additional possibilities during more arid phases,” Chris Stringer, a paleoanthropologist at the Natural History Museum in London who was not involved in the research, tells CNN. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Texas energy companies are betting hydrogen can become a cleaner fuel for transportation

Supporters say developing hydrogen as a fuel is critical to slowing climate change. Critics are concerned that producing it with fossil fuels will prop up the oil and gas industry.

This is the first of a three-part series on emerging energy sources and Texas' role in developing them. Part two, on geothermal energy, publishes Tuesday, and part three, on small nuclear reactors, will publish on Wednesday. JEFFERSON COUNTY — A concrete platform with fading blue paint marks the birthplace of the modern oil and gas industry in southeast Texas. Weather-beaten signs describe how drillers tapped the Spindletop oil well in 1901, a discovery that launched petroleum giants Texaco, Mobil and Gulf Oil. Nearby, a red pipeline traces a neat path above flat, gravel-covered earth. French company Air Liquide started building this unassuming facility, with a wellhead and other machinery, on the iconic site in 2014 to store what it believes will be key to an energy revolution: hydrogen. The ground that once released millions of barrels of oil now holds some 4.5 billion cubic feet of highly pressurized hydrogen. The gas is contained in a skyscraper-shaped cavern that reaches about a mile below ground within a subterranean salt dome. Hydrogen promoters see the gas as a crucial part of addressing climate change. If it’s produced in a way that creates few or no greenhouse gas emissions, it could provide an eco-friendly fuel for cars, planes, 18-wheelers and ships, and could power energy-intensive industries such as steel manufacturing. Hydrogen emits only water when used as fuel. If companies can produce clean hydrogen at a price that’s competitive with gasoline or diesel, supporters say it would revolutionize the fuel industry. That’s a big if. Hydrogen is among the most common elements in the universe, but on Earth it’s typically found bonded with something else, such as carbon. Today, hydrogen is often obtained by isolating it from methane, a mix of carbon and hydrogen that is the main component of natural gas. This process leaves behind carbon dioxide, which worsens climate change if released into the air. Engineers say it’s possible to clean up that process by catching the extra carbon dioxide and reusing it — to get more oil out of a well, for example — or injecting it into the earth to store it. Another less polluting method is to split hydrogen from water, which is made up of hydrogen and oxygen, using electricity generated by wind, solar or nuclear power. Texas has emerged as a leader in producing hydrogen the cheaper way using abundant supplies of natural gas without capturing the carbon dioxide. Air Liquide makes hydrogen at facilities along the state’s coast, from Beaumont to Corpus Christi. More than 100 miles of pipelines move that hydrogen to companies that buy it for processes such as removing sulfur from crude oil. Little hydrogen is made from gas with carbon capture or from water in the state — or the rest of the country. Some academics, policy advisers and companies that make hydrogen say Texas and the Gulf Coast should be where hydrogen created with fewer emissions takes off. A majority of the country’s hydrogen pipelines are already here, Texas’ petrochemical workers have skills that easily transfer to hydrogen production — which involves chemical reactions — and the state has the natural gas and renewable energy needed to produce it. “We can be the breadbasket for not only the U.S. but for the world in providing hydrogen,” said Bryan Fisher, a managing director with RMI, a nonprofit that supports the clean energy transition. But producing enough hydrogen cheaply, building the pipelines to move it and the subterranean caverns to store it and finding the customers to buy it requires companies to take some financial risk. That effort is getting a boost from the federal government, which is offering billions of dollars’ worth of tax credits to kick-start production of hydrogen from gas with carbon capture or water. The government also plans to divide as much as $7 billion among seven regional clusters of projects to build hydrogen infrastructure, including up to $1.2 billion for projects in Texas and Louisiana that plan to make hydrogen largely from natural gas. Competing to break into the industry are traditional fossil fuel companies, including Chevron and ExxonMobil. Hydrogen advocates say interest by the oil giants is good because they have the money and expertise to tackle such an ambitious project. But environmental groups doubt that fossil fuel companies can make hydrogen from natural gas as cleanly as they say they can. They worry the federal funding