Bad weather has gripped much of Europe as well. A bitterly cold snap has killed hundreds of people across the continent, and melting snow caused a dam wall to break and flood an entire village in Bulgaria, according to Reuters.

Despite recent heavy rains, the water levels in Texas remain low, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Antarctica
Scary and exciting. After more than a decade of drilling, Russian scientists have now reached the top of the enigmatic Lake Vostok in Antarctica, Scientific American reported. Lying two and a half miles beneath the ice of Antarctica’s central Eastern ice sheet, the lake has been isolated from the rest of the world for millions of years.

Coal
Asia’s growing demand for coal has triggered a boom in export-facility investments on U.S. shores, according to the Dow Jones Newswires.

Asia
Jakarta’s Water Agreement is muddied by a lack of public information on water privatization, according to the human rights group Article 19.

You can see Africa, the Arabian Peninsula and India in this spectacular high-resolution image of the Earth by NASA.

Sustainability
The current GDP-based model of growth causes overconsumption, drives up commodity prices and ignores the environment, according to Europe’s climate chief.

The Stream is a daily digest spotting global water trends. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

Photo ©2012 Lloyd DeGrane

BP is spending nearly $4 billion to expand and modernize its Whiting, Indiana refinery to process tar sands oil from Canada – an investment that has helped to make the Great Lakes Basin both a center of commerce in the two nation’s oil production boom and a target of rising environmental risks to the largest system of fresh surface water in the world.

By Jacob Wheeler
Special to Circle of Blue

WHITING, Ind. — At least 3,000 kilometers (1,900 miles) separate the tar sands mines and processing plants of northern Alberta, Canada, from British Petroleum’s mammoth refinery here along the southern shore of Lake Michigan.

But tying one of the world’s largest industrial zones in northwestern Canada to this Great Lakes industrial city is more than a growing network of pipes and pumps that transport raw fuel to be made into gasoline, diesel, and other products. The connection also is formed by billions of dollars in new investments in pipelines and refinery expansions in Indiana and Michigan. The massive spending — more than $US 6 billion since 2009 — has made the Great Lakes Basin both a center of commerce in the two nation’s oil production boom and a target of rising environmental risks to the largest system of fresh surface water in the world.

In July 2010, a pipeline transporting tar sands oil ruptured near Battle Creek, Michigan, and dumped 20,000 barrels (840,000 gallons) of raw crude into the Kalamazoo River, just 128 kilometers (80 miles) from Lake Michigan. It was the worst oil spill ever in the Great Lakes Basin. A study four months later by the Michigan Department of Community Health found that in the days after the accident, 60 percent of Calhoun County residents who lived near the river experienced respiratory, gastrointestinal, or neurological symptoms.

Now the Great Lakes region is focusing fresh attention on BP’s $US 3.8 billion project to modernize and expand the Whiting refinery so that it can process more tar sands oil.

Advocates say that the refinery is good news for the local economy, because it creates jobs and reduces U.S. dependence on imported fuels from unfriendly nations.

“Thousands of BP employees support Whiting’s turn-of-the-century shopping district, and that has been a very significant benefit for the downtown economy — the restaurants are crowded at lunchtime,” Brian Lowry, a member of the Whiting Redevelopment Commission, said in an interview with Circle of Blue. “BP is also partnering with the city on a $US 50 million lakefront development program. It’s a huge contributor to the local economy.”

But environmentalists assert the economic and consumer benefits are not worth the costs to either the local air and water, and in a broader perspective, to the Great Lakes Basin .

“Tar sands are a heavier and dirtier form of crude, and our concern is that, on an apples-to-apples basis, there’s a risk of more pollution,” said Faith Bugel, a senior attorney at the Chicago-based Environmental Law & Policy Center. “What are the risks of additional mercury, sulfur, and toxins on the air and water?”

Tar Sands – The Source
Northeastern Alberta’s bitumen deposits rest beneath a stretch of Canada’s boreal forests and wetlands the size of Florida. In 2011, the tar sands were being excavated, heated, processed, and transported out of Canada at a rate of 1.5 million barrels of oil per day (BPD), according to Canadian oil trade associations. Of that, 1.1 million barrels were transported, principally by pipelines, to the U.S.

