environmental
University of Alberta
Environmental Research and Studies Centre
news
Volume 3, Issue 3
November 2003
Good Vibrations
Lindsey Carmichael
PhD Student,
Department of
Biological Sciences
I
t’s six AM, and I’m rumbling down a road that
gives “washboard” a whole
new meaning. Some of the
ruts are narrow and closely
spaced; some are deep
enough to hide bodies in.
My bones vibrate, and when
the truck stops for a moment,
they echo like the ringing in
your ears after a rock concert.
The road itself is little more
than a clear cut through the
trees, packed snow over muskeg. It’s created and maintained, for six weeks a year,
by enormous tires dragged
behind tractors.
An hour later the sky begins
to lighten, but it remains cold
outside. It’s the kind of cold
that freezes your nostrils shut,
while simultaneously lighting
your sinuses on fire. When
my flight landed in Norman
Wells, this third week of
February, the temperature
was –45ºC. Wind chill excluded. It’s the kind of cold
that causes spontaneous fire
alarms in hotels, and triggers
the remote start when you get
out and close the car door.
We’re bouncing south along
the winter road, along (and
across) the frozen Mackenzie
River, for Tulita, and the
Sahtu Renewable Resource
Board (SRRB) Meeting. The
Board consists of trained
biologists and First Nations
residents from throughout
the Sahtu, and is the primary
agency responsible for wildlife and resource management
in the region. Board meetings are also open to the public;
any member of the communities who is interested can
attend and participate in the discussion. One of the goals
of this particular meeting is to allocate research funding
for the coming year.
A third year PhD student at the University of Alberta, I’m
here to talk about ways DNA technology can be used to
study wildlife, including examples from my own work on the
population genetics of northern wolves and arctic foxes.
Co-management of natural resources is a relatively new initiative in Canada. It’s designed to allow local people, specifically First Nations members, greater power over decisions
that impact the environment and resources they have used
for generations. It’s goal is to integrate residents’ traditional
knowledge and current concerns with the scientific expertise,
and political power, of researchers and territorial governments. It’s intention is to provide scientists with insight into
the problems and questions local people would like to see
addressed. It means that all research conducted in the north
must be approved, not only by government agencies, but
by every community that could be affected. It means that
northern residents must be included and incorporated into research designs wherever possible. It means that local people,
often with little formal education and limited knowledge of
English, must believe that research is valuable, and support
its execution.
I listen as the visiting scientists, experts in a diverse range of
fields, present their work to the board. The response of the
audience is telling. It soon becomes clear that most of the
people in this room are evaluating each proposal, not by its
scientific merit, but by the quality of its presentation. The
key factor is the ability of the researchers to make their work
accessible in, and relevant to, this world. Scientists that have
failed to do so seem frustrated or bewildered as the discussion
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continued from page 1
swirls away without them. Funding decisions that will soon
be announced will reinforce this point: the projects of those
who treat this group like colleagues at a scientific meeting
will not receive support this year.
It’s my turn. Alasdair Veitch, the regional biologist for the
Sahtu, had advised me to target my presentation towards
an eighth grade audience - a perilous compromise between
losing the interest of the PhDs, and losing local community
members in the dust. I’d thought my presentation was clear
and comprehensible; the expression on the translator’s face
as she struggles to keep up tells me otherwise. During the
morning drive, Alasdair told me that the Slavey equivalent of
his job title is approximately “man who goes to school to learn
about animals.” Somehow, despite the explanatory graphics,
I don’t think that “microsatellite” has survived.
I ask if there are questions. The PhDs seem interested; the
residents regard me in silence. I’m glad I haven’t come here
to apply for money.
It’s another two hours back to Norman Wells, the same washboard in a different darkness. The single hotel in Tulita is full (so
are the church and the community hall). I consider the day.
I’ve spent three years composing permit application packages
and talking to Hunter and Trapper Associations over the phone,
but for the first time, I am beginning to understand the full implications of the term co-management. It is an uneasy alliance,
built on a history of misunderstandings, conflicting agendas and
priorities, and struggling for balance in the face of lingering suspicion and doubt. It is also a group of people, acknowledging
the mistakes of the past, and reaching out in search of a better
way. As a scientist in a “southern” university, it has been easy to
roll my eyes and sigh over the additional restrictions, complications, and delays that now accompany research in the north.
