Ed Miliband: people must be persuaded of need for pylons near homes

3 Questions: Bridging anthropology and engineering for clean energy in Mongolia

Anthropologists Manduhai Buyandelger and Lauren Bonilla discuss the humanistic perspective they bring to a project that is yielding promising results.

In 2021, Michael Short, an associate professor of nuclear science and engineering, approached professor of anthropology Manduhai Buyandelger with an unusual pitch: collaborating on a project to prototype a molten salt heat bank in Mongolia, Buyandelger’s country of origin and place of her scholarship. It was also an invitation to forge a novel partnership between two disciplines that rarely overlap. Developed in collaboration with the National University of Mongolia (NUM), the device was built to provide heat for people in colder climates, and in places where clean energy is a challenge. Buyandelger and Short teamed up to launch Anthro-Engineering Decarbonization at the Million-Person Scale, an initiative intended to advance the heat bank idea in Mongolia, and ultimately demonstrate its potential as a scalable clean heat source in comparably challenging sites around the world. This project received funding from the inaugural MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium Seed Awards program. In order to fund various components of the project, especially student involvement and additional staff, the project also received support from the MIT Global Seed Fund, New Engineering Education Transformation (NEET), Experiential Learning Office, Vice Provost for International Activities, and d’Arbeloff Fund for Excellence in Education.As part of this initiative, the partners developed a special topic course in anthropology to teach MIT undergraduates about Mongolia’s unique energy and climate challenges, as well as the historical, social, and economic context in which the heat bank would ideally find a place. The class 21A.S01 (Anthro-Engineering: Decarbonization at the Million-Person Scale) prepares MIT students for a January Independent Activities Period (IAP) trip to the Mongolian capital of Ulaanbaatar, where they embed with Mongolian families, conduct research, and collaborate with their peers. Mongolian students also engaged in the project. Anthropology research scientist and lecturer Lauren Bonilla, who has spent the past two decades working in Mongolia, joined to co-teach the class and lead the IAP trips to Mongolia. With the project now in its third year and yielding some promising solutions on the ground, Buyandelger and Bonilla reflect on the challenges for anthropologists of advancing a clean energy technology in a developing nation with a unique history, politics, and culture. Q: Your roles in the molten salt heat bank project mark departures from your typical academic routine. How did you first approach this venture?Buyandelger: As an anthropologist of contemporary religion, politics, and gender in Mongolia, I have had little contact with the hard sciences or building or prototyping technology. What I do best is listening to people and working with narratives. When I first learned about this device for off-the-grid heating, a host of issues came straight to mind right away that are based on socioeconomic and cultural context of the place. The salt brick, which is encased in steel, must be heated to 400 degrees Celsius in a central facility, then driven to people’s homes. Transportation is difficult in Ulaanbaatar, and I worried about road safety when driving the salt brick to gers [traditional Mongolian homes] where many residents live. The device seemed a bit utopian to me, but I realized that this was an amazing educational opportunity: We could use the heat bank as part of an ethnographic project, so students could learn about the everyday lives of people — crucially, in the dead of winter — and how they might respond to this new energy technology in the neighborhoods of Ulaanbaatar.Bonilla: When I first went to Mongolia in the early 2000s as an undergraduate student, the impacts of climate change were already being felt. There had been a massive migration to the capital after a series of terrible weather events that devastated the rural economy. Coal mining had emerged as a vital part of the economy, and I was interested in how people regarded this industry that both provided jobs and damaged the air they breathed. I am trained as a human geographer, which involves seeing how things happening in a local place correspond to things happening at a global scale. Thinking about climate or sustainability from this perspective means making linkages between social life and environmental life. In Mongolia, people associated coal with national progress. Based on historical experience, they had low expectations for interventions brought by outsiders to improve their lives. So my first take on the molten salt project was that this was no silver bullet solution. At the same time, I wanted to see how we could make this a great project-based learning experience for students, getting them to think about the kind of research necessary to see if some version of the molten salt would work.Q: After two years, what lessons have you and the students drawn from both the class and the Ulaanbaatar field trips?Buyandelger: We wanted to make sure MIT students would not go to Mongolia and act like consultants. We taught them anthropological methods so they could understand the experiences of real people and think about how to bring people and new technologies together. The students, from engineering and anthropological and social science backgrounds, became critical thinkers who could analyze how people live in ger districts. When they stay with families in Ulaanbaatar in January, they not only experience the cold and the pollution, but they observe what people do for work, how parents care for their children, how they cook, sleep, and get from one place to another. This enables them to better imagine and test out how these people might utilize the molten salt heat bank in their homes.Bonilla: In class, students learn that interventions like this often fail because the implementation process doesn’t work, or the technology doesn’t meet people’s real needs. This is where anthropology is so important, because it opens up the wider landscape in which you’re intervening. We had really difficult conversations about the professional socialization of engineers and social scientists. Engineers love to work within boxes, but don’t necessarily appreciate the context in which their invention will serve.As a group, we discussed the provocative notion that engineers construct and anthropologists deconstruct. This makes it seem as if engineers are creators, and anthropologists are brought in as add-ons to consult and critique engineers’ creations. Our group conversation concluded that a project such as ours benefits from an iterative back-and-forth between the techno-scientific and humanistic disciplines.Q: So where does the molten salt brick project stand?Bonilla: Our research in Mongolia helped us produce a prototype that can work: Our partners at NUM are developing a hybrid stove that incorporates the molten salt brick. Supervised by instructor Nathan Melenbrink of MIT’s NEET program, our engineering students have been involved in this prototyping as well.The concept is for a family to heat it up using a coal fire once a day and it warms their home overnight. Based on our anthropological research, we believe that this stove would work better than the device as originally conceived. It won’t eliminate coal use in residences, but it will reduce emissions enough to have a meaningful impact on ger districts in Ulaanbaatar. The challenge now is getting funding to NUM so they can test different salt combinations and stove models and employ local blacksmiths to work on the design.This integrated stove/heat bank will not be the ultimate solution to the heating and pollution crisis in Mongolia. But it will be something that can inspire even more ideas. We feel with this project we are planting all kinds of seeds that will germinate in ways we cannot anticipate. It has sparked new relationships between MIT and Mongolian students, and catalyzed engineers to integrate a more humanistic, anthropological perspective in their work.Buyandelger: Our work illustrates the importance of anthropology in responding to the unpredictable and diverse impacts of climate change. Without our ethnographic research — based on participant observation and interviews, led by Dr. Bonilla, — it would have been impossible to see how the prototyping and modifications could be done, and where the molten salt brick could work and what shape it needed to take. This project demonstrates how indispensable anthropology is in moving engineering out of labs and companies and directly into communities.Bonilla: This is where the real solutions for climate change are going to come from. Even though we need solutions quickly, it will also take time for new technologies like molten salt bricks to take root and grow. We don’t know where the outcomes of these experiments will take us. But there’s so much that’s emerging from this project that I feel very hopeful about.

