10.9.25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Radio Wise Diary of Science and Nature. Your
reader's Kelly Taylor. I'll have articles on the topics of
science and nature, But first a reminder that radioi is
a reading service intended for people who are blind or
have other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.
From Wired magazine, we have an article that is headlined

(00:24):
why US power bills are surging. This is from October fourth.
Like most Americans this month, your most recent power bill
may have given you a shock. Residential electricity rates have
risen fast across the United States, more than thirty percent
on average since twenty twenty, and almost double the rate

(00:47):
of inflation in the past year, with no end in sight.
It's not great for anyone's budget, whether you're a renter
or an industrialist. High electricity prices ripple beyond consumers and
throughout the whole economy, disrupting manufacturing, construction, transportation, and more.
And of course, electricity prices are a huge political issue.

(01:11):
President Donald Trump campaigned on cutting energy prices in half,
and now that they're moving in the wrong direction, he
has taken to blaming renewables the cheapest sources of new
generation and promised six hundred and twenty five million dollars
to the ailing US coal industry. Power bills are becoming

(01:32):
a hot button in local politics too, like the New
Jersey governor's race, and you'll likely see them featured in
more political ads. Given how fast and how high electricity
prices have jumped, just how worried should we be? Is
this a crisis, something that's going to put more households
in danger of getting their power shut off while driving

(01:53):
up inflation and slow in growth. Or is this a
return to normal after an era of unusually low prices.
There are several dynamics driving the current power price spike.
Rising electricity demand, volatile fuel prices, inflation, tariffs, a slow

(02:14):
down in transmission line construction, and long delays in adding
new generators to the power grid are all conspiring to
create more expensive utility bills. And these variables aren't changing
direction anytime soon, so unfortunately, your bills will likely rise further. Quote.

(02:35):
All of those factors are combining to create a scenario
in which there could be long lived, year over year
increases in electricity prices, it says John Quigley, a senior
fellow at the Kleiman Center for Energy policy at the
University of Pennsylvania. High electricity prices hit the poorest households

(02:58):
the hardest, since they spend a larger share of their
money on their power bills. Power shut offs you to
non payment. We're already rising. At the beginning of the year,
close to eighty million Americans have to trade off between
paying their electricity bills and other expenses like healthcare and housing,
and utilities are asking their regulators to raise rates further.

(03:23):
Quote to a big segment of households, lower income even
moderate income households. It's already a crisis, quickly said, but
there is some important context you have to consider, and
some of the big picture trends are actually working to
help us spend less on energy and reduce our impact

(03:43):
on the environment. How quickly this happens, though, will depend
on policy decisions in the near term. One thing to
keep in mind is that electricity is just one form
of energy that you use. You may also have to
pay for natural gas for heating and cooking, as well
as gasoline for your sedan or pickup truck. But many

(04:04):
American homes are electrifying, trading gas furnaces for more efficient
heat pumps, gas burners for induction stoves and V eight
engines for electric motors. Electric Power Research Institute, a nonprofit
think tank, dubbed this combined basket of household electricity and
fuel spending as the quote energy wallet end quote, using

(04:26):
it as a way to track how these trends are
changing over time while accounting for fuel switching. Last month,
EPRI released a report calculating that in twenty twenty four,
the average annual US energy wallet spending was five five
hundred and thirty dollars per household. Gasoline was the largest

(04:47):
slice of that pie at twenty nine hundred and thirty
dollars per household, while electricity was eighteen hundred and fifty dollars.
Adjusting for inflation, overall energy spending as actually he held
fairly steady since two thousand and Prior to twenty twenty four,
electricity spending was mostly level as well. Perhaps it's more

(05:09):
remarkable that overall energy spending was so stable for so long.
Now electricity prices are surging in addition to all of
the uncorked demand from the COVID nineteen pandemic. When the
global economic slow down and pressure from policy makers kept
a lid on utility bills. Quote. I think if we

(05:31):
were to repeat this analysis for next year, there would
probably be a little bit of an uptick this year,
But the data that I'm looking at doesn't suggest a
really significant increase in the historical context. That's Jeffrey Blandford,
lead author of epri's report. But there isn't just one
story unfolding across the country. The US has a particularly

