EUA investigam torres eólicas da China e do Vietnã

Departamento comercial norte-americano acusa chineses de novos subsídios ilegais para energia renovável; Ministério do Comércio da China declarou que nova denúncia pode comprometer relações mercantis dos dois países

Mais uma acusação contra a indústria renovável da China vem para engordar ainda mais a lista de denúncias dos Estados Unidos contra o setor chinês de energia limpa. Na última quinta-feira (19), o Departamento de Comércio dos EUA confirmou que iniciará uma investigação formal sobre a importação de torres eólicas da China e do Vietnã para descobrir se não há subsídios ilegais sobre elas.

De acordo com o departamento, a margem de dumping – a diferença entre o preço normal de um produto e seu valor para exportação – das torres eólicas chinesas é de 213,54%, enquanto a das vietnamitas é 140,54% a 143,29%, o que os fabricantes norte-americanos alegam que está prejudicando sua competitividade no mercado interno frente aos artigos asiáticos.

A Coalizão do Comércio de Torres Eólicas, grupo de produtores norte-americanos, já havia pedido anteriormente medidas antidumping de 64% nas importações da China e de 59% nas do Vietnã, com o objetivo reduzir os efeitos prejudiciais dos produtos asiáticos no mercado dos EUA.

A Comissão de Comércio Internacional dos EUA (ITC), agência do governo norte-americano, realizou uma audiência na quinta-feira para investigar se as empresas foram realmente prejudicadas ou ameaçadas pelas importações. Um painel votará no próximo mês se há evidências suficientes de danos para que a acusação prossiga.

Entre diversos casos, Kerry Cole, presidente da Trinity Structural Towers, comentou à Reuters que os fabricantes dos EUA sofreram um duro golpe quando foram excluídos do projeto Shepherd Flat, no estado do Oregon, que será a maior fazenda eólica do mundo, devido à deslealdade dos preços das torres chinesas.

“Tudo isso foi para a China. Essa venda perdida teve efeito cascata na indústria. Depois de perder essa venda, os produtores domésticos ficaram desesperados para preencher suas carteiras de pedidos”, lamentou Cole.

“Os atuais níveis de produção [norte-americanos] estão baixos, e por causa das importações, eles não estão previstos para aumentar nos próximos anos. Se essa tendência continuar, uma série de produtores domésticos terá que fechar as usinas ou consolidar a produção”, alertou Michael Barczak, vice-presidente da DMI Industries, à ITC.

Se o Departamento de Comércio conseguir comprovar que a China e o Vietnã estão realmente desenvolvendo práticas comerciais ilegais, os EUA poderão fixar taxas de importação maiores nas torres eólicas asiáticas, que podem atingir até US$ 100 milhões. Para se ter uma ideia, em 2010 as importações de torres eólicas chinesas e vietnamitas foram estimadas em US$ 103,6 milhões e US$ 51,9 milhões, respectivamente.

Mas a ação dos EUA não deve ficar sem resposta. Após a declaração do departamento, o Ministério do Comércio da China respondeu que tal iniciativa poderá comprometer as relações mercantis entre os norte-americanos e os asiáticos.

“Essa investigação não será apenas prejudicial para o desenvolvimento da cooperação sino-americana de novas energias; prejudicará também os interesses da indústria dos EUA, e não está de acordo com os esforços globais de mudanças climáticas e de segurança energética”, observou o ministério, em uma declaração.

“A China espera que o lado dos EUA possa respeitar as leis e fatos relevantes, e respeitar os compromissos assumidos na conferência do G20 em Cannes de evitar introduzir novas medidas de protecionismo comercial”, acrescentou.

Além disso, representantes dos produtores chineses e vietnamitas, além de outras firmas estrangeiras que atuam nos EUA, argumentam que o crescimento da demanda por produtos asiáticos em detrimento dos artigos norte-americanos não foi conduzida apenas pelos preços, e sim porque os fabricantes dos EUA não têm se mostrado “confiáveis”.

“Os fabricantes norte-americanos se mostraram frequentemente não satisfatórios e sem vontade de fornecer suprimentos. A Siemens não pode se dar ao luxo de ficar sem alternativas de suprimentos”, justificou Christopher Hauer, diretor da Siemens nos Estados Unidos.

Os representantes asiáticos dizem ainda que “não há evidências reais” de que as companhias norte-americanas foram prejudicadas ou ameaçadas pelas importações de torres eólicas chinesas e vietnamitas.

A investigação segue o caminho de um caso semelhante que vem ocorrendo no setor solar, no qual os EUA também investigam a presença de subsídios ilegais na indústria solar chinesa. Na época da denúncia, o Ministério do Comércio da China afirmou que lançaria sua própria investigação sobre os subsídios que o governo norte-americano fornecia a suas firmas de energia renovável.