As a survivor of the winter road and the SRRB, it has become
easier to appreciate my role, and its relative importance, in this
often tumultous journey. Humility is good for the soul.
And for the scientist.
Biopower for Greenhouse
Gas Mitigation
Amit Kumar
Jay B. Cameron
PhD Candidates,
Department of
Mechanical Engineering
E
mission of greenhouse
gases (GHGs) by fossil
fuel based power is one of
the main contributors to
global warming.
Canada has signed the Kyoto
Protocol and the target is to
reduce GHG emissions to 6
percent below 1990 levels
by the period between 2008
and 2012.
There are three main ways of
reducing the GHG level: conservation, sequestration and power
generation based on renewable
energy technologies. We focused
on power generation.
Among the different renewable energy technologies for
power generation biomass is
one of the most promising
options.
Biomass is CO2 neutral as the
amount of CO2 released during combustion is nearly equal
to that taken up by the plant
during its growth. Biomass
is being used in many places
in Europe for power generation on a medium scale and
in North America it is on a
smaller scale. In Canada biomass power plants are mostly
based on sawmill residues.
Our study focuses on the
economics of biomass based
power generation in western
Canada, especially in Alberta.
Alberta is the largest hydrocarbon base in North America and
its economic future depends
on how effectively it deals
with the GHG issue. Two main
factors make Alberta a unique
place for biomass based power
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generation: it is an active area
of fossil fuel based power development and it has a large
biomass resource potential
made up of forest biomass
and agricultural biomass.
Our study considers three
biomass fuels sources:
whole forest biomass (trees
from the forest, cut whole
and chipped), chipped logging residues (the branches
and tops of trees that today
are left on the roadside after
pulp and lumber operations),
and wheat and barley straw
from the black soil region of
central Alberta. We evaluated
the cost of power generation
based on these three fuels
and also estimated the optimum size of biomass power
plant for the three fuels.
Finally the study determined
the GHG credits required to
make the biopower competitive with coal in Alberta.
In the case of whole forest biomass, a tree would be cut and
would be allowed to re-grow
naturally or the land could be
replanted by hybrid species
having higher yield per year.
Current forestry practices in
Alberta do not use the forest
harvest residues. These forest residues are collected on
the roadside and burned to
reduce forest fire hazard.
Agricultural residues (principally straw from harvesting of
grain) are mostly left on the
field where they rot. These
residues could be collected and
used for power generation.
The main components of biomass based power generation
cost are: capital investment;
harvesting cost of biomass;
transportation cost; biomass
purchase cost; operations
and maintenance cost; and
ash disposal cost.
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In addition to above costs, whole forest biomass based power cost
also includes: silviculture cost; forest road construction cost; and
capital investment in construction of power transmission lines.
We estimated the GHG credit value to make the biomass based
power competitive to the power from a new coal-based plant,
assuming a coal power cost of $60 per MWh.
In the case of agricultural residues nutrient replacement cost
was also included; current forest harvesting is “first cut”, and
nutrients are not replaced after initial harvest.
Figure 2 shows the GHG credits that would be required to make biomass power economic in Alberta as a function of power price.
The estimated power cost and optimum size of the power
plant for the three biomass fuels are given in Table 1.
Table1: Power cost and optimum size of plant
Fuels
Power Cost
($/MWh)
Optimum Size
(MW)
Whole forest biomass
Forest harvest residues
Agricultural residues
71.68
95.76
76.46
900
137
450
Figure 2: Power Cost vs. Carbon Credit
The cost of power from forest harvest residues is highest
among the three fuels because of the high transportation
cost due to the wide dispersion of the residues. If nutrient
replacement cost is considered in the case of whole forest
biomass, the cost of power generation is nearly same as
agricultural residues.
Figure 1 shows the profile of power cost vs. capacity for the
different fuels. Two of the biomass cases show flatness in the
profile of power cost vs. capacity. This gives the opportunity
of building biomass based power plants at smaller capacities
with minimal capital cost penalty.
Figure 1: Plant Size vs. Power Price
Power cost ($/MWh)
100
The optimum size of the power plants is a tradeoff between the
capital cost and the transportation cost of biomass. The capital
cost decreases with the increasing capacity and the transportation cost increases with the increasing capacity. Hence at optimum size of the plant the total cost of power is a minimum.