will prop up oil and gas companies, when the emphasis should be on making hydrogen from water or creating clean power another way. “Producing hydrogen from natural gas is not clean, not low-carbon and cannot and should not be considered a solution in our efforts to solve the world’s worsening climate change crisis,” David Schlissel, the co-author of a report from the Institute for Energy, Economics and Financial Analysis, said in a webinar. Katie Ellet, left, president of hydrogen energy and mobility for Air Liquide, walks past Facility Manager Craig Allen at the company's hydrogen storage facility. Credit: Mark Felix for The Texas Tribune First: A worker monitors the hydrogen storage site. Last: Marked pipelines move hydrogen. Credit: Mark Felix for The Texas Tribune Sitting in a mobile office at the Spindletop site, Katie Ellet, president of hydrogen energy and mobility for Air Liquide, urged critics not to be so puritanical about hydrogen production. She described hydrogen as part of a centuries-long evolution toward progressively cleaner fuels: coal replaced wood, then oil replaced coal. Ellet believes now is hydrogen’s Spindletop moment. She believes the technology, economics and interest are in place to allow the industry to boom. “We transition through these different energy cycles,” Ellet said. “And we’ve gotten better. We’ve learned, and we’ve gotten better. This is us … evolving into that next generation.” Hydrogen hype grows in Texas One weekday in October, Brian Weeks, senior director of business development at GTI Energy, walked onto a Houston hotel’s conference room stage to discuss hydrogen. GTI Energy used to be known as the Gas Technology Institute and researched natural gas. Now it promotes low-carbon energy. Weeks faced a standing-room-only crowd at the Hydrogen North America event. He remembered when, maybe a decade earlier, only seven people at a conference showed up to hear him speak on the topic. People have predicted hydrogen was about to take off before. Weeks worked on the idea off and on since the late 1990s, when he was at Texaco and the company believed hydrogen could power cars. At the time, they worried energy prices would keep rising. Weeks recalled it as a heady time for hydrogen, with actors from the hit TV series Baywatch starring in promotional videos. But hydrogen didn’t catch. Technology for producing it remained expensive, while oil production instead got a giant boost. Hydraulic fracturing technology allowed the United States to rapidly increase how much oil it produced. Still, Weeks wouldn’t have spent so much of his life on hydrogen if he didn’t believe it had a future, he said. Like Ellet, he said the circumstances feel different now. That’s in large part because of the federal government’s big investment: By 2030, the Biden administration wants America to produce 10 million metric tons per year of hydrogen made from water using renewable energy or from gas using carbon storage — about how much is produced now largely from gas without carbon capture. “It’s been a roller coaster, really, for the last at least 20 years,” Weeks said in an interview. Over the past few years, Weeks has helped a coalition of businesses, researchers and others apply for the federal funding earmarked in the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act for regional hydrogen projects, called “hydrogen hubs.” Nine projects centered in Houston sought money as a single hub, and on Oct. 13, the Department of Energy announced that they and six other applicants from across the country won. As part of the Houston group, Chevron wants to make low-carbon hydrogen and ammonia, which is used in fertilizer. ExxonMobil wants to build hydrogen pipelines and fueling stations for trucks. The Gulf Coast projects aimed to produce more than 1.8 million metric tons of hydrogen per year, more than any of the other winning hubs. Some 80% would be made from natural gas. Brett Perlman, CEO of the nonprofit Center for Houston’s Future, poses for a portrait at the Houstonian Hotel in Houston on March 24, 2024. Credit: Mark Felix for The Texas Tribune Local and state leaders are cheering on the industry’s growth. Brett Perlman, CEO of the nonprofit Center for Houston’s Future, supported the hydrogen hub effort. Perlman’s job is to consider Houston’s economy and what will happen to it as the world works to address climate change and wean itself off fossil fuels. Perlman wrestles with how to make Houston the low-carbon energy capital of the world. He speaks at conferences, too, to build the case that hydrogen should be part of maintaining the city’s success. “The energy transition is going to happen, and Houston will have a role,” Perlman said at his office. “The real question is can Houston be, continue to be, a leader?” Back at the same conference where Weeks spoke, Texas Public Utility Commissioner Lori Cobos, whose agency regulates the electricity industry, explained