Bitumen, though, is pretty tough stuff to work with. Before it can be shipped by pipeline to become usable transportation fuel, bitumen must be processed at the mine sites and diluted with natural gas condensate, naphtha, or a mix of other light hydrocarbons and then transported to refineries that have the capacity to handle such heavy crude. Canadian refineries are already operating at full capacity to harvest tar sands oil. The BP project is one of a number of refineries in the U.S. — fuel plants in Michigan, Illinois, Oklahoma, and Texas also are involved – that are spending a combined $US 23 billion to rework their equipment to accept tar sands crude.

By 2019, the amount of tar sands oil flowing into the United States could reach 1.5 million barrels per day, according to the Alberta Energy Resources Conservation Board.

Photo ©2012 Lloyd DeGrane

A crude crude distillation unit used to process heavy tar sands crude awaits installation. Sometime after 2013, when the refinery modernization is completed, BP executives said tar sands oil will be 90 percent of what the Whiting refinery will process.

Though energy sector executives forecast a tar sands bonanza that will keep fuel prices in check and improve the nation’s security, environmentalists see a much darker picture. Along with consuming much more than conventional crude ( see sidebar) it also takes so much more energy to mine, heat, and process bitumen for fuel. Tar sands oil is estimated to release at least three times the greenhouse gas emissions per barrel of conventional crude, the National Energy Technology Laboratory projected in 2008.

“What makes tar sands particularly odious is that the energy you get out in the end, per unit carbon dioxide, is poor,” NASA scientist James Hansen told InsideClimate. “It’s equivalent to burning coal in your automobile. We simply cannot be that stupid if we want to preserve a planet for our children and grandchildren.”

New Pollution Risks For Great Lakes
Approximately 30 percent of the oil currently processed at BP Whiting is a mixture of bitumen — the raw, jet-black hydrocarbon that saturates Canada’s tar sands — that has been diluted so that it could flow through pipes and across the border. Sometime after 2013, when the refinery modernization is completed, BP executives said the so-called “dilbit” will be 90 percent of what the Whiting refinery will process.

BP’s switch to refining tar sands is expected to increase greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent — equivalent to adding 320,000 cars to area roads, according to the Chicago Tribune. The plant’s upgrade will release significantly more nitrous oxides, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, mercury, benzene, and lead into the air in northwest Indiana, a region that already suffers from poor air quality.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) warns that these emissions cause acid rain, smog, and major health issues like cardiovascular disease, lung damage, and premature deaths. Scientists say that many of the pollutants will also settle into the lake and eventually work their way into the human food chain through fish.

The pollution produced by the BP refinery — already the sixth largest source of industrial pollution in the Chicago area, which is 29 kilometers (18 miles) away — is just part of the problem, say environmentalists. The other part is transporting dilbit into the region, as shown by the 2010 rupture in Michigan.

Photo ©2012 Lloyd DeGrane

The refinery's cracking towers and processing vessels rise like a giant steel curtain above surrounding neighborhoods and the Lake Michigan shoreline. The Whiting refinery, which dates from 1889, is the largest on the Great Lakes and seventh largest in the nation. It is capable of producing 405,000 barrels of fuel per day.

Aging, Corroding Pipelines
Tarsands oil pipelines are a hazard in the U.S., assert environmentalists, because of the acidic and corrosive characteristics of the material they transport. The authors of a February 2011 report by the Natural Resources Defense Council describe dilbit as “a highly corrosive, acidic, and potentially unstable blend of thick raw bitumen and volatile natural gas liquid condensate — raising risks of spills and damage to communities along their paths.”

The bitumen blends contain 15 to 20 times higher acid concentrations and five times as much sulfur as conventional crudes. Tar sands oil is up to 70 times more viscous than “sweet crude,” and those characteristics can weaken pipelines or make them more brittle. In addition, tar sands have been found to contain much higher quantities of abrasive quartz sand particles.

Photographer: Lloyd DeGrane

Lloyd DeGrane is a Chicago-based photographer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Reader, the Paris Match and other national and international publications. He specializes in location photography and portraiture. DeGrane’s black & white documentary work has been exhibited at the Chicago Cultural Center, the Chicago History Museum, and the Corcoran Gallery among others.

Visit Lloyd DeGrane’s website.

Transporting dilbit through conventional pipelines therefore requires higher operating temperatures to move the thicker material along, which increases the risk of pipeline ruptures due to corrosion or problems with leak detection. The NRDC asserts that, despite these significant risks, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration “does not distinguish between conventional crude and dilbit when setting minimum standards for oil pipelines.”