Energy

Climate

Crisis

The Department of Energy promised this tribal nation a $32 million solar grant. It’s nearly impossible to access.

Washington’s Yakama Nation received both the grant and a $100 million federal loan. Held up by a series of bureaucratic hurdles, the funding could expire before the government lets the tribal nation touch a dime.

The Department of Energy gave the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation what seemed like very good news earlier this year: It had won a $32 million grant for a novel solar energy project in Washington state. Built over a series of old irrigation canals, the proposed solar panels would generate electricity for tribal members without removing farm acreage from cultivation. The location would preserve the kinds of culturally sensitive land that have prompted concerns about other renewables projects. Months after announcing the grant, the same department is making it nearly impossible for the tribal nation to access the money. “It is because literally the feds cannot get out of their own way,” said Ray Wiseman, general manager of Yakama Power, the tribally owned utility. The bureaucratic whiplash stems from the fact that while one part of the Energy Department hands out money for clean energy projects, another part decides which projects get access to the Northwest electrical grid. The Bonneville Power Administration’s process for approving connections comes with such exorbitant costs and is mired in such long delays that the federal grant could well expire before the tribe can touch a dime. It’s a dilemma that persists despite the Biden administration’s explicit promise last year to help tribes create new sources of renewable power affordably and quickly. Bonneville and the Energy Department blame the holdup on a glut of renewable energy proposals that are creating a need for massive transmission upgrades across the country. In a joint statement on behalf of Bonneville and its parent agency, Energy Department spokesperson Chris Ford said the government is required to put all energy proposals through the same process with the same costs. Read Next Why aren’t tribal nations installing more green energy? Blame ‘white tape.’ Taylar Dawn Stagner But Ford added that federal agencies are “exploring different options within the law to both speed the process and reduce the costs the Yakama Nation would have to pay.” The White House Council on Environmental Quality, which brokered the agreement pledging to help tribes build renewables, said in a statement the administration is coordinating with tribes and others in “taking action to deliver a clean, reliable electric grid and make federal permitting of new transmission lines more efficient.” But council spokesperson Justin Weiss didn’t answer questions from Oregon Public Broadcasting and ProPublica about why the Yakama project was stalled and what specific steps the White House has taken to help speed tribal energy connections. Renewable energy supporters say the Yakama solar case shows that if the White House can’t keep the federal bureaucracy from undermining its own goals, then it’s making promises it can’t keep. Nancy Hirsh, who’s worked since the 1990s for a coalition that advocates for clean power in the Northwest, said the situation is exactly what she feared would happen after the tribal agreement was signed. “This is just the thing that we need to fix,” Hirsh said, “the left hand not connected with the right hand.” An unprecedented promise The Yakama reservation in Central Washington bears the scars of the federal government’s energy policies. Transmission lines stretching across tribal properties were built a century ago without permission. The country’s largest nuclear waste cleanup site, Hanford, has poisoned parts of the tribe’s ancestral land under the Department of Energy’s watch. Families on the reservation were displaced from their homes along the river to make way for massive reservoirs and hydroelectric dams. Those dams nearly wiped out runs of wild salmon that are vital to Indigenous cultures and that the U.S. government swore in treaties it would preserve. Even today, the development of renewable energy often risks encroaching on land held sacred by tribes, who have argued they are cut out of the decision-making process. President Joe Biden seemed to offer a fresh approach to tribal sovereignty, declaring it a priority for his administration shortly after taking office in 2021. Soon, the White House began negotiations to end a decades-old lawsuit by tribes and environmental groups who want some of the Northwest’s federal dams torn down to keep local salmon populations from going extinct. Read Next Washington solar project paused amid concern about Indigenous sites B. ‘Toastie’ Oaster The result of the talks was what the administration called a “historic” deal. The tribes would put their lawsuit on hold. In return, the White House promised to help tribes develop up to 3 gigawatts of renewable energy. That could power all the homes in a city roughly the size of Portland, Oregon. More significantly to the tribes, it’s enough to replace the output of the four dams on the lower Snake River deemed most detrimental to salmon. “It will take all of us committing to this partnership now and for years to come to lift the words off the page and bring this agreement to life,” White House senior adviser John Podesta said at the signing of the agreement with Northwest tribes in February. “I want you to know that President Biden and Vice President Harris and the whole administration are committed to making that happen.” Yakama Nation Chair Gerald Lewis also voiced hope when he signed the agreement with the Biden administration. “The last time energy was developed in the Columbia Basin, it was done on the backs of tribal communities and tribal resources,” Lewis said at the time. “Now we have an opportunity to do better.” The Yakama Nation’s proposal would seem to exactly fit the bill. Its initial plan was to cover 10 miles of irrigation canals with solar panels and to outfit the canals themselves with small-scale hydroelectric turbines. That would generate enough electricity to power a few thousand homes on the reservation, which has a population of about 30,000. In addition to avoiding the tribe’s culturally sensitive lands, the project wouldn’t encroach on any wildlife habitats. And covering the irrigation canals would shade the water so that less of it evaporates in the sun. The Department of Energy awarded its $32 million grant for the project at the end of February. Soon after, the agency posted an interview about the plan with Lewis and Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm on its Facebook page bearing the caption, “Sometimes, the great ideas are the ones right in front of us.” Washington’s U.S. senators, Democrats Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray, each issued news releases announcing the grant and praising the project, saying the canals could boost water conservation by 20% and cut the reservation’s power bills by 15%. But those ambitions quickly ran up against stark realities, according to the people directly involved in bringing the project to life. “Everybody thinks that the federal government gave us 32 million bucks,” Wiseman, the general manager for Yakama Power, said. “They did not.” Stuck in bureaucracy In its landmark accord with tribes, and in documents supporting the accord’s implementation, the White House promised more than money. It vowed to muster the full clout of the federal government to achieve the plan’s goals. Specifically, the agreement said the energy department, working with Indigenous leaders, would find “legal and regulatory options” for getting projects connected to the grid faster and for making them affordable for tribes. That didn’t prevent the first tribal project to come along — the Yakama Nation’s — from getting caught in a snare of bureaucracy. In addition to the grant from the Energy Department’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations, Yakama Power was promised a nearly $100 million rural clean energy loan from the Department of Agriculture. But it cannot access any of the federal money without first obtaining a “power purchase agreement,” which essentially offers proof that the electricity the tribal utility plans to generate has a destination. That’s hard for the tribe to do because it can’t get a purchase agreement until its project connects to the grid, which is owned by Bonneville, itself an arm of the Energy Department. Bonneville’s earliest estimate of when it will finish studying connection requests such as the Yakama Nation’s is 2027, but the federal agency says it could be longer. Read Next The green transition will make things worse for the Indigenous world Taylar Dawn Stagner That’s just one of many steps. The tribe can’t distribute electricity from the new solar project until Bonneville completes upgrades to the section of its transmission system that serves the reservation, including the installation of a new electrical substation. The federal agency’s estimate for what it would charge for the substation alone: $144 million. Building transmission lines to and from the new solar array would drive the cost higher still, but Bonneville hasn’t done those estimates yet. The Yakama would have to bear those costs. The tribe had counted on some rate increases to pay for the solar array, but covering the unexpectedly high cost of the upgrade would add hundreds of dollars more to a household’s monthly utility bill, Wiseman said. That’s on a reservation where nearly 20% of residents have incomes below the poverty line. Another financial hurdle: Inflation has driven up construction costs for the solar array itself in the two years since the project was proposed. Even if the tribe can come up with all the extra money needed, time is working against the project. Bonneville says it will take five to seven years to build the substation after it’s paid for. All the delays will push the tribe up against a 2031 deadline to use or lose its $32 million grant and $100 million loan. They were funded under the bipartisan infrastructure bill and the Inflation Reduction Act, which both expire that year. Wiseman is no longer confident of how many miles of canal, if any, the utility can cover with solar panels. He’s unsure whether Yakama Power will need to opt for a much smaller solar array that lacks the specialized hardware needed to suspend the panels above the irrigation canals. “I have serious questions about whether or not these things will survive to go forward,” Wiseman said. The green energy traffic jam The Yakama Nation in many ways faces the same pressures that are holding back new wind and solar farms across the country. The surge in such projects over the past decade has jammed up the system that grid operators like Bonneville Power Administration use when evaluating requests to connect to the grid. The onslaught of green power has also taxed a grid designed to carry much less energy. And yet the new supply is badly needed to meet soaring demand, driven in part by thearrival of energy-guzzling data centers in the past decade. Bonneville is changing the way it studies energy proposals to streamline the process. But renewable developers, advocates and industry analysts have published a white paper with a list of more than 20 recommendations that they say can create the grid the Northwest needs and that, for the most part, they say Bonneville has not addressed. Read Next For a just transition to green energy, tribes need more than money Taylar Dawn Stagner In the meantime, despite the Biden administration’s agreement last year to help tribes, their projects have not moved to the head of the line. Hirsh’s group, the clean and affordable energy coalition, was party to the lawsuit that the tribal deal was meant to settle. She said the government’s failure to deliver on its clean energy promises “could jeopardize the agreement.” Yakama Nation leaders say because of the long history of energy development violating tribal rights, and because reservations were set up with marginal infrastructure, the federal government should not treat tribes the way it does any other energy developer. The Department of Energy, however, says its lawyers have yet to find a way through federal energy regulations or treaty law to let the agency deal with tribal projects differently. Wiseman continues to incur costs on behalf of Yakama Power, planning for the solar project while doubts linger over whether all the pieces will come together in time. “If I can’t get the transmission access that we need — whether intentional, unintentional, whatever you want to call it — Bonneville will have single-handedly killed these projects,” Wiseman said. “And that’s why at this point, I feel incredibly frustrated, because beating them up doesn’t do me any good.” This story was originally published by Grist with the headline The Department of Energy promised this tribal nation a $32 million solar grant. It’s nearly impossible to access. on Sep 29, 2024.