that because it has huge natural gas reserves and is a top producer of wind and solar energy, Texas is “uniquely positioned to be a national and global leader in hydrogen.” The easy path to selling hydrogen made in these new ways would be to start by converting places already using hydrogen for purposes such as making fertilizer, refining petroleum and treating metals. But even more environmental benefits would come if it could also be used in new applications, said John Hensley, vice president of markets and policy analysis for the industry advocacy group American Clean Power Association. Hydrogen believers envision the fuel could decarbonize industries that are considered hard to electrify. Hydrogen would power planes and trucks that heavy electric batteries would slow down. It would supply the high heat needed to make cement that electricity could not provide. The new federal tax incentives get hydrogen close, if not all the way, to being able to compete with fossil fuels on price, said Fisher of RMI. The government plans to pay up to $3 per kilogram of what it defines as clean hydrogen, such as that made from water, or up to $85 per metric ton of stored carbon dioxide that’s captured after making hydrogen from natural gas. With the subsidies, producing hydrogen from water would cost generally from $4 to $6 per kilogram, and producing it from natural gas would cost generally from $2 to $4, Fisher said. He stressed that it would depend on the specifics of the project. The government’s goal is to get the cost to $1 per kilogram for both types. Environmental groups and critics raise concerns  The hydrogen solution does not sound so promising to environmental groups, especially when it comes to making it from natural gas using carbon capture. A number of critics came together in a windowless Houston conference room of their own later in October to build the case to journalists that carbon capture in hydrogen production shouldn’t be seen as a way to address climate change but instead as a boost to the oil and gas industry. “This is not a transfer off of fossil fuel dependency,” said Jane Patton, campaign manager for U.S. fossil economy at the Center for International Environmental Law. “This is a perpetuation of fossil fuel dependency.” With money from the Rockefeller Family Fund, which has an initiative focused on slowing oil and gas production because it drives climate change, organizers brought in the big guns to tell the other side of the story. The day began with a speech from Bob Bullard, founding director of the Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice at Texas Southern University, known by many as the father of environmental justice. Bullard has passionately told many versions of the same narrative. He pioneered his environmental justice work decades ago when he highlighted that the city of Houston primarily built its trash incinerators and landfills in Black neighborhoods. And he brought attention to one example after another of companies polluting poor communities of color rather than wealthy, white ones. Professor Robert Bullard, center, speaks at a roundtable event with Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan at Texas Southern University in Houston on Nov. 18, 2021. Credit: Annie Mulligan for The Texas Tribune Now a member of the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council, Bullard said he’s seen no proof that a build-out of hydrogen and carbon storage will be any better for local communities than the expansion of the petrochemical industry was over the past century, bringing more pollution than benefits to surrounding communities. He continued to call for a federal study to find out whether hydrogen production with carbon capture is safe for the people who live around it. “You’re asking the same people to sacrifice in the same way,” Bullard said at the event. “Can we trust the oil and gas industry to be truthful? I don’t have to write a book on that. We know the answer.” Schlissel, the director of resource planning analysis for the Institute for Energy, Economics and Financial Analysis, believes the government is using a badly built model to judge how clean hydrogen projects are when they’re evaluated for federal support. One problem is that the model inappropriately leaves out the fact that hydrogen pipelines could leak, Schlissel says. Hydrogen can react with the molecule that breaks down harmful methane in the atmosphere and make the methane last longer, contributing to climate change. Schlissel also says the model assumes companies can catch a lot of carbon dioxide — which he believes is totally unrealistic. While companies using carbon capture technology don’t typically publicize their capture rates, Schlissel and his colleagues dug up what they could and concluded that the technology was far short of where it needs to be. Speakers at the event also expressed little confidence in the Railroad Commission of