There is solid evidence to be concerned. According to NRDC study, Tar Sands Pipelines Safety Risks, the Alberta pipeline system, which has transported tar sands oil for years, has had approximately 16 times as many spills due to internal corrosion as the U.S. pipeline system, which only recently began transporting dilbit.

From 2002 to 2010, Alberta’s hazardous liquid system experienced 218 spills that were greater than .61 barrels per 16,000 kilometers (26 gallons per 10,000 miles) of pipeline, the study found. That compared to 13.6 spills greater than .61 barrels per 16,000 kilometers (26 gallons per 10,000 miles) of pipeline in the U.S.

Alberta’s greater risk of leaks and spills has emerged even though over half of that province’s pipelines were built in the last 20 years. Meanwhile, America’s pipelines, on average, are twice as old yet leak less because they don’t transport dilbit.

The Great Lakes appear to be vulnerable. Alberta tar sands dilbit arrives through the Alberta Clipper, a transcontinental 1,600-kilometer (1,000-mile), $US 1 billion pipeline that was completed in 2010 by Enbridge Inc., the big Canadian pipeline company that was responsible for the Kalamazoo River spill.

The Clipper runs southeast through Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and the Chicago region, before feeding dilbit into the Enbridge Lakehead system that transports it through northwest Indiana and onward through southern Michigan to Detroit’s Marathon refinery.

Photo © J. Carl Ganter/Circle of Blue

Looking south to Chicago, which sits just 29 kilometers (18 miles) northwest of the Whiting refinery.

Because of its thickness, tar sands oil is pumped through pipelines at pressures of up to 101 kilograms per square centimeter (1,440 pounds per square inch, or psi) and temperatures of up to 70 degrees Celsius (158 degrees Fahrenheit), whereas conventional crude is typically pumped at ambient temperatures and lower pressures. Industry insiders assert that the rate of corrosion doubles with every 7 degree Celsius (20-degree Fahrenheit) increase in temperature. And at those high temperatures and pressures, the natural gas liquid condensate can change from liquid to gas form, which can create gas bubbles within the pipeline that release bursts of high pressure that can deform the pipeline.

When liquid changes to gas in the pipeline, it creates a gas bubble that can stop the flow of oil — known as “column separation.” Workers are taught to treat column separations by pumping more oil through the pipeline. But actual leaks in the pipeline show the same signs as column separations, which means that a misdiagnosis can mean more oil being intentionally pumped into the ground, and water, rather than shutting off the supply.

According to formal accident reports about the Kalamazoo River rupture and spill, the Enbridge pipeline in Michigan gushed for more than 12 hours before workers finally shut it down. Initial investigations indicated that the pipeline’s monitoring data had suggested a column separation, instead of an oil leak. Emergency responders were not notified until more than 19 hours after the spill began.

Tar sands oil is more hazardous and difficult to clean up once a leak has occurred. The low flash point and high vapor pressure of the natural gas liquid condensate used to dilute dilbit increases the risk because the heavy crude can form an explosive mixture at any temperature above 0 degrees Fahrenheit. In addition, dilbit contains benzene, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and n-hexane, all of which can affect the human central nervous system.

While the EPA describes mechanical devices such as booms, skimmers and sorbent materials as the primary line of defense against waterborne oil spills, dilbit is heavier than water and requires significantly more dredging than a conventional oil spill would. The cleanup of the Kalamazoo River spill ultimately required more than 2,000 personnel, over 4,600 meters (15,000 feet) of boom, 175 spill response trucks, 43 boats and 48 oil skimmers.

More Jobs, More Emissions
In Whiting, most residents join BP executives in their view that the risks of transporting tar sands oil are low, and the value of the modernized refinery is high. From Interstate 90, it is easy to see why the BP refinery, which is two-thirds of the way through the expansion, is Whiting’s main industrial attraction. Its cracking towers and processing vessels rise like a giant steel curtain above surrounding neighborhoods and the shoreline. The refinery, which dates from 1889, is the largest on the Great Lakes and seventh largest in the nation. It is capable of producing 405,000 barrels of fuel per day.

BP Whiting, in short, is a community mainstay. The refinery accounts for approximately half of the local tax base, employs 5,000 construction workers to expand the refinery, and promises 80 to 100 more full-time positions once the expansion is complete in 2013.