Energy

Government

Conservation

Kashmere Gardens, Fifth Ward gets $20 million for solar energy generation and ecosystem enhancements

Part of the grant will fund nature-based solutions, like the installation of native trees and grasses, intended to address runoff from the contaminated site as well as flooding and heat.

Lucio Vasquez/Houston Public MediaEntrance to Kashmere Gardens. Taken on December 12, 2019.Northeast Houston residents around a cancer-causing contamination site will see ecosystem enhancements and a solar energy system thanks to a $20 million grant from the Environmental Protection Agency. Houston City Council unanimously voted to accept the grant on Wednesday. "The purpose of that project is to uplift communities that have been challenged by environmental injustices," said Loren Hopkins, chief environmental science officer for the Houston Health Department. The soil under a Union Pacific Railyard in the Kashmere Gardens and Fifth Ward area has long been contaminated by the cancer-causing chemical creosote, used to treat wood in the 1900s. A plume of soil pollution extends under more than 100 homes in the area. Part of the grant will fund nature-based solutions, like the installation of native trees and grasses, intended to address runoff from the contaminated site as well as flooding and heat. "We’re expecting nature-based changes throughout the area to work on just improving the quality of the air and the water and the runoff and the soil," Hopkins said. The grant will also fund a community solar energy system. Residents will be trained and employed to construct the system. "We have available land in Fifth Ward, and so we always ask what we are going to do with this land," said Council Member Tarsha Jackson, who represents the area. "This is what we can do. Putting solar on this land — that’s going to help residents if we have another storm with power outages." Hopkins said the health department is still selecting a location for the solar system. On Wednesday, Council Members Julian Ramirez and Twila Carter expressed concerns. They pointed to a stalled solar project in the Sunnyside neighborhood, where residents were promised the conversion of a 240-acre landfill into a solar farm. The initiative floundered this year as the company sought funding. Dori Wolfe, Houston-area program coordinator for nonprofit advocacy group Solar Neighbors United, said community engagement will be important for the success of the Northeast Houston project. "Having community at the table — knowing what the benefits are and how they’re going to be distributed — is vital to getting acceptance, and that is one of the things that Sunnyside solar array has to keep working on," Wolfe said. According to the ordinance approved by the City Council, the solar system in Fifth Ward and Kashmere Gardens is expected to improve the area's resilience in the case of outages during climate disasters. The start date for construction is still up in the air as the city's health department selects a site for the solar array.

