Lorena Rios-Mendoza, an oceanographer at the University of Wisconsin-Superior, is one of the scientists who've plunged the polluted depths of American lakes. Her team recently sampled sections of Lake Erie – which can't seem to catch a break these days, what with its mercury infection and rashes of poisonous algae – and discovered that the water's been invaded by great quantities of microplastics mostly smaller than grains of rice. Specifically, they measured concentrations between 1,500 and 1.7 million particles per square mile, which is 24 percent greater than what they found in the Atlantic Ocean's debris field.
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This survey comes on the heels of another effort by researchers at the State University of New York, who found that Erie was the most debris-ridden of the Great Lakes. (Lesser-populated areas around Superior and Huron had less plastic pollution.) One of the scientists in that project noted that the material seems custom-built to stay off the public's radar: “People became aware of plastics in the oceans and waters in the ‘60s and ‘70s, and the great Pacific garbage patch. But from far away, bits of plastic look just like the water. So it’s not so noticeable or recognized in the greater topic of plastics in the environment.”
May not seem like a big deal. But anything that could affect cross-border trade on the Ambassador Bridge could have huge ramifications. Why? From Bloomberg Business Week:
Twenty-five percent of U.S.-Canada truck freight moves across the bridge, some $82 billion worth of goods every year. That’s more than the U.S. exports to Germany or Japan.
So, in the trade world, this is a huge deal, one if it involved federal actors would be all over WaPo and the NYTimes.
So let’s check out the details of this proposed policy change, which would give hazardous waste truckers another option besides the Detroit-Windsor Truck ferry.
The Detroit International Bridge Company, which owns the Ambassador Bridge, is seeking permission from the Michigan government to let trucks carrying gas, propane, and other flammable and corrosive chemicals across the bridge.
… Under the proposed new rules, trucks carrying gases and chemicals would require Ambassador Bridge escort vehicles to make the trip across the span with them.
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Every day, more than 8,000 trucks cross the Ambassador Bridge, which is Canada’s busiest border crossing, noted Minister of Transport Denis Lebel (Roberval-Lac Saint Jean, Que.) in a column for this week’s transportation policy briefing in The Hill Times.
If the bridge is allowed to carry hazardous materials, the increase in truck traffic would likely be just a few dozen more vehicles a day, said Mr. Stamper.
The bridge carries 25 per cent of Canada-U.S. merchandise trade, worth almost $500-million a day, according to the bridge company.
… Commercial vehicles crossing the bridge pay a toll of between $3.25 and $5.25 an axle. At current rates, which don’t include a premium for hazardous materials, a typical semi-trailer truck with five axles would pay $26.25 to cross the bridge one way.
Alberta, Canada's oil production heavyweight, is pushing for increased carbon production taxes and seeking to slash GHG emissions. Apparently, Ottawa is surprised. Yeah, I thought I was reading an exceedingly dry Onion article. Oh, wait...it's a plan offered by Alberta's Environment Minister...that is not endorsed by Alberta's Conservative government. OK, the sky's not falling. So the real question: Are Alberta's Conservatives looking green to win Keystone, and then offer up a dead-on-arrival plan?
Is McQueen's carbon plan for real?
The Globe and Mail reports (or hypes up?) a recent carbon tax and reduction plan offered by Alberta's Environment Minster:
The Alberta government has quietly presented a proposal to sharply increase levies on carbon production and force large oil-industry producers to slash greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 40 per cent on each barrel of production, a long-term plan that has surprised Ottawa and industry executives with its ambition.
Alberta Environment Minister Diana McQueen stunned a recent meeting in Calgary attended by senior oil executives and her federal counterpart, Peter Kent, with the proposal, which goes well beyond anything Ottawa or the companies contemplated, industry and government sources said Wednesday. The three sides are engaged in intense negotiations, with the industry warning that regulations that are too onerous could undermine the competitiveness of the oil sands sector as it seeks international investment. to drive production growth.
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[Alberta Premier Alison Redford/Diana McQueen's boss] and Prime Minister Stephen Harper are under considerable pressure to introduce regulations for the oil industry to limit greenhouse gas emissions.