“O Ministério do Comércio decidiu iniciar uma investigação de barreira comercial em apoio a políticas e subsídios para o setor de energia renovável dos EUA”, declarou o governo chinês.

Segundo os representantes da China, as políticas dos EUA constituíam “uma barreira comercial contra a exportação de produtos chineses de energia renovável para os Estados Unidos” e “violaram os compromissos dos Estados Unidos sob as regras da Organização Mundial do Comércio, e são uma barreira e uma restrição irracional para a indústria de energia renovável da China, reduzindo a competitividade dos produtos chineses no mercado dos EUA”.

Autor: Jéssica Lipinski
Fonte: Instituto CarbonoBrasil/Agências Internacionais
Original: http://bit.ly/zmt4WS

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Expanding the Panama Canal may shrink shipping industry emissions

Image courtesy of lyng883 via Flickr under Creative Commons.

The Panama Canal is growing. By 2014 – 100 years after it was first completed – ships with a beam of up to 49 metres will be able to travel through the 82-kilometre channel (pictured), up from the current 32.2m limit.

Upping the beam constraint, known among seafarers as ‘Panamax’, will have ripple effects throughout the shipping industry. Larger ships will enable the transport of more goods in fewer trips, and larger beams will facilitate the design of more efficient hulls, according to a study in the International Journal of Maritime Engineering.

Overall, the potential savings—in both fuel and reduced emissions—may be up to 16% per tonne-mile. The potential for such reduced environmental impact stemming from the canal expansion is, largely, an unexpected windfall for the shipping industry as a whole, says study author Paul Stott, a marine engineering lecturer at Newcastle University.

A 16% improvement in efficiency is significant given that the International Maritime Organisation estimates that, without major steps to reduce emissions, shipping will be responsible for 12%-18% of global emissions of carbon dioxide by 2050.

The improvements would go beyond the ships that use the canal. Some 45% of larger seagoing vessels built in the last decade conformed to the Panamax constraint because, despite the fact that many of these ships never go near the Panama Canal, their value is based on their ability to do so. “The size of the benefit is much larger than one might think based solely on the canal’s traffic statistics; it has to be viewed in the context of the whole fleet,” says Stott.

However, the industry has just been through a huge boom in building ships —so it could take a while to transition to more efficient hull designs. But, says Stott, “because we built too many ships, freight rates are poor; as a result, the 16% cost savings could, paradoxically, provide enough incentive for ship owners to buy newer, more efficient boats”.

Author: Virginia Gewin
Source: NATURE NEWS BLOG
Original: http://bit.ly/AzBBsV

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Carro compacto norueguês tem emissão zero de CO2

O TH!NK já é um dos veículos elétricos mais comercializados na Europa e em abril deste ano passou a ser vendido nos EUA. Em junho foi apresentado no Brasil pela CPFL Energia, que encomendou três unidades do veículo, durante o Challange Bibendum, evento do setor automotivo com foco em fontes energéticas alternativas.

A iniciativa faz parte dos investimentos da empresa em pesquisa e desenvolvimento de modelos menos poluentes. Com autonomia de 160 km por recarga, o TH!NK pode ser recarregado por 8 horas em tomada comum (220 V).

Nesse processo, o modelo norueguês tem emissão quase nula de CO2 se comparado a veículos movidos a combustíveis tradicionais. O carro atinge uma velocidade de 110 km/h, possui freios ABS, air bag e oferece a possibilidade de adotar baterias de sódio ou lítio, com emissão zero de dióxido de carbono.

Autor: Vanessa Barbosa
Fonte: Exame
Original: http://bit.ly/zy5iY2

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10 places abandoned because of man-made environmental catastrophes

Photo: maurusone/iStockPhoto

No-man’s-land

Man-made environmental catastrophes come in varying degrees of tragic, but none is as awful as when human action renders once-pristine land uninhabitable. It’s important to remember that while clean air, water and soil seemingly come for free, those resources require stewardship. Keeping that principle in mind, here’s our list of 10 places that have had to be abandoned because of environmental neglect.

Pripyat, Ukraine

Photo: Bo Nielsen/Flickr

Located within the Chernobyl disaster zone, Pripyat, Ukraine, was ground zero for the worst nuclear disaster in history when an accident destroyed a plant reactor on April 26, 1986. The city, which once bustled with nearly 50,000 residents, is now an Orwellian ghost town. Radiation levels remain too high for permanent human habitation, though it is considered safe for tourists to visit. The vanquished city’s ghoulish ambiance includes an old amusement park, with a rickety, abandoned Ferris wheel and empty, lifeless bumper cars.

Centralia, Pa.

Photo: ZUMA Press

Centralia is an old coal mining town once populated by more than 1,000 residents. Today, it is a smoldering ghost town, perpetually burning like a hell pit, with deadly fumes of carbon monoxide rising from cracks in the ground. What happened?