Energy

Nature

Climate

LISTEN: Mokshda Kaul on making the clean energy transition work for all

Mokshda Kaul joins the Agents of Change in Environmental Justice podcast to discuss the clean energy transition and how policymakers and other leaders can avoid mistakes of the past.Kaul, a Ph.D. candidate in the sustainable energy program at the School of Sustainability at Arizona State University, also talks about the crucial role of coalitions in a just energy transition.The Agents of Change in Environmental Justice podcast is a biweekly podcast featuring the stories and big ideas from past and present fellows, as well as others in the field. You can see all of the past episodes here.Listen below to our discussion with Kaul and subscribe to the podcast at iTunes or Spotify.Agents of Change in Environmental Justice · Mokshda Kaul on making the clean energy transition work for allTranscript Brian BienkowskiMoksha, how are you doing today?Mokshda Kaul I'm good. How are you, Brian?Brian Bienkowski I'm doing wonderful. I'm a little hot. I turned off my fan so we don't have the background noise. And where are you today?Mokshda Kaul So speaking of hot, I'm in Arizona, so I'm in Phoenix, and I've also turned my fan off. And luckily, my AC is working, so I'm not going to explode into flames, which is always possible in Arizona. So, you know, just saying. But yeah, that's where I am right now, and I'm just really excited to do this actually.Brian Bienkowski Well, I am really excited to talk to you too. Your research and your path there, to me, are fascinating. So I'm so excited to have you on the program. So as you probably know, I like to start at the beginning. So tell me a little bit about your upbringing. Of course, you're not from Arizona originally.Mokshda Kaul yeah. So I moved here for my PhD in 2020 and that was in the middle of the pandemic, by the way, which was quite jarring. There were only those bubble flights operating from the US to India, and it was terrifying for multiple different reasons. And I got got here, and I was again stuck in a room. Instead of being stuck in a room in India, I was stuck in a room in Phoenix. Nothing changed in my life, honestly speaking. But in terms of, like, where I'm from, and coming to Arizona, I'm from Mumbai, which is I think, the world's most densely populated city. So I'm used to having people step on my toes while I'm walking. And I came to Arizona, and I was like, there are no people here. What's wrong with this place? So that was number one for me. And, I mean, being raised in Mumbai, India is a country with so many multitudes. And I'm born and raised in Mumbai, but I come from Kashmir, and I spent my summer vacations, and, like a lot of my time, even, like a few years in my childhood, actually, in this smaller town near Kashmir called Jammu, which is, I would say, like now it's a tier-two city, but back then, maybe it was like a tier-three city, and it was very jarring the difference between Mumbai and Jammu, because Mumbai is the financial capital of India. So you have every amenity you can think of. You have round the clock electricity, and of course, within Mumbai also, we have terrible infrastructure problems, but that's a different story. But juxtaposing that against Jammu, where you'd have blackouts in the middle of summer heat and like summer, like the Phoenix summer, and I used to find it so uncomfortable to sort of when I'd come back to Mumbai to have that feeling of, wait, what is the thing that the people here are doing right, that they don't have to have these blackouts? Like, what? What is it like? Why is there this element of chance and privilege that's deciding who gets to experience these things or not? And I think I was just always very irritated and uncomfortable by it, and I was benefiting from it for all intents and purposes.Brian Bienkowski And so you mentioned that juxtaposition of Kashmir and Mumbai, and I'm wondering if that was kind of where you became aware of the concept of environmental justice, or if that was or if it was something else.Mokshda Kaul So I mean, I'm really glad you point that out, but that's exactly it. I would find it very unsettling. And it's just, if you look at it, I mean, at the same time as I was growing up, I was reading like, Rawlsian theories of justice and trying to understand, like, who decides, who decides that somebody gets something just by virtue of the fact that they were born in a particular city? Like, I don't have anything to do with the fact that I was born in Mumbai. Okay, and I think that the unsettled feeling never left me, and I think that's what they call acknowledging your privilege. And I was just always affected by it. And also in addition to this, India has lot of issues on the grounds of caste and class, and growing up in a space like that, where you... especially in Mumbai, where it's so cosmopolitan and so it's like a melting pot. You see all of it every single day, and you can't be away from your privilege. You can't face away if you really choose to tap into it. So I guess that's where that idea of environmental justice kind of ticked in my brain.Brian Bienkowski And before we get into some of that, some of the energy justice work you've done, and what you're working on now, what is a moment or event that has helped shaped your identity up to this point?Mokshda Kaul It's interesting because I was listening to Maria Jo's podcast the other day, and she said the same thing that I have been thinking about that I don't think it's a particular incident. I think it's these bunch of different things that have come together to this moment of like who I am. First of all, it's obviously my parents' history as being internal refugees and learning from them about how conflict operates at a very young age, like I was, I think, three or four, when I understood that, oh, we are not in our hometown because of this huge issue that happened, and there was violence and there was extremism, and there were two sides to the story at that same time, my parents side and the other side. And I think growing up with that, and then there's actually very funny thing that I remember now that you said defining incidents. I think I had bit of a bleeding heart syndrome since I was a child. I don't know why, but I had this. So I still remember this, because it's, it's like, etched so vividly in my memory. I was in third grade and we had to make posters for something in school. I don't remember what exactly, but my poster was the planet crying because it was hot. And this is 2003 and I remember one of my uncles came home and he made fun of me, and he was like, "This is so stupid. Like, why are you concerned about the environment and the planet?" And I was in tears, because I was like, no, no, we need to care about this. I don't understand why you don't care about this. And I was, I was sad, like, I was heartbroken that people don't care. And so that little child always had that element of, why don't we want to make the world a better place? Like, what's wrong with people?Brian Bienkowski So the world is still crying. Since your picture, unfortunately, we're all we should all be crying. And so you are, you are trying to better the world, and your research focuses on, I'm distilling it down, but the clean energy transition. So first, what drew you to this line of research, and how are you using this economics background that you mentioned to understand the clean energy adoption and policy?Mokshda Kaul Back in 2014 King's College London did this really cool thing where they got professors from King's College to come down to Mumbai and do this really cool summer course. And I did the one on international political economy. And every student, it was very strenuous. They packed a summer school's worth of teaching and practice into like a one and a half week period. So it was so much reading, like this huge binder of – I don't even want to go back to that – but each student had to prepare, like a presentation on a particular topic. And this is big bit of a background. My dad works in oil and gas, and that's very unsettling to me, and I'm sure he's going to listen to this, but so I naturally decide that I want to work on the energy topic, energy presentation for this class. Because I was like, Oh, my dad knows about this. And the day that I had to present, our professor actually did this whole presentation on how the shale oil boom is going to change, like the face of the earth. And my entire presentation actually was about the shale oil boom. So this is like one hour before my presentation, and I'm having a meltdown because I don't know what to talk about anymore, because you just