(05:56):
chaotic energy system. How much people pay to light their home,
stay warm, and get around varies a lot from state
to state and even among neighbors. For example, Texas households
tend to spend a larger share of their budgets on
keeping their pickup trucks running, while families in Massachusetts spend
a greater portion on staying warm. So, no, we're not

(06:19):
in an energy crisis, but it's unlikely that your power
bills will come down anytime soon. There is some good
news though, In the years ahead, Americans are actually poised
to spend a smaller share of their incomes on energy overall,
as technology makes it more cost effective to shift away
from fossil fuels quote. In our forward looking scenarios, one

(06:44):
of the key drivers for change is electrification particularly like
neuty vehicles. Blanford said this tends to actually reduce the
energy while in in real terms per household over time,
even as you're spending more on electricity. Though electric car
sales have slowed down in the US, they are still
rolling into more driveways, and as homes and appliance has

(07:07):
become more efficient, that will help reduce energy bills as well.
Based on current trends, the average US household energy wallet
will shrink by thirty six percent by twenty fifty, with
state level declines anywhere from ten to fifty percent, according
to the report looking ahead to the upcoming winter. There
are also things that policymakers can do to soften the

(07:30):
blow of higher electricity rates for the most vulnerable families.
One is to bolster initiatives like the Low Income Home
Energy Assistance Program and initiative Trump wanted to eliminate. Another
is to impose generation requirements on major new power users,

(07:50):
like data centers to run AI models so they aren't
competing with households for existing electrons on the grid. Quote
these dats, which are kind of ground zero of all
the angst about increasing costs, they should be without question
required to bring their own power quickly said, and there
needs to be a major push to deploy more generation

(08:13):
and upgrades to the power grid as particularly energy storage.
Grid scale batteries have seen breathtaking growth in the past
few years, but there's still a small segment of the
energy mix. Quote. There needs to be a huge push
to foster battery deployment. Quiggly said, the quickest way to
bring on new generation is to look at solar and

(08:33):
storage in quote. We're still facing chaos in the energy industry,
and the Trump administration isn't making things easy for utilities,
power providers, and even the fossil fuel industry. But we
have many of the tools we need to manage higher
utility prices if we're willing to invest in them. For

(08:54):
US normal people, the US Department of Energy recommends tactics
like conducting a home energy audit, using energy efficient appliances,
installing double pane windows and ceiling gaps indoors. Now we'll
switch to a sort of related article from Reuter's News agency.

(09:16):
This is October seventh, and its headlined global renewable power
output overtakes coal For the first time, renewable energy sources
generated more electricity than coal globally for the first time
in the first half of twenty twenty five, driven by
rapid growth in China and India. A report by think

(09:37):
tank Imber showed on Tuesday, curbing coal power generation, which
emits around double the amount of carbon dioxide as gas generation,
is regarded as vital by most scientists to meeting global
climate targets. Renewables such as wind and solar supplied five thousand,

(09:58):
seventy two tarot wa hours of electricity globally between January
and June, surpassing coal's four thousand, eight hundred ninety six
tarrawat hours. Quote. We are seeing the first signs of
a crucial turning point, says Malgorzata Viatros Mattoya, senior electricity

(10:22):
analyst at Ember. Quote. Solar and wind are now growing
fast enough to meet the world's growing appetite for electricity
in quote. Global electricity demand increased two point six percent,
or three hundred and sixty nine tarawatt hours in the
first half of twenty twenty five, compared with the same
period in twenty twenty four, which was more than met

(10:45):
by a three hundred and six tarrawat hour increase in
solar power and a ninety seven tarawat hour in wind
power output. The shift to renewables was driven largely by
China and India. China, the world's largest electricity consumer, reduced
fossil fuel generation by two percent, while its solar and

(11:07):
wind generation grew by forty three percent and sixteen percent, respectively.
In India, there were increases in wind and solar generation
of twenty nine and thirty one percent, respectively, which helped
the country reduce coal and gas use by three point
one percent. Fossil Fuel generation, however, rose in both the