Texas, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry, to regulate hydrogen pipelines and underground storage. Commission Shift, a watchdog group that calls for reforming the Railroad Commission, says the agency has a poor track record when it comes to protecting Texans from explosions, leaks and other problems with wells and pipelines. In a statement, commission spokesperson Patty Ramon said the agency has "protected public safety and the environment for more than a century." The agency does pipeline inspections regularly and has exceeded Legislative performance goals, Ramon added. These advocates are up against wealthy, politically powerful companies that say making hydrogen from natural gas with carbon capture is a ready solution to start lowering how much carbon dioxide escapes into the atmosphere — even if it’s imperfect. “I find this polarization of seeking perfect at the expense of very good is problematic,” Chris Greig, a senior research scientist with the Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment at Princeton University, said in an interview. “And, to be clear, the distrust (of oil and gas companies) is not unwarranted, right? There’s been some wrongs done,” Greig added. “But somehow we have to set that aside and find some sort of middle ground.” Disclosure: Exxon Mobil Corporation and Texas Southern University - Barbara Jordan-Mickey Leland School of Public Affairs have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here. We can’t wait to welcome you to downtown Austin Sept. 5-7 for the 2024 Texas Tribune Festival! Join us at Texas’ breakout politics and policy event as we dig into the 2024 elections, state and national politics, the state of democracy, and so much more. When tickets go on sale this spring, Tribune members will save big. Donate to join or renew today.

UN: Droughts hit women and girls hardest in vulnerable areas

In poor and rural regions around the globe, women and girls bear the brunt of drought's impacts, underscoring the need for water strategies to address their unique challenges, according to the United Nations.Fiona Harvey reports for The Guardian.In short:The UN's world water development report calls for enhanced global cooperation on water resources to mitigate conflicts and improve conditions for women and girls.Access to clean water and safe sanitation significantly affect women's and girls' education and safety in disadvantaged areas.Conflicts over water, exacerbated by climate change, pollution and overuse, pose risks of local and regional disputes, impacting food security and health.Key quote:"As water stress increases, so do the risks of local or regional conflict."— Audrey Azoulay, director general of UNESCOWhy this matters:Climate-related water stress significantly impacts communities worldwide, but its effects tend to be more acute for women and girls, who often bear the brunt of environmental crises. Due to traditional roles and socio-economic factors, women and girls are primarily responsible for water collection in many cultures. This task becomes increasingly arduous and time-consuming as water scarcity, exacerbated by climate change, forces them to travel longer distances.Bangladesh is on the front lines of a water crisis driven by climate change and politics. There, as in many other countries, women are made especially vulnerable by safe drinking water shortages.

In poor and rural regions around the globe, women and girls bear the brunt of drought's impacts, underscoring the need for water strategies to address their unique challenges, according to the United Nations.Fiona Harvey reports for The Guardian.In short:The UN's world water development report calls for enhanced global cooperation on water resources to mitigate conflicts and improve conditions for women and girls.Access to clean water and safe sanitation significantly affect women's and girls' education and safety in disadvantaged areas.Conflicts over water, exacerbated by climate change, pollution and overuse, pose risks of local and regional disputes, impacting food security and health.Key quote:"As water stress increases, so do the risks of local or regional conflict."— Audrey Azoulay, director general of UNESCOWhy this matters:Climate-related water stress significantly impacts communities worldwide, but its effects tend to be more acute for women and girls, who often bear the brunt of environmental crises. Due to traditional roles and socio-economic factors, women and girls are primarily responsible for water collection in many cultures. This task becomes increasingly arduous and time-consuming as water scarcity, exacerbated by climate change, forces them to travel longer distances.Bangladesh is on the front lines of a water crisis driven by climate change and politics. There, as in many other countries, women are made especially vulnerable by safe drinking water shortages.

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