Green Development

Federal Task Force Sends Recommendations to President on Fostering Clean Coal Technology

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 08/12/2010 - 23:35.

It is worth noting that two days after 70+ Cleveland-area citizens came together in unified citizen action and opposition against coal burning in their neighborhood of University Circle, the EPA sent out a press release that "President Obama’s Interagency Task Force on Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS), co-chaired by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Energy (DOE), delivered a series of recommendations to the president today on overcoming the barriers to the widespread, cost-effective deployment of CCS within 10 years" and "the report concludes that CCS can play an important role in domestic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions while preserving the option of using coal and other abundant domestic fossil energy resources."

That conclusion will be at the center of intense debate, experimentation and demonstration, to the tune of $10s billions, over the ten year vision of this policy statement, until some event brings such spending to a stop - science and economic reality push innovation above the industrial din of mountaintop removal and churning urban furnaces.

Federal clean coal funding is the stimulus for plans like MCCO was developing to continue burning coal into the future, and expand coal capacity to DEMONSTRATE innovative clean coal technologies (which are not yet in practice here). Such visionary science has a role in the big system of solutions for the world, but delays clean energy innovation of the type that would offer immediate human benefits in communities like Cleveland that cannot wait for the bleeding edge to arrive... too much real bleeding from environmental injustice here right now.

Think how close Cleveland, Case, UH and MCCO Leaders came to getting this headline: "Clean coal dream a costly nightmare"

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 08/12/2010 - 19:37.

Informed realNEO stakeholders remember that the Cleveland City Council made a pact with the devil to sell the city and region down the environmental toilet by signing a 50 year commitment for AMP Ohio "clean coal" power purchases for Cleveland Public Power - the economics of that dirty rotten deal collapsed last year, thank God.

But that has not been the only dirty clean-coal deal in the works around here, as MCCO has been planning to build additional coal burning capacity for the plant needs of University Circle... a bullet the community is fighting to dodge right now, while attempting to shut down the current coal burning facilities MCCO has polluted the region with since 1932... all of which now seems to be blowing up in the master planners of this region's faces like a mountain-top full of high sulfur coal in West Viginie

As MCCO fights to maintain the rights and economic wherewithal to burn what coal it may - up to 50,000 tons per year -  a few sorry other communities weren't so fortunate to have the brakes put on their clean-coal-insanity before the shovels hit dirt, meaning their shit is hitting the fan... as in the cost of the projects are through the roof and rising...  the most sorry being the Peabody Energy Prairie State Energy Campus coal industry orgy in Illinois... read the sorry details below from the Chicago Tribune and thank your lucky stars at least we don't have a multi-billion-dollar mess like that to subsidize and breathe emissions from for the next 50 years! Phew... read what happens in REALLY poorly led communities, like outside Chicago, below...

If You Are Wondering What Will Be The Second Brightest Greenest Customer After MCCO... Biomass Needed At FirstEnergy

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 08/12/2010 - 06:26.


Map 7.1: Potential Biomass Energy Distribution among Ohio Counties (in Billions)

In an important development from the Ohio Public Utilities Commission, the Plain Dealer reports today that "FirstEnergy Corp. gets permission to burn biomass as sustainable energy source". I previously highlighted this issue on realNEO, as the environmental concerns raised about this plant revolve around developing sustainable fuel stocks for such massive biomass initiatives as the R. E. Burger power plant in Shadyside, Ohio... as burning wood is not the solution... even refuse wood from recycling. But that is all that is on the horizon, for this plant so far... "FirstEnergy spokeswoman Ellen Raines said the company is spending $200 million to re-design and renovate Burger's boilers to be able to burn a mixture of green wood chips, wood pellets and briquettes and something very similar to charcoal."

There isn't enough refuse wood biomass to go around, and the carbon foot print of deforestation for biomass is poor. That is why I propose the state of Ohio take THE global leadership position innovating agricultural biomass optimization, which I believe includes hemp. Thus, the proposal to make Northeast Ohio the Open Source Capital of the Brightest Greenest State on Earth.