Forest residues
Agricultural residues
Whole forest
80
60
40
20
0
0
10
20
30
40
50
Carbon Credit ($/tonne of C02)
60
Biomass power generation would need development of key
policies.
Biomass projects would need large investment therefore security
of the fuel supply is a key issue. For example, in the case
of forest harvest residues, the government could tie timber
rights to an obligation on forest companies to make the forest
residues available at the roadside.
This would not likely meet high resistance since currently
disposal of residues by burning is a net cost to forestry companies and would result in security of fuel supply.
150
Power price ($/MWh)
The GHG credit of $11 per tonne of CO2, $32 per tonne of
CO2 and $15 per tonne of CO2 for the whole forest, the forest
harvest residues and the agricultural residues respectively.
These values can be used to calculate a variable incentive
required to sustain a biomass power plant.
120
The average monthly power pool price in Alberta has varied
from $27 per MWh to about $260 per MWh over the last three
years. This results in large variation in GHG credit value and
in case of high power cost the GHG credit is negative.
90
60
Forest residues
Agricultural residues
Whole forest
30
0
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
Capacity (MW)
None of the projects based on the three fuels are economic
today as compared to coal-based power in western Canada,
which has a power cost of $50 to $60 per MWh.
Biomass projects can become economic with a GHG credit.
The government could relate the GHG credit to the market
price of power under a rate based scheme, and could also
do so through the structure of a specific market for carbon
credits from biomass power.
The technology for biomass power generation is available
and it is being used around the world. GHG credits would
be required for biopower to be competitive with coal power.
With government support development of biomass based
power projects could become a reality and would lead to a
large reduction in GHG emission.
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Are We Giving Songbirds
Their Last Supper?
by Michael Simpson
PhD Candidate,
Department of
Biological Sciences
F
rigid winds slice their
way through leaf less
trees, water is like glass, and
the earth is buried beneath
a foot of frosted snow. This
is the uncomfortable reality
of the long Alberta winter.
Faced with it, garden birds
seem fragile and helpless.
Compassion drives us to
stock up our bird feeders.
But this practice has become so widespread that
some people are beginning
to question it. According
to the US Department of
Interior’s 2001 National
Survey of Fishing, Hunting
and Wildlife-Associated Recreation, Americans alone
spend over US$3.8 billion
a year on bird seed, feeders,
baths, houses and nest boxes.
A recent Wall Street Journal
article challenged the notion
that birds must benefit from
this bounty. Could it be too
much of a good thing?
Bird conservation organizations and businesses trading
in bird-feeding products argue that bird feeding gives
people personal contact with
nature. Encouraging citizens
to record observations of
birds at their feeders has
also allowed conservationists to monitor bird habits
and numbers. The British
Trust for Ornithology’s Garden BirdWatch collates data
from millions of homes in
the United Kingdom. The
Canadian Nature Federation
and Bird Studies Canada,
in association with Cornell
Laboratory of Ornithology
and the National Audubon
Society, co-ordinate countless
North American contributions
to Project FeederWatch and
the Great Backyard Bird
Count. On both sides of the
Atlantic, these surveys have
highlighted declines in the populations of some wild bird species. Consequently, they have allowed the public to contribute
directly to conservation policy.
But there is a downside. A study published in1992 in the
American periodical Virginia Wildlife concluded that the
state’s one million domestic and feral cats kill up to 26 million birds a year. Fifty-five million are killed annually by 8
million pet cats in Britain, says that country’s Mammal Society.
Feeders attract birds into the cat’s domain. Thus, the argument
goes, feeding cruelly exposes birds to the risk of an untimely
death in the jaws of Felis catus.
Wherever birds of a feather flock together, disease is also
likely to spread rapidly. Salmonella, trichomoniasis, aspergillosis and avian pox are all associated with garden birds. All
are transmitted through close contact, or food and water contaminated with faeces or bodily fluids. Hence, feeders have
been implicated in their spread. Another killer, mycoplasmal
conjunctivitis, reached epidemic proportions in eastern North
America’s house finch population after it was identified in
1994. House finches visit feeders often.
Apparently, though, the biggest killer of garden birds is invisible. In a 1992 Cornell Laboratory study into garden bird
mortality, 51 percent of deaths resulted from birds flying
into windows. Garden birds startle easily, and in the city,
glass is rarely far away. A 1993 report summarising public
observations estimated between one and ten birds are killed
annually for every building in North America. Many more
deaths probably go unnoticed.