(11:28):
United States and European Union during the same period, as
stronger demand growth and weaker wind and hydropower output forced
greater reliance on coal and gas. In the US, coal
generation rose by seventeen percent as gas generation fell by
four percent, while in Europe, gas fired power generation rose

(11:50):
by fourteen percent and coal by one percent. US President
Donald Trump, a climate change skeptic, earlier this year, signed
executive orders aimed at boosting coal production, and last month
also pledged support for coal fired power plants. Well, let's

(12:12):
turn out to National Geographic this article dated October sixth
as the following headline, how a warming planet is wreaking
havoc on your skin. As dermatologist Mario hy Wei Why
or Way Anyway, biked to her University of California San

(12:35):
Francisco clinic one day in November of twenty eighteen, she
looked up at the white flakes drifting from the sky.
She quickly realized it wasn't snowfalling but ash. Quote. It
was ash from the twenty eighteen campfire, which was one
hundred and seventy five miles away, says Way. I was

(12:55):
wondering what the impact was on my lungs, and then
I questioned what about my skin? Ute Way saw the
effects her stand over the next few weeks, her clinic
at the University of California, San Diego, San Francisco treated
a spike in patients reporting skin issues. She saw cases
of eczema sore in San Francisco, along with clinic visits

(13:19):
for psoriasis and general complaints about itchiness. Climate change is
making the planet hotter and worsening air pollution caused by
natural disasters such as wildfires. But how do these changes
affect the largest organ on your body, your skin? And
can you actually build a skin care routine that shields

(13:40):
your skin from the extremes of a warming planet. Quote.
The effects of climate change are more powerful than any
skin care product, says Harvard Medical School dermatologist Arion Shoddy Kuroche.
Here's what dermatologists say you can do and what won't
make it difference when it comes to protecting your skin.

(14:03):
As global temperatures rise, excessive heat is causing existing skin
conditions to become inflamed, increasing skin cancer risk. Skin is
our largest organ and it's the primary interface with our environment,
says Eva Parker, dermatologist at Vanderbilt Medical Center in Tennessee.

(14:25):
A twenty twenty four review by the International Exema Council
showed that severe heat and sweating can make people scratch more,
aggravating exima symptoms, which Parker sees in her patients in Tennessee.
Extreme heat and sweat also exacerbate psoriasis and facial flushing

(14:47):
from lupus, says Parker. She adds that these issues are
appearing earlier in the spring and later into the fall
because hotter days are beginning earlier in the year and
lasting longer into the fall. Third year Harvard medical student
and study author Natalie Baker has also seen how heat

(15:07):
affects skin conditions in Boston clinics during unusually hot summers.
One patient with cutaneous T cell lymphoma, a type of
cancer that can cause rashes and scaly skin, told Baker
in her clinic visits the itching was absolutely unbearable during
the summer. Patients suffering from hydradenitis superativa, a condition that

(15:33):
causes painful abscesses on the skin, also reported more severe
symptoms during periods of heat and humidity, which creates a
breeding ground for bacteria and can cause skin irritation as
the abscesses create friction against clothing. I have patients in
the clinic who say, I'm on the edge of my
seat all summer, just waiting for myself to flare again,

(15:55):
says Baker. Here's a tip, keep cool and high. Dermatologists
recommend staying as cool as possible to prevent exacerbating these
skin issues when outside during heat waves. Broad grimmed hats,
long sleeved ultra violet protection factor shirts, and staying in
the shade when possible both keep the body cool and

(16:17):
protect the skin from sun damage. De Hydration from fluid
loss through sweating can also make the skin dryer and
more irritated, so staying hydrated is key. As climate change
makes wildfires more frequent and intense, the air quality effects
are far reaching. Just like the flaky white debris wheat

(16:37):
Wiy saw in California seven years ago, Many, if not all,
inflammatory diseases will be affected by air pollution, including wildfire smoke,
says Whey. When wildfires burn, they release pollutants like fine
particulate matter, which can trigger oxidative stress damaging the skin.