covered everything, and I'm doing this frantic internet search of what do I talk about? And that's how I found out about the energy transition, and that's how I discovered that, oh, renewable energy is a thing. So instead of talking about shale oil, I talked about how we have these other sources of energy which actually don't create the problems that we have with fossil fuels, and they need more investment, of course, in time. But this is 2014 so it was different situation back then. And so that was how I kind of was drawn to the energy transition. It was a very important moment in my life, I would say, and that changed the focus of how I was seeing the world, and that changed the focus of what I wanted to do with the world. And speaking to my background as an economist, I'm trained as an economist. But I come from a very interdisciplinary school, the School of Sustainability here at ASU, and we kind of, my advisor has a political science background, so I incorporate methods from political science and economics, and the way I see it is it kind of helps me translate the world. So I know econ gets a bad rap for the fact that it's been, it's kind of led us to the point we are at in terms of exploiting the environment and all of those things. But I'm surrounded by a bunch of folks in the School of Sustainability who use econ as a tool to sort of address these problems of environmental and climate issues and distribution concerns and equity concerns. And that's how I see econ. I see it as like this toolkit that I can use to understand why do things look the way they do. And then the political science part also adds to it, because it helps me understand why did people decide what they decided. So all in all, I feel like really grateful for the fact that I have this pol-sci + econ situation, because I'm able to understand policies from like, start to finish in a way that what went into the background, why did you think the way you thought when you made this and how did this come about? And then what are the outcomes from it? So from that sense, yeah, these disciplines have helped me just unpack the whole thing as much as I can.Brian Bienkowski I think the economics arguments and studies and the information that comes out when it comes to environmental issues, energy included, are some of the most interesting, in my opinion. So for instance, EHN covers endocrine disrupting chemicals, and we can say till we're blue in the face, you know, they're bad. And they do this, they hijack your hormones, so on and so forth. But a few years ago, someone did an economic impact study that looked at like healthcare costs associated with chemical exposure. And when you start putting dollar amounts to things like this, I feel like you have all that. You have, all of a sudden gotten the attention of a whole other group of people who have, maybe aren't as concerned.Mokshda Kaul AbsolutelyBrian Bienkowski so I, and I'm sure this is the case in clean energy and fossil fuels. So I I always find those kind of economic angles really, really interesting. And you're looking at the role of coalitions in clean energy policy making. So I want to unpack this a little bit. What can you tell us about the importance of coalitions in this space? And do you have some examples?Mokshda Kaul So for this piece on coalitions that I'm working on, first of all, this is more about the political science space of understanding how policies are made. And I think I came from this question of wanting to understand there were these two very interesting climate legislations in the US that I encountered. I'm sure there are many more. One was in New York, which was the CLCPA, the community leadership, climate leadership and community Protection Act. And other was the CEJA, climate and equitable jobs Act in Illinois. And when I looked at both of these, the first things that you see when you like just do a Google search, is the coalitions that led them there. So there was this really intense advocacy by these major environmental coalitions happening on the ground for both of these acts. And I personally, of course, coalitions are an important tool because they bring in that element of procedural justice, because you are actually having representation from the people you seek to create these acts for and create these bills for. But more than that, I also feel like coalitions become this interesting way to create buy in, because if you have people who are actually invested in, let's say, like, reducing energy burdens, putting their words out there, and having people actually respond to it, and that makes its way into legislation, then this person actually feels represented. And then you have, like, buy-in from this person towards protecting the environment. And I think that's like, these are the two legislative examples. But in terms of coalitions themselves, there's the Illinois clean job coalition in Illinois, which was leading the way on seizure and NY renewals, which was leading the way on clcpa. But outside of the environmental coalitions, there are also jfossil-fuel-union-based job coalitions trying to represent this other side of justice in the transition, in the sense that there are fossil fuel labor groups who are trying to advocate for the fact that they need provisions to sort of help them after these fossil fuel plants are closed down to transition into other work. And so there are, there's the Climate Jobs Institute by, I think it's with Cornell, yeah. And they essentially have these affiliates across the country in different states. So there is Climate Jobs New York, there's Climate Jobs,Illinois, and all of these spaces, I mean, these coalitions represent this other side of justice. And again, if you don't have these coalitions doing it, there's nobody who's going to actually speak like represent these people's interests, is my point. So I think coalitions are incredibly important, especially when you think about justice and in the policy making process, not just in like the part where you advocate for your needs, and you just do these die ins, or you do demonstrations, not just that, but also the language that goes into these policies. So that's my perspective, and why I think coalitions are incredibly important. And I don't want to sound biased, but I really love the work that ICJ has been doing and the work that the climate jobs affiliates have been doing, it's, yeah, it's incredible to watch how they are trying to deal with this.Brian Bienkowski So you mentioned this idea of buy in, and perhaps that gets people kind of more interested, more engaged. Most of us have also heard about these incentive programs. You know, just financial incentives for clean energy, whether it's upgrading our inefficient fridge or purchasing solar for our roof. So what kind of impact do these policies have on adoption?Mokshda Kaul So I think my question to your question is, the question is adoption for whom? Because at the end of the day, it is not about... I mean, yes, they increase adoption of like, let's say solar energy or electric vehicles or efficient appliances. But I think the question is not about, Is it leading to a relative increase? But who is it leading to a relative increase for? because, again, econ is amazing for this, but it is. There are. There's so much documented evidence at this point that electric vehicle tax credits, residential solar tax credits, tend to benefit wealthier households, which are from like a higher income status or a higher socioeconomic status in the US, and I'm talking about specifically here. So I think the question is the kind of I mean, speaking, what the kind of impact they have on adoption, I'm sure they're improving adoption. Yes, they are. But I think again, that question about how these policies define who's eligible for them, changes who can apply for them, and changes who can receive these benefits. And just as a simple example, there is this program called the affordable solar program in New York, and it's aimed at low-middle income households. But it's the eligibility criterion is that you need to be an owner-occupied household. So you need to be owning the property you live in. But if you're a program that's trying to cater to low-middle income households, you'd know that most of them are renters. So if you are trying to target LMI households by being an owner-occupied program, you're missing a huge chunk of the target population. So I guess the question that I mean, I'm all for it, I'm all for these programs that encourage adoption, but I feel like, inadvertently, they are encouraging inequities in adoption, and that is a much bigger problem to deal with honestly, because