Photo ©2012 Lloyd DeGrane

Thousands of BP employees support Whiting’s businesses, including Happy Jack's Liquors. "That that has been a very significant benefit for the downtown economy," said Brian Lowry, a member of the Whiting Redevelopment Commission.

For these reasons and more, BP’s modernization project has attracted considerable attention from business executives, government leaders, and environmental advocates.

On the business side, the expanded refinery will yield three times the profits, according to BP executives. In Detroit, Marathon Oil executives who are completing the $US 2 billion modernization of their refinery in Michigan’s largest city have expressed similar predictions about profitability. If the projections turn out to be accurate, it could significantly influence strategic decisions for the three other existing refineries on Lake Superior, Lake Huron, and Lake Erie.

BP’s expensive upgrade for the Whiting refinery includes a new petroleum coker — which heats heavier residual products, such as asphalt, into lighter fuels like gasoline and diesel. BP says the new coker will produce 15 percent more motor fuels.

The upgrade also will install a crude-distillation unit, a gas-oil hydrotreater, sulfur-recovery facilities, and, BP says, a modernized wastewater-treatment facility. This and other equipment, say executives, will limit air and water pollution from the plant.

More Than An Eyedropper
BP executives in Indiana have worked hard to win over Whiting and the neighboring town of Hammond, which sit just 29 kilometers (18 miles) southeast of Chicago. Even on a smoggy day, the Windy City skyline appears in the distance. In a visit to Chicago in January, Bob Dudley, BP’s chairman, described the Whiting refinery modernization as a very high priority that would add to the company’s revenue, and told reporters it was part of a national and global program to “restore the public’s trust” in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf two years ago.

Dudley’s words resonated in Indiana, where the refinery modernization is the largest and most expensive industrial project in state history, according to BP. Despite the decline of the local steel industry after its peak during the World War II, Whiting still looks like a proud small town, in the heart of midwestern America, with its ball fields and playgrounds, patriotic flags, packed breakfast diners, and main street shops.

Photo ©2012 Lloyd DeGrane

BP’s switch to refining tar sands is expected to increase greenhouse gas emissions by 40 percent — equivalent to adding 320,000 cars to area roads.

BP, a generous employer, has delved into local philanthropy. The company gives each employee $US 300 to donate to the nonprofit of their choice, provides local education and job training, offers pre-apprentice training to minorities and job demonstrations at local high schools, and funds the Indiana Dunes Environmental Learning Center. Suffice to say, the massive oil company and job provider enjoys broad local support.

But not among everyone. Sixty-three-year-old Steve Kozel, who was seven when the Standard Oil refinery exploded in 1955 and nearly took Whiting with it, is worried about what the refining of mostly tar sands will do to northwestern Indiana and the local air and water — especially in the case of an explosion or oil spill.

“If you took an eyedropper and dropped it into Lake Michigan, there wouldn’t be a problem,” Kozel told Circle of Blue. “But these spills haven’t been just a barrel or two. They haven’t been 50 barrels either. They’ve been 50,000.”

Kozel is president of a citizens group called the Calumet Project, which has teamed up with national environmental groups to force BP to limit the effects of its expansion. Chicago leaders, including former mayor Richard Daley and current mayor Rahm Emmanuel, raised an outcry in 2007 when Indiana first granted BP the right to increase the amount of ammonia and sludge that it would release into Lake Michigan. BP then backtracked and promised not to increase the limits of its previous permit.

Environmental activists are also worried about the presence of the volatile natural gas that is used in dilbit. Carolyn Marsh, who helped establish a bird sanctuary in Whiting, fears that it could lead to another explosion. BP burns off that gas through flaring, which shoots flames into the sky and increases air pollution. BP’s air emissions also include sulfur dioxide, benzene, lead and other pollutants linked to respiratory disease and cancer.

“They’re going to increase air pollution by anywhere from 20 to 25 percent,” Kozel said. “There are a lot more chemicals and toxins in the air than there are with ‘sweet crude’. And we know that the sediment won’t just fall back down next to BP’s stack. It could blow over the lake.”

Jacob Wheeler writes from Minneapolis. Reach him at jacob.wheeler@theuptake.org. Funding for Circle of Blue reporting on Great Lakes and energy issues is made possible by the C.S. Mott Foundation.

The eastern line of China’s South-North Water Diversion Project, which will transfer water from the Yangtze River Basin to the drought-prone northern provinces, will begin operating in 2013, AFP reported.