PD Continues... Case Western Reserve University steam plant may wait months for decision about permit renewal

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Thu, 08/12/2010 - 05:46.

Mattie Reitman of the Sierra Club standing-up to EPA against MCCO burning coal in University Circle Cleveland Ohio
Mattie Reitman of the Sierra Club standing-up to EPA against MCCO burning coal in University Circle, Cleveland, Ohio

John Funk of the Cleveland Plain Dealer continued his expanding coverage of the dangerous situation in University Circle that is the Medical Center Company. Outlining the timeline below, Funk highlights that "The permit, the facility's first ever, expired in 2003, and authorities have been reviewing the company's renewal application ever since" and "Built in 1932 and expanded with gas boilers as needed, the steam plant is operated by the Medical Center Co., a non-profit corporation whose board of directors represent CWRU and the major institutions that make up University Circle. The plant burns about 40,000 tons of coal per year." At issue is the renewal by the EPA of their permit to continue burning coal for five more years, which is outragous.Public feedback to the EPA is encouraged!

The article is included in entirety below to protect this information for public health and safety...

Case Western Reserve University steam plant may wait months for decision about permit renewal

Billionaires aren't used to being told what to do by citizens - congratulations!

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Wed, 08/11/2010 - 20:55.

If you wonder why some powerful people in town and their pawns and puppets have been up in arms about realNEO and us bringing MCCO to trial... take a look at these financials (tons of money) and realize MCCO is listed as a Non-Profit Foundation for "Public, Society Benefit – Multipurpose and Other: Fund Raising and/or Fund Distribution" and a "Charitable Organization" - which is perverse, as they in fact cause immense public harm and they shouldn't even have this exemption... and should be "For Profit" and Paying Taxes

With 2009 assets of $66 million and annual sales over $33 million, MCCO was gaming another $500 million (according to former East Cleveland Mayor Brewer) in new funding (probably federal money) to build a new COAL facility at Lakeview and Euclid... even bought the land. The Opportunity Corridor is also being discussed - and the public is asked to wait a year before seeing any plans... as MCCO asks for a 5 year coal burning extension to operate as is for $150+ million more in activity - to burn 220,000+ TONS more coal... spew around 25,000 TONS more pollution...

Doctors at University Hospitals Should Turn In Their Licenses to Practice Medicine, as Hypocrits

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Wed, 08/11/2010 - 10:25.

The Hippocratic Oath is an oath historically taken by doctors swearing to practice medicine ethically.

As they do not practice medicine ethically, all Doctors at University Hospitals Must Turn In Their Licenses to Practice Medicine - including my Father - as they do more harm than good as they pollute this community with soot from burning coal that is unnecessary and that causes certain harm and death to area citizens - especially the young, old, poor, black and weak... and these supposed "doctors" know that very well now.

Make Friday the 13th Very Unlucky for Slacker, Failing NOACA Governing Board Members

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Tue, 08/10/2010 - 14:13.
08/13/2010 - 10:00
08/13/2010 - 12:00
Etc/GMT-5

NOACA Attendance Sheet through July

Beautifully timed, just days after the EPA Hearing about MCCO's permit to burn coal in excessively polluted Northeast Ohio for five more years, and in the middle of a Smog-Wave and air pollution crisis - as citizens awaken to the fact their air pollution monitoring for Northeast Ohio has been broken by NOACA (Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency - which is responsible for managing air quality here... for as long as there has been a NOACA) - the NOACA Governing Board is meeting on their unluckiest Friday the 13th ever.

The Cuyahoga Democratic Party has asked for the resignation of two of their most powerful and ineffective leaders - Jimmy DiMora is on the NOACA Governing Board and has not personally attended one meeting this year - neither has Tim Hagan. Neither has Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson - his planning Director Bob Brown only attended three... same with Commissioner Jones. RTA Boss Dixon - none. Port representative Raskind - none.  ODOT representative - 2 out of 6 meetings. NOBODY FROM THE EPA.