The Cynical Read: Looking Green Key to U.S. Keystone Approval. My guess is that this plan has one main audience: the United States. If Alberta looks 'super' green, it makes it easier for Keystone to get approved. The catch: the plan will be so long-term that the 'carbon pain' won't be felt until Alberta's Progressive Conservatives or either out of office or filled with new leaders. Cynical Read 2.0: What 'Great' Timing! Oh, and this is a pretty well-timed leak, given that Alberta oilsands environmental data is about to be released. Yeah, yeah...but maybe the plan's for realies? Ha. This March 2013 Globe and Mail article shows just how blistering the Alberta's environmental hot potato is. The main takeaway: Alberta Premier Redford will take heat for any real carbon tax increase, let alone steep reductions, unless (1) they come online way into the future and (2) secure Keystone XL in the short-term. And Redford's opponents, Alberta's Liberal Party and the strong provincial party Wildrose, are happy to exploit Redford's tough spot whatever way they can. Something tells me that Redford's Alberta critics and Keystone critics are going to react to news of Redford's Green Plan 2.0 with some help The Who:
But it might just get Alberta Keystone. From the Globe & Mail ,March 2013 article on Alberta Conservative's environment-Keystone XL headache:
The Alberta government’s climate-change plan was under scrutiny Tuesday, a day after comments Ms. Redford made in Ottawa were interpreted as a call on the federal government to follow Alberta’s lead in putting a price on carbon.
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The Premier quickly backed away from those remarks, saying that’s not what she meant, but was grilled in Question Period by the opposition. At one point, she scolded the provincial Liberals – a party that last year proposed what would ultimately be a $1.8-billion-per-year provincial carbon levy – for “saying that our environmental record in Alberta isn’t good enough. That’s not good for Alberta, and it’s not good for Canada.”
Liberal Leader Raj Sherman said a higher carbon price would help pave the way for pipelines. “If we actually dealt with the environmental issues that we face, we could get our pipelines to the U.S. and the West Coast. It’s hurting us not to do this right,” he said.
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The Premier was said to have called on the federal government to follow Alberta’s lead and introduce a price on carbon. Her office later said she was misunderstood, issuing a clarification and then making Ms. Redford available to speak to reporters in Edmonton on Tuesday. “I am in no way advocating any sort of national carbon tax. That’s for other governments to decide,” she said.
Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith nonetheless accused the Premier of advancing a plan that “would see Alberta’s vast resource wealth sucked out of this province and pumped into Ontario and Quebec.” Ms. Redford later fired back. “The suggestion that that’s what the conversation was about [in Ottawa Monday] is absolutely absurd, but I don’t expect anything more from the opposition,” the Premier said, later noting that Ms. Smith said just last year that the “science isn’t settled” on climate change.
CUSLI-Nexus talks Canada-U.S. trade relationship, with the help of some classic 60s tunes!
The Canadian Business Journal (CBJ), an excellent and free resource to catch up with Canadian business issues, offers a Canadian Chamber of Commerce article that reviews Canada's Top 11 impediments to international competitiveness (go to page 18). Top on the list: Human resources. Canadian businesses are having trouble attaining the skilled work-force they need. But, also of note, was the Chamber's addition of trade diversification, especially in energy (cough, Keystone). (Note: This 'Top 11' list built off the Chamber's 'Top 10' list in February.)
So is the Chamber telling Canada change its U.S. lullaby to this Nancy Sinatra classic?
Canada as Resource King. From the selection of articles, Canada's resource industry dominates Canada's business scene.
Canada Should Up Trade Diversity, But Loving Microsoft. While pushing trade diversification, especially in energy, note the cover story on Microsoft Canada.
Business and the public sector. Business issues are social issues: (1) note the absence of concern over healthcare costs, unlike in the United States, and (2) the need for Canada to train its workforce (or bring in skilled immigrants). Impact: government policies are business issues.
Canada and the United States: 'I Got You Babe?' I hate to repeat myself, but the defining issue in Canada-U.S. relations isn't whether they diversify their trade partners. Rather, it's whether both nations harness their relationship in order to succeed in an increasingly competitive global marketplace.
Check out Idea Scale here. Whether sharing ideas or just monitoring the mystical art of crossborder regulatory transformation, the site is definitely worth regular visits.
GAO releases a report, which by a press release, seems like a simple 'turn in your homework' admonition regarding the U.S. federal program that prioritizes sites in the U.S. where we really don't want bad things to happen. But, as Keith White shows, when the report it read, you might be a little worried about how well DHS is handling this list, and the resulting federal funds and programs that accompany it. And yes, Canada factors in too.
GAO releases a report on the National Critical Infrastructure Prioritization Program (NCIPP). This report lists places where the U.S. government would really not want bad things to happen.