These figures have been used by critics to suggest there is a
strong ecological case for discouraging feeding. Yet, evidence
that bird populations are seriously depleted by deaths attributable to feeders is lacking. Indeed, research has suggested
that the risk of death from predation and disease is no greater
in the presence of feeders than it is elsewhere. Conservation organisations advocate placing blinds or curtains over
windows close to feeders, or placing feeders away from
buildings and roads. If limiting deaths from this cause is that
easy, depriving birds might be counterproductive.
continued on page 5
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continued from page 4
There is a general consensus among conservationists that
natural food sources for many songbirds have diminished.
Consequently, it seems unlikely that rejecting backyard birding would benefit even those species, such as the British
house sparrow and the North American house finch, that
might have declined as a result of deaths at feeders. A combination of ideas put forward by proponents and opponents
of bird feeding seems more promising.
Birders themselves are pushing for a more considered approach
to their pastime. They advocate cleaning feeders and bird
boxes and replacing food and water often. Feeders should
be shielded from above to prevent predation by hawks. And
food must be kept off the ground so birds are not put in easy
reach of cats.
The conflict between Sylvester and Tweety is challenging,
though. Data suggest that on average a single feline kills, at
most, one wild bird every two weeks. Given the number of
daily visits by birds to feeders, the risk from any single cat
seems small. But there are cats aplenty. Hence, if bird deaths
must fall, it will require responsible cat ownership and policies that discourage the growth of cat populations.
Cat ownership licenses and statutory punishment for the
owners of cats that kill wild birds are advocated by proponents of cat control. But they are difficult to enforce and
unlikely to be effective. The Humane Society of the United
States and the American Bird Conservancy are encouraging
people to keep cats indoors. Many owners, though, feel it
is cruel to inhibit a cat’s roaming. Moreover, none of these
approaches deal with feral cats. Euthanasia might save some
urban wildlife, rats and mice included, but it is curtains for
the cats. Adoption won’t cut predation, though, unless both
cat and bird lovers do their part. If there is a duty to protect
birds, it rests not only with owners of predatory pets. Anyone
that invites birds into a garden must do everything possible
to keep them out of harm’s way.
Death is not the only issue, though. There is evidence that
songbird populations expand or migrate into new areas where
feeders are abundant. This could result in declines in species that are valued in the invaded area. Individuals of some
species may also change their feeding habits to preferentially
forage at feeders, leading to dependency.
Until better information is forthcoming on the impacts of bird
feeding, conscience must guide our actions. Undoubtedly
feeders are culpable in the deaths of some birds, but without
our help some might not be alive at all. It will be hard to say
‘No’ to them as winter closes in.
Documenting
Biodiversity: The
Importance of Natural
History Collections
Jeff Saarela
PhD student,
Department of
Biological Sciences
B
iodiversity has been a hot
topic ever since the word
was coined by entomologist
E. O. Wilson in the late 1980s.
Short for biological diversity,
biodiversity can be broadly
defined as the variety of living
things on earth, encompassing
genes, species and ecosystems.
As the word has moved into
the popular lexicon, there has
been a growing awareness of
the importance of understanding what the different kinds
of life on earth are and where
they occur.
The enormous task of cataloguing life on earth began
in earnest about 250 years
ago, when Carolus Linnaeus
began naming organisms and
developed his familiar system
of hierarchical classification
and binomial nomenclature.
Indeed, many of the most
common organisms that we
encounter today bear the scientific names that Linnaeus
gave them in the late 1700s,
but the task of cataloguing
and describing life on earth
is nowhere near complete.
Scientists around the world,
known as taxonomists, continue to study the biodiversity with which we share our
planet. Taxonomists strive to
understand how species can
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be differentiated from each
other, the kinds of habitats
that they live in, their geographic distributions and how
they are related to other species. They compile the basic
information that forms the
fundamental foundation for
our understanding of all the
species in the world.