(16:59):
Since the skin its barrier function is already impaired in
EXEMA patients, air pollution is more easily able to enter
the pores of the skin and cause irritation. In Sarrias's patients,
air pollution causes an inflammatory response, where the body's immune
system releases inflammatory chemicals into the bloodstream that trigger a

(17:20):
skin flare up, says way Kuoche also noticed an unusually
high number of patients with EXIMA flare ups when Canadian
wildfires shrouded Boston and Smoke in June of twenty twenty three.
Exima's peak season is typically the winter months when the
air is drier, so a flood of EXIMA patients in

(17:41):
June was unexpected. The clinic would normally see under twenty
patients in a summer month for eczema, but during wildfires
the number jumped to one hundred and sixty. Even more surprising,
Kuoche says, patients who never dealt with skin issues were
suddenly reporting irritation. Way's team in San Francisco saw the

(18:02):
same thing in twenty eighteen, so they tracked online searches
in the region before, during, and after the campfire, observing
a sharp increase in searches about itching, coordinated with the
spike in dermatologists visits. Koch explains that when issuing public
recommendations to stay indoors and use an air purified during

(18:24):
the Los Angeles wildfires early this year, she thought of
many of her own patients who couldn't afford or access
these preventative measures. They may not have resources, says Kurochi.
Their job may require day labor outdoors, they may not
have that luxury to stay inside. People without access to

(18:46):
indoor filtration systems, for example, are more likely to have
existing skin conditions and allergies triggered by wildfire smoke. According
to a preprint published earlier this year that reviewed forty
recent study on climate impacts and skin health, but routine
exposure to periods of smoke may also cause long term

(19:08):
damage to the skin. Way's research team at University of California,
San Francisco is reviewing studies around the world on skin
cancer and firefighters, and although the analysis is not yet completed,
Way estimates there's about a two to threefold increase in
the risk of skin cancer in firefighters compared with the

(19:29):
rest of the population. There's another tip use antioxidants, sunscreen,
and moisturizer for a skincare routine that considers air pollution.
Corroch recommends starting the day with a serum that includes antioxidants,
followed by a moisturizer with seramides and a mineral based sunscreen.

(19:52):
Minerals in some sunscreens, like zinc, titanium, and iron oxide,
don't just protect against sunlight, but also provide a shield
against pollution. Algae and green tea leaves are trending in
the world of anti pollution skin care for their anti
inflammatory and antioxidant properties. Products that contain vitamin C also

(20:15):
claim to prevent collagen degradation that may be caused by
air pollution, and studies have found that some plant extracts
like from Gensen. Camelia and brown algae do protect against
oxidative stress. For your nighttime skin care routine, Corro suggests
using a cleanser to wash pollution off the skin, followed

(20:37):
by a moisturizer with seramides to restore the skin's barrier,
which may have been degraded throughout the day. There's some
debate about whether using moisturizers provides an extra barrier against
pollutants or whether it traps pollutants to be stuck on
the skin. This area needs further study. Gut health is

(20:59):
linked to skin health, and probiotic treatments are becoming more
popular to treat skin conditions, says Parker, although research is
still emerging on the connection and the effectiveness of probiotics
to treat air pollution damage. Dermatologists say monitoring air quality

(21:20):
and preventing damage during these poor air quality days is
key to protecting your skin. Keep windows shut and wear
a mask and protective clothing. If you go outside, well,
we're going to turn down to the Los Angeles times.
Majestic wild horses are trampling Mono lakes other worldly landscape.

(21:46):
The FEDS plan around up. This is October seventh, several
dozen horses calmly grays along the shores of Mono Lake,
a sparkling saline expanse spread out before the jagged Sierra
Nevada Mountains. The September sun is blazing. A pair of

(22:07):
brown horses come up side by side and stare intensely
at an approaching visitor. These wild equines soon may disappear
from beside the ancient lake. The prospect is stirring emotional
disagreement over the future of the herd, which has surged
to more than three times what federal officials say the

(22:28):
land can support. These horses deserve a place to rome
and be free, but around Mono Lake is not the place,
said BArch Miller of the Mono Lake Committee, an environmental nonprofit.
Earlier this year, the US Forest Service and Bureau of
Land Management approved a plan to round up and remove