Citizens must now recognize the breadth of their influence and failure, causing failure of the region and state though such vehicles as the governing board of NOACA.

Location

NOACA
1299 Superior Avenue
Cleveland, OH
United States

Testimony to the EPA about MCCO from Sharon Dowhaniuk Roulet, of Tremont and Old Brooklyn

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Tue, 08/10/2010 - 01:28.

My daughter Kylie says SHE shall be the first woman President, and I certainly believe that is possible, if she lives long enough to run.... and her older sister Grace doesn't beat her to the job. You win either way - they are socially conscious!

Those reading realNEO who are real old-time Tremonters will know or remember Kylie's mother, Sharon Dowhaniuk Roulet - Roman's little girl - real Ukranian family... Baba still lives overlooking Mittal... barely. Guido is dead.

Sharon asked me to submit her testimony to the EPA about MCCO, in case she can't get a sitter for the hearing, and I'm sure the realNEO community will be moved by her words as well. I certainly appreciate her words of support for me, as they come so rare here. Thanks Cheri.

Good afternoon:

My name is Sharon Roulet and I was born on September 10th, 1977 at Metro health medical center. I was raised in a home approximately 1 mile away at 2531 Scranton Rd. I was born the middle child with 2 brothers. In the early 80's Tremont was not one of the safest areas to have a family. My father worked at LTV steel and for the city of Cleveland. We were of the lower class. Even though my father worked hard we did not have the money to move elsewhere.

PD Writes: Old-fashioned Ohio coal still being burned at tech-savvy University Circle institutions

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Mon, 08/09/2010 - 19:55.

This excellent article on the MCCO coal burning powerplant in University Circle - Old-fashioned Ohio coal still being burned at tech-savvy University Circle institutions - by the Plain Dealer's John Funk speaks for itself... and is truthful to the best of my knowledge... and I learned some important new information. Thank you John Funk!  I've included the entire PD article below in the interest of public safety.

Thank you Mattie and the Sierra Club for making all this happen - love the conclusion... "The solutions are not as forth coming as some might think," Reitman said. "You can't just put up a wind turbine and call it warm." Now to get a timeline in writing from MCCO for all aspects of their planning to move off coal, WITH CITIZEN INVOLVEMENT!

Old-fashioned Ohio coal still being burned at tech-savvy University Circle institutions

John Funk, The Plain Dealer

The tall smokes stacks at the back of the Case Western Reserve University campus belong to the Medical Center Co., a non-profit that has been burning coal for nearly 80 years to heat CWRU and much of University Circle.

Good Morning real NEO - last night the air was unhealthy... were your windows open?

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Mon, 08/09/2010 - 01:22.


August 9, 2010 Ohio EPA AirNow web portal air pollution current conditions for Northeast Ohio - 1:00 AM Report
Unhealthy For Sensitive Groups in Cleveland and surrounding communities, as it was all prior day and last night... now?

Good Morning real NEO - last night the air was unhealthy... were your windows open?

It seemed like a beautiful Sunday night for sleeping with the windows open but you should not have last night. You should have known better. Did you know the air pollution would make you unhealthy last night? Were you warned it would be unhealthy today?

REALNEO Tech Committee RFI From Most Active realNEO Members And Supposed Board And Officers, etc...

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Sat, 08/07/2010 - 13:11.

As it is time for realNEO to assign a new administrator, I recommend to the membership Ramzi Harb
(see below), who is a world class technologist, programmer and musician... the drummer featured here

I sent this out by email to the following realneo members who came to mind for feedback on some technology changes immediately brought upon the REALNEO.US technology committee today - I did not mean to exclude any members of the general realNEO/realcoop community and encourage each of you to comment or email me at norm [at] realneo [dot] us if you want to help address these issues and be active with the Tech Committee for REALNEO.

Let's make this a truly great new day in realNEO!

Most active realneo members and supposed board and officers, etc...