that's impeding a just transition, because there's inequitable access then and again. It's that privileged thing, like, just by virtue of the fact that I own the house that I live in, I can get a tax credit for buying panels, and I can get cheaper electricity, and I can, like, also feel good about saving the environment. But then there's somebody else who actually pays much higher amount in their energy bills, because, you know, the energy burden is higher for lower income classes, and they can't even access solar panels because they're not eligible for such tax credits. And in fact, even funnier is giving tax credit to folks who don't earn enough to fall under a tax bracket you're missing, you're missing a huge chunk of the population. If you're saying this is how we're going to help you, when that's not what they'll use. So, yeah, I'd say I'm always very concerned about trying to see who are these benefits going to when we are encouraging adoption in these ways.Brian Bienkowski Yeah, it's a really good point. There's these kind of baked in inequities, even in, you know, programs and policies that are ostensibly trying to do the right thing, we're still baking in these kind of the same kind of inequities that got us here in the first place. And speaking of that, you know, there's a lot of kind of back and forth in the EV, electric vehicle, space, and I happen to be from Detroit, so I I hear even more about this from my family who everybody worked in or does work in the automotive industry. But we're increasingly see some of the environmental justice implications around mining for the needed metals here. And again, I live in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, and they are trying to reopen old mines up here that have been closed for years. And I don't know if it's necessarily EVs or just kind of electronics at large, but specific to the EVS. Can you talk about this and what it means as EVs become more popular, some of these environmental justice concerns that might pop up or that are popping up.Mokshda Kaul So if you're a Tesla bro and you're listening to this, stop listening right now. But if you're not, go on. I have this whole, again, I have this whole I have a lot of hills that I want to die on eventually, but we'll get there when we get there. So speaking about EVs, again, they're incredibly important if we want to have, like an electrified grid, in the sense that we want that balanced demand curve, so that we can have more clean energy in our energy mix, so that way EVs, yes, 100% important. And of course, reducing, like greenhouse gas emissions that come from tailpipes. I'm all for that thing that I'm not all for is, like you said, the mining aspects of it. So I have not spent as much time looking at the domestic implications of it, and that's something I'm stepping into now, in terms of the US. But if you look at a global picture, we get most of a cobalt from the Democratic Republic of Congo, and a this has been documented by tons of reports by Amnesty International. There's also a book called Cobalt Read by Sid Kara. And there's extensive documentation of how you have child labor, you have unsafe working conditions, the wage rate that they're paid, the laborers are paid at is definitely unfair, it's way below what should be acceptable. And there's also the problem is that as the demand goes up, the fact is that people in DRC, I mean, and I'm just conjecturing from all that I've read, I might be completely wrong if I go to the ground and talk to people, but it's creating that pressure where people think that it's profitable to keep mining cobalt. So they're like little children getting into this business, and they're like, indulging in artisanal mining, which is where you dig in your backyard, kind of a thing, just in very broad terms, but as the demand goes up, it's encouraging this pressure to kind of keep mining that way. And there's no regulation in place to ensure that there is ethical mining. And because of that, you're left with the situation where you are, like, incentivizing this to be done in the wrong way, and you want to keep the price of EVs down so that more people buy it because it's a solution for fighting climate change. So it's the question of, if we were to define this in a just way, if we would have ethical mining practices, who would bear the cost? And I mean, depending on your political leaning, you would have five different answers to the question. To this question, but I guess EVs, yes, good. But how we are getting them is a huge question, and it's not about just about DRC and cobalt. It's about lithium coming from South America, and the kind of questions and issues that it's raised with, like Indigenous farmers and their rights to their land and the water pollution it's creating, and rare earth mining in Myanmar, and that's not just for EVs. That's also for a whole host of clean energy technologies. Rare earths go into panels, they go into wind turbine blades and whatnot. And if you look at these pictures, I think Global Witness to this very heartbreaking report where they showed pictures side by side of areas in Myanmar, which had been like a year back. They had not they were completely untouched, covered in like green cover. And now there's these deep wells with polluted water because they've been indiscriminately mined for rare earth. And there's also, like, the one other thing I want to flag is I feel like the world is exploiting the fact that there are a lot of places in the world which are having a breakdown of constitutional mechanisms to protect their citizens. And the rest of the world is kind of like being privy to it and also exploiting it to make these EVs and make them cheaper and, like, have them run the way they run, kind of a thing. So, yeah, I Yes, EVs, but at what cost, is how I'd frame it.Brian Bienkowski And so, just to give you a few more hills, if you want to die, yes, before and we, I do want to get into some of the, you know, some of the optimistic and some of the bright signs you're seeing, but just kind of writ large, you know, we've talked about EVs just just now, and some of the contamination concerns and EJ components we talked about, you know, kind of inequitable distribution of incentives. What are some other environmental and energy justice concerns that you have in clean energy use? Because I think most of us, it's often painted in a very positive light, understandably so, I mean, fossil fuels remain such a big problem for this planet. So but before we get to those, some of those solutions, what are some other concerns you have?Mokshda Kaul I'm actually glad about what you said. I just want to touch on what you said for a second that we need to remember the fact that we need the clean energy transition, but we also need to have a little bit of prudence about how we are doing it, because let's not forget that we are kind of building on the backs of someone at the end of the day. And the question is, who is that someone? who's that like sacrifice zone for this now? because we've had sacrifice zones for fossil fuel production, but we sure are having it for clean energy as well. We just can't pretend that, because it's solving climate change. All's hunky dory. So other questions and like concerns that I have, first of all, I'm very deep in this bit of mining for critical minerals, which are important for the energy transition, not just for EVs. So I have been looking at, who would, you know, sort of shoulder the cost if we were to mine ethically, like, who would pay that cost? And I'm trying to get into that a little bit more lately, and I'm also trying to understand within the US, because there has been the chips act and IRA, which are kind of Inflation Reduction Act, which are encouraging domestic mining. What happens then? Because there are these reports that say that most of the reserves of critical minerals that we need if we are going to mine in the US are located close to Native American territory. So we are starting to recreate a problem we have not solved really in the past. So it becomes another question about that, in terms of the mining issues. And I think the other stuff that I'm honestly concerned about is access to clean energy opportunities. And I know, like a lot of people are working on this, but I'm thinking about electrifying like jobs, clean energy jobs. So who gets access to these and there are certain states which are creating provisions for environmental justice communities to be able to access these jobs. But then, if you're creating provisions to access a job that doesn't have prevailing wage rate, what are you doing and who are you trying to, like