I got the report through a third-party information gatherer I'll keep unnamed, who summarized it as such:
“In a new report, GAO finds that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has not sufficiently met statutory requirements to report annually to congressional committees. Specifically, DHS needs to work on how it identifies critical infrastructure such that it is consistent with the National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP). GAO recommends the DHS commission an external peer review to develop an approach to verify the quality and timing of annual reports.”
Sounds like a not too consequential, and likely dull, report.
Then I read the report.
DHS has made several changes to its criteria for including assets on the NCIPP list. These changes initially focused on introducing criteria to make the lists entirely consequence based, with subsequent changes intended to introduce specialized criteria for some sectors and assets. DHS’s changes to the NCIPP criteria have changed the composition of the NCIPP list, which has had an impact on users of the list. However, DHS does not have a process to identify the impact of these changes on users nor has it validated its approach for developing the list.
Our analysis shows that changes to the NCIPP list can have an impact on users of the list, specifically, FEMA’s allocation of UASI grant funds and PSAs’ ability to prioritize outreach and conduct site visits for its protection programs. Our analysis of the FEMA risk formula shows that a change in the number of NCIPP-listed assets located in a city has an impact on a city’s relative risk score. Our analysis also shows that current UASI grant allocations are strongly associated with a city’s current relative risk score. Therefore, a change in the number of NCIPP-listed assets located in a city can have an impact on the level of grant funding it receives. For example, in fiscal year 2012, FEMA allocated approximately $490 million in UASI grant funds to the 31 cities with the highest relative risk scores out of 102 eligible cities nationwide. Our analysis of FEMA’s risk formula showed that, at the minimum, if the number of level 2 assets is increased or decreased by as few as two for each city, it would change the relative risk score for 5 of the 31 cities that received fiscal year 2012 UASI grant funding. Such a change could result in increased or decreased grant funding allocations for the affected cities. The changes in the relative risk scores tend to affect cities in the middle to the bottom of the top 31 list because there is generally a larger gap between the relative risk scores of those cities at the top of the list than those in the middle to bottom of the list. However, even a small change in grant funding could have an impact on a city, especially if that city does not traditionally receive other federal assistance as compared with cities with higher risk scores.
And yeah, this might have a significant impact:
While the change to an entirely consequence-based list created a common approach to identify infrastructure and align the program with the statute and NIPP, recent and planned criteria changes to accommodate certain sectors and assets represent a departure from this common approach, which could hinder DHS’s ability to compare infrastructure across sectors.
Go intra-agency coordination! NCIPP, FEMA, and PSA are all housed in one federal department, the Dept. of Homeland Security, and information-sharing problems seem to linger.
But let's not get too snarky. DHS is taking on the arduous task of changing the, at times politicized, NCIPP list. Getting more Congressional oversight on this hot-bottom item will bring, whatever its numerous benefits, will bring increased political pressures on a program--especially in the lean (or not so lean) times of sequestration.
WaPo misses the mark, and Canada may be the sequestration-avoidance winner. Today the Washington Post (WaPo) reports on how one federal program 'beat' the sequester, highlighting Department of Agricultural's ability to snag meat inspectors funding. WaPo's take on the strategy: If one Agricultural program could win, so can others; ergo, sequester isn't playing out the way we want.
Well, the conclusion's sound: Sequestration isn't playing out the way some commentators said it would. But seeing as sequestration really starts today, it seems a little early to be writing sequester's post-script. And sequester 2.0, i.e. next year's cuts called for in the 10-year cost-cutting plan, still have to be played out. But, less impressive, is WaPo's omission that the FY13 continuing resolution that enshrines sequester in the final six months of the current fiscal year (FY), which one Agr. program avoided, came along with four new FY13 appropriation packages. So, really, Defense, Homeland Security (DHS), Commerce/Justice/State, Veterans Affairs/Military Construction all 'beat' sequestration to varying extents. In fact, DHS got roughly the same agency-wide funding as it did last budget cycle. I doubt these agencies will be asking Agr. Secretary Tom Vislack for sequester advice any time soon. To sum-up: WaPo mistakes a tree for the forest, and--in so doing--misses the gravity of sequestration's interesting FY13 implementation. And then WaPo gets tree myopia, and doesn't really illuminate sequestration's 10-year 'loop'.
But, perhaps more interesting to readers, is figuring out what country has benefited the most from FY13's unusual sequestration implementation.Given the extensive military acquisition, trade, and border security relationship between Canada and the United States, maybe WaPo should cast Canada as sequestration's Biggest Winner.
