Local firms feel the heat of global warming

By David Steinkraus

Monday, September 13, 2004 1:03 AM CDT

Forget Florida's hurricanes for the moment. Whether this is just a bad storm season, or a sign of global climate change, isn't the point.

Look around Racine County. Our wet spring and dry summer may be a better indication of what you and your children will be living through in coming decades.

There are uncertainties about the magnitude of the effect, but there are fewer doubts and many more warnings about the prospect of global climate change.

In mid-August, the European Environmental Agency urged rapid action. Last week The Conference Board, which specializes in providing information to business executives, issued a memo saying that there is consistent evidence and a scientific consensus that the climate is changing, that it will affect how we live, that human activity is the likely cause of changes we're seeing now, and that business needs to prepare for this new world. The board's report followed a meeting with 11 climate specialists assembled with the help of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Climate science One of those 11 was Gerald Meehl, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo.

"It seems that things are progressing in a way that would be consistent with the increase of greenhouse gas in the

atmosphere."

Data recorded at climate observation stations show the atmosphere has warmed by 1.3 degrees during the 20th Century, and while there is some disagreement among various observations, the central point is that the Earth is warmer, he said.

Many factors can affect climate change. Volcanic eruptions, for example, spew dust into the air which shades the Earth and cools it, Meehl said, and such natural forces seem to be the reason for global warming early in the 20th Century. But when scientists add and subtract factors in computer models, another picture emerges for the later years of that century.

"From those types of experiments, the models indicate that the warming we observed in the second half of the 20th Century, we just can't get that warming in the model unless we put in the anthropogenic greenhouse gas effects. So in other words, the natural forcings - volcanoes and solar variability - just don't give that much warming," Meehl said.

Anthropogenic gases are those produced by human activity as we heat and cool buildings and manufacture goods. Gases such as carbon dioxide - or CO2 - trap heat in the atmosphere the way a blanket does.

Those climate models predict a future for the upper Midwest that is wetter in the winter and drier in the summer, Meehl said. Warmer air also has implications for snowfall.

"Usually what happens is the rain-snow mix changes. You tend to get more precipitation falling as rain, especially in fall and spring. So as you're going into the winter season, the cold winter season basically becomes shorter, so your fall and spring storms tend to be more rain rather than snow." The extent of the effect will depend in part on what we do about our greenhouse gas

emissions.

Coal challenge Two large local businesses say they're looking at the problem, and acting on it.

Look at state records of who produces the most carbon dioxide, and near the top of the list you'll find We Energies, the utility that burns lots of coal to heat and light your home, office or

factory. "Climate change is one of a number of environmental issues that we as a coal-fueled utility face," said Kris McKinney, the company's manager of environmental policy. Although important, global warming hasn't been as pressing as other issues

such as pending rules for the emission of mercury and very small particles.

Still, he said, the utility will reduce its greenhouse gas production through increasing efficiency. New equipment that captures more heat to generate electricity means burning less fuel for each megawatt. The company's Power the Future proposal - which includes expanding the Oak Creek power plant - calls for a greenhouse gas reduction of 15 percent below the level at the time the project was announced.

There's some natural gas in the utility's fuel mix, including some generated in landfills, he said, and there's a goal of generating 5 percent of the company's power with renewable resources, such as wind power, by 2011. We Energies has also invested in reforestation projects in Europe and the Caribbean. The idea is that trees will suck carbon dioxide out of the air as they grow.

It doesn't matter that these projects aren't right here, McKinney said. "The one thing about CO2 emissions is that they're distributed relatively evenly across the planet." Scientists say those molecules linger in the atmosphere for between one and two centuries.

Through the Electric Power Research Institute, underwritten by utilities, We Energies is also helping to explore keeping carbon dioxide out of the air by pumping it underground. "Not too far from Wisconsin, but not underneath Wisconsin, there is thought to be deep saline aquifers that could serve as suitable repositories for injecting carbon dioxide," McKinney said.

Burning gas SC Johnson also has been looking at its greenhouse gas effects. The issue became important enough that it was written into the company's five-year environmental plans beginning in the 1990s, said Scott Johnson, vice president for global environmental and safety actions.

"We had very little experience with it," Johnson said. "We set a goal globally that we would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5 percent per year among our top five manufacturing plants."

As it turned out, he said, two others volunteered to join, meaning that the goal applies to about 80 percent of the company's manufacturing capability. This past calendar year, he said, those plants cut emissions by 14 percent over the previous year.

Emblematic of that are the two gas-fired turbines at the Waxdale plant in Mount Pleasant. One, already running, burns gas from the nearby Kestrel Hawk landfill. It generates electricity, and the heat from combustion is used to produce steam. A second turbine is now being built. It will burn 15 percent landfill gas - all that was available through a special pipeline - and the rest will be natural gas.

Together, those two pieces of machinery will cover Waxdale's average daily power needs and will supplant the boilers that currently produce steam, Johnson said. This means We Energies won't have to burn coal to supply power to Waxdale, he said, and that means not only less greenhouse gas but also less mercury going into the atmosphere.

Many businesses are legitimately concerned about climate change because they don't know what rules governments will impose, what that will cost, and how that will affect their operations, Johnson said.

For SC Johnson, reducing its greenhouse gas impact fitted its environmental ethic, and it was also a way to learn. Employees at plants around the world now have an idea how the process of greenhouse gas control works and how to do it, Johnson said. "And as a result, they're prepared, where many of our competitors will not be prepared."

Act or bake What happens to our climate is unknown. It may gradually warm. It may rapidly change in the course of a decade, states The Conference Board report. But the lack of certainty, the report says, is no excuse for inaction.

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