pull whose eyes are you trying to pull wool over? Is my question. So I guess, about the quality of jobs, I'm concerned. About, where are these jobs coming up? And I'm, I think the other thing that I'm also been thinking about in terms of EVs is electrifying transport and public transport in general, because EVs aren't accessible to LMI folks. And you're kind of like punishing these people with these vehicles that pollute, and you're finishing them with like higher burdens, because they are having to pay for gas vehicles. But what about electrifying public transport? And I think from in Arizona, especially, you see public trans like the lack in public transport. And I mean, I juxtapose this against India, where in Mumbai, we have brilliant public transport connectivity. So I yeah, that's the other element of public transportation, electrifying it is what I've been thinking about. And the other thing that I've just been toying with lately is clean energy jobs are creating an impact on these fossil fuel workers, where they're being forced to migrate to other places. And I know at the surface it seems like, well, it's just he's this person's just moving for the job. How does it matter? But I'm very curious about what kind of impacts does this have on the worker, their family, their like, emotional health, their like support system, and if they're moving, they're probably moving to like a job that doesn't pay as much. So what's going on there? And I'm trying to understand what are the impacts on migration from clean energy creation and incentives to clean energy production. So those are, like a bunch of things. I have so many. I don't hate the world, but I definitely love finding problems in it. So this is easy for me!Brian Bienkowski Well, let's, let's shift gears. Here we have, we have pointed out the world's problems, and I think you have some ideas on maybe how they cannot be so problematic. So first, you know, what are some ways, when we think about policymakers and others, where they could maybe build some caution into these climate change solutions to ensure that this transition is equitable?Mokshda Kaul I think first of all, I'm going to give a weird answer to this, because I have been working okay, for context, I have been working on two of my dissertation chapters around the clock for the last three months right now. So I'm very deep in a dark place, and it's a good dark place. I love this dark place. But I think the first thing that I'd want to say is we can't deny the technical realities of the energy transition. So I guess making peace with that the fact that we might need natural gas plants, or we might need some form of fossil fuel to transition, or we might need some form of nuclear to transition. So like kind of, I'm not saying being pro these fuels, but accepting the fact that you can't just, you know, snap your fingers and everything's going to be clean. So first of all, I would say that some way that policymakers could build that in is by having that acceptance of the actual system and the energy system itself. And the second thing is, like having these holistic perspectives on the energy transition itself, like I was talking about the Environmental Coalition and the Labor Justice Coalition, right? And if you think about it at the surface, an EJ activist would only see the environmental justice side. We would not want to focus on this is a set of people losing their jobs and and that's that's fair. But. Having that holistic perspective where you're acknowledging these two sides of the story helps, because it's you can build provisions to ameliorate the kind of suffering or the problems that will be created in the process there will be somebody who has to bear the cost of the transition. But the question is, are we building in enough provisions to sort of address that, and are we kind of trying to protect the people who we are going to be exploiting in the process?And the other thing that I think is a little bit personal to me because of the dissertation work and my own research, is the way we define things and policies. I think we need, as like as societ, we need to have clearer definitions of who we seek to benefit. And only when you have these clear definitions of who you seek to benefit can you actually measure if you've been impacting these people or not, like just having these broad, losey-goosey ideas of I have a program that should benefit environmentally disadvantaged communities. What does that mean? Who are you talking about? And that, I think, is a very important aspect as well. And the other thing I want to talk about is, like, humility, because I feel like we will learn a lot from our mistakes as this transition goes on. And I'm hopeful that we will, as policy makers, be able to, like, kind of, you know, take a step back and reflect on what went wrong. For example, bills where they have not built in just transition provisions are they are being able to see how coal communities have lost revenues and have lost have had to, like, do a lot of things in terms of, like, shutting down public schools. So those spaces policy makers can actually have that moment of reckoning and realize that, hey, maybe we made a mistake and we should try to change this the next time. So having that humility, I think, is incredibly important as well. But yeah, those are my high horse comments. So you mentioned the Inflation Reduction Act, and anybody living in the US, whether you know it or not, your community is being touched by this in some way. It was a massive, massive spending bill. Have you seen this approach in the IRA? Have you seen a justice-oriented approach? And if not, where is it lacking? So yes and no, IRA, I mean, I'm so incredibly amazed by it for so many different reasons, like it has this focus on low-middle income communities. It has a focus on electrifying tribal regions. It has that. It has a whole tribal electrification program, and it has like in these tax credits, investment tax credits, and production tax credits for energy communities. So specifically, the communities that have lost revenue due to coal plant closures or coal mine closures, and so they are kind of target like, you know, talking about the right groups of people, and they're targeting the right kind of issues in that sense, like encouraging the production of clean energy in these areas, or workforce development in these spaces. And there's also that whole chunk of Environment and Climate Justice block grants under the IRA, which are meant for specifically disadvantaged communities and community-based organizations in these areas, can apply to these grants for all things from like workforce development to clean energy technology development to climate resilience. It's, I mean, it's a huge set of sources to kind of A), reduce greenhouse gasses, and B), be able to kind of harness the potential of the clean energy transition. So from that perspective, I really like the IRA and the way it's focusing on people who need to be focused on honestly. But again, this is the same thing that I just talked about, the way we define things. So the IRA itself has, it doesn't have, like, a consistent definition of what is disadvantage and what is environmental justice communities or low income communities, like some places, they are using a particular definition based on a particular tax credit. Other places they are not, and even in the environmental justice Block Grant, environmental and climate justice block grant itself, program itself, they have, they say that they will use a definition by the that is being used by the Justice 40. The Council on Environmental Quality has that screen tool where they are basically identifying disadvantaged areas. But they also say that EPA has yet to finalize how we will define disadvantaged communities for this program. So I think that's my one of my icky things that I don't like about it is that when you don't define there is a lot of room for people to sort of exploit and pretend like they're doing good work when they're not. And I mean, of course, it remains to be seen how much people will be able to exploit this, but I think that that is something that makes me very uncomfortable about it. And I also think there is this one aspect of the IRA which is a little interesting. I haven't read a little bit. I haven't read more about it, and I really want to, but it's about how, if, uh. So the Department of Interior, I think, has to give out certain acreage of land in oil and gas leasing for being able to give offshore and onshore wind and solar development rights. So you are encouraging production of oil and gas in a way. And that's, yeah, that's a