(22:49):
hundreds of wild horses roaming beyond the roughly two hundred
thousand acres designated for them along the California and Nevada border.
No date has been set, but it could be as
soon as this fall. It would be a relief for
some environmentalists say the horses are degrading the otherworldly landscape
at Monolate, including bird habitat and its stained tufa textured

(23:14):
rock columns that would look at home on Mars. Ranchers
say the animals are gobbling down plants needed to sustain
their cattle. Federal officials highlight the safety hazard posed by
horses that have wandered on the highways. Others see the
move as a travesty. One method to house the horses
would use helicopters to drive them into a trap, which

(23:38):
animal welfare groups say creates dangerous, even deadly situations for horses.
A pending federal bill would ban the practice. Local tribes
and nonprofits have partnered to fight the roundup plant, arguing
that the indigenous community should be tapped to manage the
animals that roam their ancestral land. A separate group of

(24:02):
plaintiffs has sued the government, claiming it's reneging on its
duty to protect the horses. We're all living spirits, said
Ronda Koch, member of the Mono Lake Kutsaduka tribe, and
it's sad that people just don't care about another living
thing because they think it doesn't belong there. For thirty

(24:25):
six years, Dave Marquart was part of a small team
that monitored wetlands rimming. Mono Lake places so inaccessible even
four wheel drives can get stuck flung out far on
the landscape. Only wildlife could enjoy them. The area was
a major nesting site for yellow headed blackbirds, red winged blackbirds,

(24:46):
marsh rens, sorahs, and Virginia rails. Quote. There weren't a
lot of people that saw the transition that I saw
from healthy wetlands to completely trampled and devastated wetlands, says Marquart,
who was an interpretive naturalist for the Mono Lake State
Natural Reserve until he retired in twenty nineteen. Marquart recalled

(25:09):
a time when he'd encounter fewer than fifty horses. They
bolt when they saw his vehicle coming. That fear faded
and the ranks grew over time. He said. They stamped
ponds and urinated and defecated in the water. The birds
stopped showing up. Before retiring, Marquart said he helped organize

(25:30):
a field trip involving the Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management,
and state parks to showcase the impacts. Everybody saw that
it was an issue and felt that something needed to
be done. He said to day's sizeable mounds of horse
manure dot warm springs. A remote area along the eastern

(25:52):
shore of Mono Lake that Marquart had raised the alarm
about during his tenure. White bones of fallen equals rest
in the alkaline meadows. Chestnut fir gleamed on a hoof
attached to a leg bone. Miller, the Mono Lake Committee's
Eastern Sierra Policy Director, and Jeff McQuilkin, the executive director,

(26:15):
led the way to a burbling spring rimmed by innumerable hoofprints.
Surrounding vegetation was nibbled to nubs. Wildlife compete for the
limited water here. The birds that would have a safe
haven in that spring or be hidden away from raptors
and predators overhead, don't have that opportunity anymore. Mquilkin sin

(26:38):
The pair first remembered the horses showing up in remote
areas around the lake in twenty fifteen, as the state
was gripped by drought. By twenty twenty one, as they
pushed west, they landed at South Tufa, where tourists congregate
to gaze at the limestone columns. In the spring of
twenty twenty three, horse carcasses emerged along the shores of

(27:00):
South Tufa and nearby Navy Beach as the snow from
a winter of biblical proportions melted. Quote. The recent deaths
of these horses provide further evidence that the size of
this herd cannot be supported by the landscape which they
are expanding on to, says Lisa Cox, spokesperson for the
Inyo National Forest. On a pleasantly cool day in September,

(27:25):
Raina salk Stared transticks at a group of roughly fifty
wild horses not far from her tribe's reservation. They're the
town of Benton. Salki, vice chairwoman of the Paiute tribe,
draws a parallel between ousting the horses and the historic
persecution of her people. Quote, they're going to run them

(27:46):
down with helicopters and genocide them, just like they ran
down us, she said through tears. Well that's all for
this week's Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader was
Kelly Taylor. Now stay tuned for further programming on RADIOI