Brazil is planning a major expansion of hydroelectric power in the Amazon Basin, according to Scientific American. The Brazilian government is proposing to develop 48 new hydroelectric power plants by 2020, with more than 80 percent of that capacity slated to come from 18 new dams in the Amazon.

Experts have warned that farmers in England have begun ploughing up wildlife-rich grasslands so that they can continue to claim European subsidies, according to the Guardian.

Retronaut offers a glimpse into London’s legendary Victorian sewer system.

The Stream is a daily digest spotting global water trends. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

In his annual threat assessment, James Clapper told the committee that “water shortages and pollution will probably negatively affect the economic performance of important U.S. trading partners” — especially in the agriculture and energy sectors. While water problems alone will not cause instability, Clapper said, they can exacerbate tensions that already exist. He said that direct conflict in the next decade between countries over water is not likely.

Low Snowpack
The latest monthly water supply forecast from the National Water and Climate Center shows that the snowpack in the mountains of California and Nevada is less than 50 percent of normal. Most of the Colorado River basin is below average as well.

Oil Shale Developments
The Department of the Interior released a draft plan for oil shale development in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming that prioritizes research and development before granting commercial leases. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, at least 1.4 trillion barrels of oil are in the formation. But the Government Accountability Office said that limited water supplies would prevent the deposit from full development.

The Bureau of Land Management acknowledged this in the draft plan. “Because there are still many unanswered questions about the technology, water use, and impacts of potential commercial-scale oil shale development, we are proposing a prudent and orderly approach,” said BLM Director Bob Abbey in a statement.

A public comment period ends May 4. Comments can be submitted on the plan’s website.

Does Red Tape Hold Back Reservoirs?
On Tuesday, a House Natural Resources subcommittee will hold a hearing to talk about which regulations are preventing more “surface storage infrastructure” (i.e. “reservoirs”) from being built. A list of witnesses has not yet been published.

Lawsuit
One of the nation’s largest irrigation districts is suing the Department of the Interior (DOI) for $1 billion in damages over the federal government’s failure to clean up salty irrigation drainage, the Fresno Bee reports. The dispute between the DOI and Westlands Water District in California’s Central Valley dates to a law from the 1960s that put the federal government in charge of drainage. Subsequent attempts to clear the land of the poisonous irrigation runoff have been unsuccessful.

South Sudan
Last December the U.S. government hosted a conference to discuss development goals for South Sudan. A number of international organizations and donor countries participated and made commitments to the newly independent country. The government of South Sudan, for its part, pledged to increase the percent of its population with access to water and sanitation from 9 percent to 29 percent by 2014.

Transportation
Last Friday, the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee approved a $260 billion bill for transportation and highway funding. A section of the bill directs the Secretary of Transportation to establish a research program with emphasis on 16 areas, one of which is porous or permeable pavement that would minimize stormwater runoff. But a paltry amount—$3 million per fiscal year through 2016—is allocated to the broad program.

Federal Water Tap is a weekly digest spotting trends in U.S. government water policy. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

Energy
PetroChina purchased a 20 percent stake in a Canadian shale gas project, strengthening China’s presence in North America’s energy markets, according to Reuters.

The United Kingdom is considering new nuclear reactors that would use radioactive waste to provide enough electricity for 500 years, the Guardian reported. The reactors would help dispose of Britain’s cache of plutonium and depleted uranium.

The United States plans to auction and issue leases for offshore wind farms by the end of 2012, Bloomberg News reported.

Climate
Police in Chile arrested a man for allegedly stealing five tonnes of ice from one of the world’s fastest shrinking glaciers, according to the Guardian.

Astronomers discovered a new planet 4.5 times as massive as Earth with a climate suitable for liquid water and life, UPI reported.

The Stream is a daily digest spotting global water trends. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

Image courtesy Great Lakes Commission

The three separation alternatives include a down-river single barrier, a mid-system alternative of four barriers on CAWS branches between Lockport Lock and Lake Michigan; and a near-lake alternative of up to five barriers closest to the lakeshore.

Watershed separation in Chicago is the only permanent solution to stopping harmful aquatic invaders like Asian carp from entering the Great lakes, according to a study released on Tuesday by the Great Lakes Commission (GLC) and the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative.