Norm Roulet <norm [dot] roulet [at] gmail [dot] com> Sat, Aug 7, 2010 at 1:55 PM
To:

Most active realneo members and supposed board and officers, etc...

I've included here people who are likely realneo/realcoop board members as I have requested a board meeting for over a year and now it seems we just need to get down to business.

It seems Jeff S is no longer on tech support and I'm determining if anyone is - I have people who can cover this so I just want facts.

Back of napkin sketch of new I-90 Bridge - Cleveland Of My Dreams

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Sat, 08/07/2010 - 11:37.


Cleveland Institute of Art BFA and Kent State University Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative planning Master
Joseph Stanley
had a more intelligent design for the future of Cleveland than the leaders of our community have embraced

Back of napkin sketch of new I-90 Bridge... blending of visioning with Ed Hauser, Joe Stanley and Ken Prendergast...

FIRST - REPLACE ALL ODOT LEADERSHIP, CONSULTANTS, PLANNERS, ENGINEERS, ARCHITECTS AND POLITICIANS WHO EVER TOUCHED THIS DISASTER.

IMPRISON AS MANY AS POSSIBLE FOR AS LONG AS POSSIBLE.

TERMINATE ALL RTA LEADERSHIP

Keep the damn bridge we already have and decommission it for highway use - the carbon footprint return on saving this embodied carbon and not wasting unmeasurable more pollution buiilding an unnecessary new bridge alone is worth $ billions.

Pay the union mafia $ millions to stop crying about jobs and go do something to improve the world

Report Prior to Medical Center Company hearing on Tuesday!

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Fri, 08/06/2010 - 11:48.

Report Prior to Medical Center Company hearing on Tuesday!

Norm Roulet <norm [dot] roulet [at] gmail [dot] com> Fri, Aug 6, 2010 at 12:44 PM
To: "Aneesh P. Chopra"
Cc: "Reitman, Mattie" <mattie [dot] reitman [at] sierraclub [dot] org>

Aneesh P. Chopra
Assistant to the President and Chief Technology Officer
Associate Director for Technology
Executive Office of the President
Office of Science and Technology Policy
Washington, DC 20502

Dear Mr. Chopra,

We met briefly at the City Club of Cleveland and I requested your card to follow-up regarding an investigation into irregularities in our environmental monitoring data and technologies in Ohio.

I am preparing to report on these concerns to the EPA, in writing and during a permit renewal hearing in Cleveland, August 10, 2010, highlighting the fact that the citizens of Cleveland, Northeast Ohio and the world have been denied accurate, actionable air quality data here for so long, and our air quality monitoring systems are so poorly architected, it is safe to say we have no idea how polluted and polluting we are. As such, no permits to pollute further should be issued here.

I'm actually preparing my report on all this for the CTO of America

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Fri, 08/06/2010 - 09:10.

Medical Center Company hearing on Tuesday!

Norm Roulet <norm [dot] roulet [at] gmail [dot] com> Fri, Aug 6, 2010 at 10:07 AM
To: "Reitman, Mattie" <mattie [dot] reitman [at] sierraclub [dot] org>

Mattie,

I'm actually preparing my report on all this for the CIO (CTO) of America, who I have met and have direct access - he is a young Googlie techie Indian-American who embraces open source and innovation of the world through technology - what I am realizing is there has been an intentional crippling of the entire nation's environmental monitoring - this stuff the EPA is using is the worst implementation of IT I have ever seen and it is how we measure our pollution for the world...

Get it... for the world...?!

This is old tech put in place in the Bush era to keep the world from knowing how polluted we are - how polluting we are - to hide that from the world to make us look better than we are - Bush was gaming the entire world on pollution and we lose.

After reading your message, I'm concerned about the human impacts of pollution in northeast Ohio.

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Wed, 08/04/2010 - 12:43.