Much of our knowledge of the
biodiversity on our planet has
originated from the study of
biological specimens that are
stored in natural history collections throughout the world.
Natural history collections are
libraries of the living world, and
they contain specimen-based
records, collected through the
centuries, that hold information
about the biological history of
the past and present. Typically, specimens include the
actual biological organism, as
well as additional information,
including the collection date,
the geographical location of
the collection (today including detailed GPS data), the
habitat in which the specimen
was found, associated species
and the name of the collector.
Natural history collections thus
provide the only permanent
record of where and when a
species has occurred through
time and space.
Natural history collections are
used widely in many different
far-reaching capacities. When
many individual specimens of
a single species are studied,
information on various biological attributes of the whole
species begins to emerge. For
example, in my own botanical taxonomic research, I use
continues on page 6
environmental news 5
Visit the Virtual E. H. Strickland Entomological
Museum at www.entomology.ualberta.ca.
continued from page 5
plant specimens from natural history collections to study the
range of morphological variation within and between species,
and I use that information to characterize species boundaries.
I then determine the geographic distributions of species by
plotting their collection localities on maps. Often, through
careful observations of specimens, taxonomists discover new
species previously unknown to science.
Collections hold important information useful in the study
of global climate change, and they are used to track the
expanding ranges of newly introduced alien species. Collections are invaluable resources in teaching, exposing both
students and the public to the astounding diversity of life at
universities and museums, and they serve as references to
aid in the identification of newly collected specimens. Collections act as repositories where specimens from ecological
and environmental studies are stored and made available for
additional study. Paleontological collections are invaluable in
the reconstruction of environmental conditions of the past.
With the molecular revolution that has occurred in biology in the
last fifteen years, collections have garnered another important
function, serving as repositories for specimens used in molecular
studies. Such voucher specimens are the only physical entities
linking the machine-generated DNA sequence to the species that
it represents, and they allow future researchers to study the actual
specimens from which the genetic information was obtained.
Reciprocally, museum specimens serve as a priceless source of
DNA that can often be extracted and studied, sometimes many
decades after the specimen was first collected.
Alberta is home to a large number of natural history collections
that are housed in various institutions, including the Royal Tyrrell
Museum of Paleontology, The Provincial Museum of Alberta,
several government departments and the various universities
and colleges in the province. The University of Alberta alone
maintains 21 diverse natural history collections that are curated
by university professors, who use the collections in teaching and
in their varied research programs. Together, these collections
represent the biological heritage of Alberta and its neighbouring regions.
The Alberta Natural Science
Collections Information Facility (ANSCIF) is a recently
proposed initiative to create
a comprehensive information
resource that includes all of
the specimen information
currently stored in the many natural history collections in
Alberta. If funded, this exciting multi-million dollar proposal
to the Canada Foundation for Innovation will result in the
digitization and databasing of all the collection information
for 3.8 million objects. A fully searchable virtual museum
will be created that will be accessible over the internet to
researchers around the world. If this Albertan information
is made available online, it will join the leagues of the many
international institutions that have already made their data
available, and will contribute to the answering of research
questions of both local and global importance.
The E. H. Strickland Entomological Museum at the University of Alberta has already set the standard for how a virtual
museum should be constructed. Among the growing number of web-based collection databases, the Strickland site is
unique because it combines detailed specimen information
with more general knowledge summaries of the species. Of
the approximately 1 million specimens currently housed in
the museum, collection information for 4300 specimens has
been databased, and 1100 knowledge summaries (referred
to as species pages) have been created.
Today, in an era of mass ecological destruction, natural history
collections are helping to answer those crucial questions that
are most important to the survival of all species on the planet,
including our own. As the information age progresses, an
increasing amount of collection data from around the world
will become more easily accessible, and our comprehension
of the astounding biodiversity on earth will continue to grow
and be made freely available to the global community. As the
new century moves forward, natural history collections will
continue to play a central role in our understanding of life on
earth, and it is important that we understand and appreciate
their central role in this noble initiative.
Environmental News is published by the Centre. Articles, photos,
commentary and suggestions should be submitted to:
University of Alberta
Environmental Research
and Studies Centre
ISSN: 1705-2343
Editor: Beverly Levis
Design: Creative Services
Environmental News
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