The report outlines three scenarios, ranging in price from $US 3.26 billion to $US 9.54 billion, which would place physical barriers within the Chicago Area Waterway System (CAWS) to reverse the flow of the Chicago River and separate the Great Lakes from the Mississippi River watershed. The plans would require significant infrastructure changes to accommodate shipping, wastewater and flood waters.

These changes would be implemented in two phases, with the first completed by 2022 and the second by 2029. If successful, the project could save $US 1.4 billion to $US 9.5 billion in invasive species control and damage costs, as well as protect the estimated $US 7 billion sport-fishing industry in the Great Lakes. Supporters of the idea say it will also modernize Chicago’s shipping facilities, as well as improve water quality and flood protection.

Asian carp, which devastate aquatic food chains by eating huge amounts of plankton, have infested numerous tributaries of the Mississippi River, including the Illinois River, and are threatening to get into Lake Michigan through a shipping canal near Chicago.

“The millions we are spending every year to stop Asian carp is simply not sustainable,” Joel Brammeier, President and CEO of Alliance for the Great Lakes, told Circle of Blue. “We have the opportunity to solve this permanently.”

Before any construction can start, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers must complete its own study, due in 2015, on separating the two water basins, Brammeier said.

“We hope this is a wake-up call to get the federal agencies and Congress to move faster,” he added. “The biggest hurdle is that the federal side is not moving as fast as the states and cities.”

Five Great Lakes states are suing the Corps of Engineers in federal court in an attempt to speed up the government study.

“The earliest that separation could happen would be 10 years from now but would most likely mean 17 years or even longer,” Mark Biel, chairman of UnLock Our Jobs and executive director of the Chemical Industry Council of Illinois, said in a statement responding to the GLC study.

UnLock Our Jobs represents citizens, businesses and industries that want to keep the CAWS open for shipping while pursuing other means to stop Asian carp.

“Shutting down this one multi-billion dollar transportation route does not even address the 18 other waterways in and out of the Great Lakes that could serve as entry points for invasive species,” Biel said.

According to UnLock Our Jobs, separating the CAWS from the Great Lakes would harm shipping through the locks, which account for $1.9 billion in economic activity and more than 17,000 jobs in the region.

To accommodate shipping and transportation, the separation barriers proposed by the GLC study would include recreational boat lifts and intermodal transfer facilities for cargo.

Brammeier said that preserving the status quo is not an option. “The shipping industry has this idea that if you just ignore it, it will go away,” he said. “That mindset misses the reality that eight Great Lakes states and millions of individuals are understanding that you can’t operate one waterway in a manner that puts an entire region at risk.”

Sources: Great Lakes Commission; Ports of Indiana

China
Two provinces in China are testing a new pilot water project that aims to financially reward upriver provinces if they ensure quality river water for their downstream neighbors, Xinhua reported.

China will invest in agriculture innovation in an effort to increase food production and ensure long-term supplies, Reuters reported, citing the Chinese State Council’s first policy document of the year.

Just for fun, here are pictures from China’s Harbin Ice Festival.

Water-energy-climate
Tighter regulation, booming natural gas production and decreasing costs for renewable energy technology herald the end of America’s coal era, according to The Economist. But can demand from Asia stoke the industry?

The Earth’s land and ocean surfaces continue to experience higher temperatures than several decades ago, according to NASA’s annual analysis of global temperatures, Guardian reported.

Sustainability
The European Commission has invited the public to share views on how Europe can produce and consume more sustainably.

The Stream is a daily digest spotting global water trends. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

A Texas town became the first in the state this year to truck in drinking water after wells ran dry due to the ongoing drought, according to the Associated Press.

Africa
Trade constraints and climate change are making food insecurity worse in Africa, according to AlertNet.

Saltwater intrusion is forcing rice farmers in Tanzania to look elsewhere for land and freshwater, causing some to destroy protected mangroves, AlertNet reported.

Europe
The European Union should plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions 40 percent by 2030, according to a proposal from the Danish EU presidency, EurActiv reported.

A new international information system from the World Meteorological Organization will help exchange climate, weather and water data more efficiently, according to Xinhua.

The Stream is a daily digest spotting global water trends. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.

In December, the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) approved a 300-megawatt (MW) solar energy project on public land in southwestern Arizona on condition that the developer changes the plant’s design from concentrated solar thermal collectors — which use mirrors and fluids to generate steam to run a turbine — to photovoltaic (PV) panels.