Daily Air Quality Forecast for Cleveland-Akron-Lorain

Reitman, Mattie <mattie [dot] reitman [at] sierraclub [dot] org> Wed, Aug 4, 2010 at 12:13 PM
To: "Carroll, Matthew" <MCarroll [at] city [dot] cleveland [dot] oh [dot] us>
Cc: Norm Roulet <norm [dot] roulet [at] gmail [dot] com>, "Ryan, John (Brown)" <John_Ryan [at] brown [dot] senate [dot] gov>, "pamszoo [at] sbcglobal [dot] net" <pamszoo [at] sbcglobal [dot] net>, "sgreenberg [at] ehw [dot] org" <sgreenberg [at] ehw [dot] org>

Matt, thanks for the update on this issue.  After reading your message, I'm concerned about the human impacts of pollution in northeast Ohio.
 
First and quite simply, I think that it's inadequate to expect networked monitors in a region as large as northeast Ohio to be able to compensate for each other's outages, and that it's a matter of opinion whether high particulate levels are unhealthy only if they persist for a 24-hour period.  I'd say it's downright insensitive to claim otherwise, particularly for those who live in a relatively less polluted area.

Rideshare to Washington DC - leave TONIGHT - return TOMORROW night

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Tue, 08/03/2010 - 12:56.
08/04/2010 - 00:00
08/05/2010 - 06:00
Etc/GMT-4

It seems I suddenly need to go to Washington DC to meet with Federal officials about air pollution in Northeast Ohio. As timing is critical, I need to leave tonight and drive - returning tomorrow night. Rather than make the trip alone, wasting all that gas for just one person, I thought I 'd see if anyone else in the realNEO community would like to share a ride to-and-from DC for a day-trip there - we should be there for full business hours... 8am-midnight.

Location

White House, etc. Washington, DC
United States
Phone: unlisted

TUESDAY MORNING IN CLEVELAND AND ALL AROUND NORTHEAST OHIO - THE AIR IS UNSAFE TO BREATHE

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Tue, 08/03/2010 - 09:45.


The NOACA Air Pollution Time Series line chart left above shows the region has had unsafe air quality since midnight, as per many monitoring stations - Cleveland is excluded from this chart but represented in the Rose Chart right above, which indicates the air in Cleveland was Unsafe at least at 5 and 6 AM, before they cut the data stream off.... meaning it is likely unsafe NOW. DO NOT TRUST THEIR DATA BEFORE 5 AM!

Right now - TUESDAY MORNING IN CLEVELAND AND ALL AROUND NORTHEAST OHIO - the air appears unsafe to breathe. According to data hidden throughout air quality monitoring reporting in the region, our air has been AT BEST UNSAFE FOR SENSITIVE GROUPS since MIDNIGHT. In other words... it is still UNSAFE from yesterday. Of course, the Ohio EPA forecast for today was "Moderate".

I am in contact with the Senator's staff about these conflicts of interest

Submitted by Norm Roulet on Mon, 08/02/2010 - 18:48.
MCCO/Case Coal Burner Robert Brown

Mattie Reitman with the Sierra Club just forwarded me his communications with the Chairman of Medical Center Company, Robert Brown - who is Treasurer of Case.... and Senator Sherrod Brown's brother... the PD's Connie Schultz' Brother-in-Law... major regional coal-burner and source-point polluter. Through Brown's leadership MCCO operates a secretive coal burning, polluting steam plant for University Circle in my backyard, causing 1,000s of tons of pollution a year in my backyard, harming us each and every day... which I am fighting with the Sierra Club to shut-down.

Sherrod Brown has proven to be a pro-coal Senator. The PD basically denies global warming exists, loves coal, and ignores the issue of environmental injustice entirely.

I am in contact with the Senator's staff about these conflicts of interest, as I am dealing with his brother's pollution, I don't like that my Senator is pro-coal, I don't like that his wife's monopoly newspaper ignores pollution.

As you will see below, Mattie politely asked Robert Brown to arrange for better communications between MCCO and neighbors like myself, including "putting energy into something like" forums on moving MCCO off coal... and Brown said no.