Centralia had to be abandoned after a fire broke out in 1962 in the coal mines that run underneath the town — a fire that continues to burn today, and may continue to burn for the next 250 years. Residents have since been evicted and the town’s ZIP code has been revoked.

The mine fire was dramatically described by David DeKok in 1986 in his book “Unseen Danger: A Tragedy of People, Government and the Centralia Mine Fire”: “This was a world where no human could live, hotter than the planet Mercury, its atmosphere as poisonous as Saturn’s. At the heart of the fire, temperatures easily exceeded 1,000 degrees. Lethal clouds of carbon monoxide and other gases swirled through the rock chambers.”

Carteret Islands

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Residents of the Carteret Islands, low-lying atolls in the South Pacific, became the world’s first climate change refugees as planned evacuations have saved them from rising sea levels, which threaten to submerge the islands by 2015. In 2005, at least 1,000 residents called the islands home, but as the ocean slowly lapped further and further ashore, their fate became clear. Nowhere on the islands is currently more than 1.2 meters (3.9 feet) above sea level.

As temperatures rise due to global warming, sea levels could engulf island nations and coastal communities around the world. The Carteret Islands could be a sign of things to come.

Wittenoom, Australia

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

This town in Western Australia has the baleful reputation of being home to the greatest industrial disaster in Australian history. Wittenoom was the site of an asbestos mine, where thousands of workers and their families were exposed to lethal levels of blue asbestos 1,000 times higher than was legally regulated at the time. Though the town was shut down in 1966, today the air remains contaminated and toxic to breathe if stirred, and the state of Western Australia has the highest rate of malignant mesothelioma per capita of anywhere in the world.

Picher, Okla.

Photo: peggydavis66/Flickr

The modern-day ghost town of Picher, Okla., is a woeful example of gross contamination from a local lead and zinc mine. Surrounded by giant piles of toxic metal-contaminated mine tailings, in 1983 Picher was declared to be the center of a 40-square-mile Superfund site. In the mid-1990s, studies found that about a third of the children living in Picher had elevated blood levels of lead. Over the years residents have been offered voluntary buyouts from the state and federal goverments, and in 2009 the city and school district dissolved.

Aral Sea

Photo: ZUMA Press

The Aral Sea, one of the four largest lakes in the world just 40 years ago, has almost completely dried up after the rivers that fed it were diverted by poorly planned and mismanaged irrigation projects. The event has been called “one of the planet’s worst environmental disasters.” Fishing vessels that once sailed the vast inland sea now sit eerily out of place in the middle of a desolate, dusty desert, relics of a time when thriving villages flourished along the Aral Sea’s banks. Although some of the cities, which were once grand ports, remain populated today, many have had to be abandoned. Where the sea’s edge once lapped with waves, today remain only sullen towns consumed by windswept sand.

Three Gorges, China

Photo: xenotar/iStockPhoto

China’s construction of the world’s largest power station, the Three Gorges Dam, has been wrought with controversy. Though the dam provides clean, fossil-fuel-free energy to a nation with rapidly increasing energy needs, rising floodwaters have already transformed the once-pristine river valleys, engulfed whole villages and ancient townships, and displaced more than 1 million people, with millions more projected to be affected.

Great Harbour Deep, Newfoundland

Photo: Joanna Poe/Flickr

Great Harbour Deep was once a remote but thriving fishing village along the coast of Canada’s Newfoundland. Harking back to a time when the area was one of the world’s top cod fisheries, the bounty seemed endless and impossible to deplete. After decades of overfishing, though, the fishery collapsed, residents departed and the township was disbanded. Today its decaying fishing boats tilt haggardly, and the raggedy old buildings recall a time when our oceans were healthy and the fish were plentiful.

Gilman, Colo.

Photo: John Holm/Flickr

Once at the center of Colorado’s zinc and lead mining operations, the now-deserted Gilman was designated a Superfund site in 1986 by the Environmental Protection Agency due to irrevocable contamination of the groundwater. Mining operations left such large amounts of arsenic, cadmium, copper, lead and zinc in the soil that it caused large fish kills up and down the nearby Eagle River. Although cleanup efforts have reportedly been successful in reclaiming the river, human resettlement at Gilman has not yet been approved.

The town is one of only a few sites in the world, including Wittenoom, Australia, and Picher, Okla., to be declared uninhabitable due to environmental and health damage caused by mines.

Fukushima evacuation zone

Photo: ZUMA Press

The tragedy at the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan, caused by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and subsequent tsunami, has been called the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. An evacuation zone up to 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) around the damaged plant has been declared unsafe to occupy, and former residents of the area have been told that they may never be able to return to their radiation-ravaged homes. Among the several towns expected to be on the blacklist are Futaba and Okuma, which are just two miles from the Fukushima plant.

Author: Bryan Nelson
Source: Mother Nature Network
Original: http://bit.ly/wvs0Uf

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