The PV technology will cut down the plant’s water consumption by almost 99 percent. Instead of pumping 3.7 million cubic meters (977 million gallons) per year from the nearby Rainbow Valley aquifer, the facility will use a mere 40,705 cubic meters (10.7 million gallons), primarily for washing the panels.

Each drop conserved is important in the arid Southwest, where the water from most river basins is fully allocated and where climate models predict an even drier future.

The Sonoran Solar Energy Project, as the facility in southwestern Arizona is known, is among a growing number of solar energy projects across the deserts of the American West to make design changes that use less water. As the federal government pushes solar power production, developers both on public and private lands are increasingly switching from wet cooling to dry cooling — like the proposed Quartzsite Solar Energy Project in Arizona — or swapping mirrors for PV panels, which are getting cheaper each year.

Government Targets, Public Pressure, Market Forces
The solar boom in the United States was kick-started by a provision in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which required the DOI to approve 10,000 MW of non-hydroelectric renewable energy projects by 2015. Then in 2009, the Obama administration called for rapid development of solar and wind power on public lands, and set a target of getting 25 percent of the nation’s electricity from renewable sources by 2025.

Yet in the midst of this development, concerned citizens have pushed regulators to consider solar technologies that save water. During the permitting process for the Sonoran project, the DOI requested less water-intensive PV panels after several residents in the area worried that water withdrawals for solar power generation would draw down the shallow aquifer that the community is using for drinking water.

“Given feedback from stakeholders, the decision is one that we support,” said Steve Stengel, a press officer for NextEra Energy Resources, the parent company of the Sonoran project developer.

Though the DOI generally does not have jurisdiction over water rights, it does assess the total environmental consequences of resource use. As part of the evaluation process, the department can require an alternate technology if a project is estimated to use too much water.

“There haven’t been [federal] regulatory changes,” said Arreola. “But we have seen changes in the developers.”

Those changes, Arreola told Circle of Blue, are being driven by industry economics. The falling price of PV panels has in recent years prompted more and more developers to choose this technology instead of the more established solar thermal systems. According to GTM Research, the price of silicon panels fell by half in 2011, to $0.90 per watt, and will drop even more.

The downward price pressure caused Solar Trust of America, which is developing the world’s largest solar project — a 1,000 MW facility in the Mojave Desert near Blythe, Calif. — to alter its plans.

In August, Solar Trust decided to switch the Blythe plant from a solar thermal design with parabolic troughs to PV panels. The company is “deploying the right technology at the right time,” Uwe Schmidt, the chairman and chief executive, said in a statement.

The trend is evident across the U.S. solar industry. According to data from the Solar Energy Industries Association, a trade group, some 82 percent of projects under development plan to use PV technology. By contrast, just 61 percent of projects already in operation do so.

The fall in solar panel prices comes as a group of U.S. manufacturers have accused the Chinese government of unfairly subsidizing the Chinese solar industry and flooding the American market with artificially cheap goods. The U.S. Commerce Department is investigating whether tariffs should be imposed on solar panel imports from China.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Department of the Interior is conducting a broad environmental review of solar development on public lands in six western states. The review aims to amend the department’s resource management plans so that solar projects are directed to the most suitable parcels of land.

Water concerns, among other issues, have already prompted the DOI to cut the number of proposed “solar energy zones” from 24 to 17. Officials from Lincoln County, Nev., for instance, have requested that only PV technology be allowed in a neighboring zone because of worries about groundwater withdrawals. The DOI eventually withdrew the land from consideration.

Until the environmental review is complete, all public lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) are open for solar development. In the last two years, no less than 16 solar projects have been approved for BLM land.

Solar development on private lands can also result in a net gain in water if it displaces irrigated agriculture, as has happened in many western states.

Australia is building a $100 million water pipeline to supply four coal seam gas to liquefied natural gas plants, according to ABC.

The Atlantic highlights some of the U.S. cities most likely to suffer from future drought conditions.

Elizabeth Economy asks whether China’s potentially game-changing water reforms can take root and blossom.

The world is running out of time to ensure sufficient food, water and energy to its rapidly growing population, a new U.N. report has warned. By 2030, the world will need at least 50 percent more food, 45 percent more energy and 30 percent more water.

Why is Chesapeake Energy drawing down some of its shale gas operations after selling numerous pieces of its vast shale gas holdings to the world’s largest energy companies?

The Stream is a daily digest spotting global water trends. To get more water news, follow Circle of Blue on Twitter and sign up for our newsletter.