Emissions

Imagine some future landfill crisis, where you and your neighbors had to cut back on the amount of trash you put on the curb for pickup.Every household -- no matter how big the family, or how much recycling it does -- could be ordered to reduce its throwaways by the same amount. Those who slipped up could be heavily fined.That sounds like a sure recipe for community bickering, if not civil war.But what if every household gets an allotment of tags to be attached to its trash bags, with only tagged refuse accepted for disposal?

Last December, an American milestone passed virtually unnoticed. Forty years earlier, Harrison Schmitt became the 12th and last person to walk on the moon. Mr. Schmitt and the 11 men who preceded him - beginning with Neil Armstrong in 1969 - had this in common: All were employees of the United States government. Some have argued that sending men to the moon may not have been the most prudent use of American resources or ingenuity. But the realization of President John F. Kennedy's dream of a U.S. moon walk before the end of the 1960s became a symbol of the scientific and imaginative leadership of this country and what Kennedy termed our "freedom doctrine" during the Cold War. Now, the United States has an opportunity, even an obligation, to mobilize its resources and knowhow to achieve a more practical, and pressing, end. Increasingly under siege by destructive and deadly weather events - wrought, many scientists believe, by man-made climate change - we need to make a national commitment to weather research, including the fields of geo-engineering, weather modification and storm mitigation.

An article in Tuesday's Business section about Baltimore Gas and Electric Co.'s challenge to the state's nitrogen oxide emission limits erroneously described the consequences of those emissions. The emissions contribute to higher ozone levels.The Sun regrets the error.Pub Date: 6/25/98

Hoping to become a better neighbor, officials at the Maryland-Virginia Milk Producers Association have applied for an environmental permit they failed to obtain two years ago and are working to reduce emission of pollutants and odors from their North Laurel milk plant.The plant's officials said the failure to obtain a Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) permit to operate their 65-foot-tall milk dryer -- a machine used to make nonfat dry milk -- was simply "an oversight." They said they purchased the dryer in January 1993 to make production more efficient and reduce pollution at the plant -- located off Leishear Road on the south side of Gorman Road.

Baltimore Gas & Electric Co. is moving ahead with its long-awaited plans to expand a power station in Annapolis, apparently ignoring severe restrictions imposed by city lawmakers who want to limit electromagnetic emissions.The City Council approved the expansion of the Tyler Avenue substation Monday night, but attached a set of stringent conditions requiring the utility to contain emissions created by power lines.Yesterday, the utility called the restrictions "unreasonable" and vowed to follow only the first set of conditions it bargained with the city.

Miller Asphalt Products Inc. in Finksburg is operating according to state regulations and likely will be allowed to continue treating contaminated soil, Maryland Department of the Environment officials said last night.Ten people attended a public information meeting at the Reese Fireman's Building to discuss the company's application for an oil operations permit. Several asked questions about the plant operation and how it's regulated.The company, on Dede Road, has been treating contaminated soil for two years.

Carroll County registered one of the highest ground-level ozone readings in the state June 7 and has averaged the poorest air quality in Maryland this month."

Maryland is on track to reduce climate-altering greenhouse gases 25 percent by the end of the decade, according to a state environmental official. In a preview of the state's overdue plan to curb emissions of carbon dioxide and methane, George S. "Tad" Aburn Jr., head of air management for the state Department of the Environment , told members of the House Environmental Matters Committee Wednesday that Maryland should exceed the goal set in a 2009 law if all 65 control programs laid out in the draft blueprint work as planned.

WASHINGTON -Potentially one of the most far-reaching elements in President Barack Obama's budget blueprint is its call to combat global warming with a "cap-and-trade" system for reducing carbon emissions from power plants and other industrial facilities. Overall, it would cut total emissions 14 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 percent below 2005 by 2050. The plan calls for setting emissions limits on facilities and tightening those limits each year to achieve the overall goals.

LONDON -- A major British study issued yesterday concludes that rapid and substantial spending to combat global warming is needed to avert a catastrophic reduction in worldwide productivity on the scale of the Great Depression that could devastate food sources, cause widespread deaths and turn hundreds of millions of people into refugees. The report commissioned by the British government, which officials said was the most comprehensive review ever of the economics of climate change, warns that failure to act could cost the world up to 20 percent a year in lost income.