little I'm still trying to understand. Why has that been said, and why is that being done? Because I'm sure there is some logic somewhere deep inside, and I'm hoping there is, but I think, yeah, that and this definition thing, like, it's the same thing, if, in fact, I mean, sorry about the off-topicness, but the Weatherization Assistance Program that also, like, there was this work done by Dominic Bernard and Tony Reems, and they have actually documented how these programs that are supposed to assist low income households with their energy burdens and alleviate energy party, they don't use a definition at the end of the day about who's energy poor. And because they don't do that, you can't just say anybody falling below 80% of area median income is LMI, because that's not what being energy poor is about. It's about a lot of different facets. So if you choose to define it by this one income based category or criterion, you're not you're not doing a good job first of all. And yes, in that sense, the Justice body tools and this EJ screen, they are kind of holistic in the way they bring in climate burdens and environment burdens. But again, if you don't have a consistent definition throughout an act, there's so much wiggle room to do not good things, is how I'd say it.Brian Bienkowski So it sounds like the IRA has some good aspects to it, and we've we actually talked to Jalan Newsome, I believe, who is on the Council of Environmental Quality. And she talked at length about Justice40 I would encourage listeners to listen to that and then listen to this again. Listen to most response. But you know, outside of the IRA, have you seen, you know, countries, states, municipalities, towns, villages, anything that are embarking on the clean energy transition in a way that you see as equitable and just, and if so, can you talk about it a little bit?Mokshda Kaul So I'm not from Illinois. I have no relationship with Illinois. This is not sponsored by Illinois. I really love CEJA! I think it's really cool. And I know I'm probably missing a chunk of things. And I'm not saying it's perfect. Please, don't get me wrong. I'm just saying that the way they have been able to bring like environmental justice and the provisions for labor justice, like fossil fuel labor justice in together at the same time is incredible, in my opinion! And they have so this is what I meant earlier, when I was saying about job creation, because what they have done is clean energy jobs are going to be created, and they're going to be union jobs. They're going to have prevailing wage standards, and they are also going to be a section of them is going to be devoted only to environmental justice communities. So you are kind of doing that, two words, one stone thing, and I think that's incredible. And the other thing I love, love about CEJA is they did this thing called the "Listen Lead Share" sessions. And I know no one can see this, but has to spark in my eye when I talk about the Listen Lead Share sessions. But the Listen LeadSshare sessions were basically this kind of listening session situation where smaller Bipoc community organizations were leading these listening sessions within Illinois, trying to collect opinions, not just opinion, but experiences and what people want in like an energy justice kind of a way from illinoisians, just to understand what is it that is bothering the people. And I wish I had the link for it, but when the bill actually came out there is he's the head of elevate. I can't remember his name right now. Really love the guy. I don't know why my brain's blanking on it, but he actually read out pieces from these listening sessions where local Illinoisans had cited concerns and what had made its way into the legislation actually, so actual people's opinions were there. And I just, I find that so amazing, like, that's what I mean by accurate representation. And the other thing that I found very cool about CEJA is they have provisions for returning citizens in these clean energy jobs. And that's some that's a, like, a huge chunk of population that we tend to miss when we talk about justice issues. And the reason they had that was because they used to have these zoom based, like, Zoom-Room based sessions where they tried to get people to talk about what's going on. And there was this one guy. He was like a representative. He was a returning citizen himself, and he was a representative for like a group, and he actually was like, You know what, we need provisions from people like me. And they bought that in, and they built that in. So it's incredible the way they have been able to sort of bring this to fruition. I mean, I'm sure implementation stages are you. Infamous for how things go wrong, but in just the way the act is written and the way it was brought together, I am so amazed, and I'm in love.Brian Bienkowski And what is that acronym? You said it's CEJA, What is that acronym? So if people wanted to check it out, yeah,Mokshda Kaul actually, you know what? I'm going to make sure I'm doing this right, because CEJA there was a CEJA proposed by the environment coalition, and then there was a final CEJA that was passed. And those two had different acronyms, but Climate and Equitable Jobs Act is how the bill that actually passed. And yeah, that's the one that was signed by the governor. And give me one second, I want to find the name of the person from Elevate, because he's really important and really cool, certainly, and I think he's like, worth mentioning if anyone's looking just one sec, Delmar. His name is Delmar Gillius, and he works for Elevate, and he was one of the few persons of color who is responsible for, like, actually, legislative negotiations as well. And he was incredible. And, yeah, it has been amazing to talk with all these folks that I've had a chance to talk to. And yes, again, not sponsored by Illinois. I just really love it.Brian Bienkowski Well, it's always nice to end on an optimistic note. And just to keep that theme, we have some fun, some fun, before we get you out of here. And thank you again, so much for this. I love talking to you about I think the energy conversation is so often missing nuance. People want to say "end" fossil fuels yesterday," or they want to say "we need fossil fuels forever," and just having nuance in that conversation is needed if we're going to get anywhere. So before we get out of here, I have a few rapid fire questions where you can just answer with one word or a phrase. My favorite comfort food is, I'llMokshda Kaul I'll have to explain this.Brian Bienkowski Go right ahead.Mokshda Kaul Okay, it's Haak, Rogan Josh and rice. Haak is collard greens. We blanch them. And Rogan Josh is a really spicy lamb curry. And these are all Kashmiri foods. So if any Kashmiri is listening, I'm representing us and and with rice and yogurt, of course, but the Indian kind of yogurt, not the Greek yogurt. I would Oh, my God. Like, I think I'm gonna make it today. I described and I was like, Yeah, well, it's been a while, maybe we should do this today.Brian Bienkowski If I had to try out a job other than my current one, it would beMokshda Kaul writing. I would love to be a fiction writer for the rest of my life.Brian Bienkowski And my dream vacation isMokshda Kaul my current dream vacation is Poland. Because Poland, Poland, however we pronounce it? because I really want to be in a place that has the mountains and the sea and all the history to it. Been wanting to go since before 2020 and now I don't know when will I go,Brian Bienkowski Are you just trying to like, like, like, kiss up to the host here? That is my so I am very, I am very, I never thought anybody would say Poland to that question, so I was supposed to go. And yes, so I am. My grandparents were immigrants from Poland to Detroit and other parts of Michigan. And so I was supposed to go in 2020 or 2021 and it was no, it must have been 2022 because it was right when a Ukraine was invaded, exactly there was, there was this tale of covid. So I waited, and then there was a war that started. So I have not gone because obviously it's so close to Ukraine. And I just, yeah, you know, but we had, we have a lot of genealogy we've done, so I'm trying to sketch out a trip to places where family was and is so very cool.Mokshda Kaul That is so cool! Yeah, I wanted to do this was my I love solo trips, and this was going to be my trip before grad school. But like I said, I started grad school in 2020 so by the time I could book the tickets, the world was shut down. So that was the start of it. And then just being in grad school, I really don't, I don't know if I had the time. And then the war happened, and so I just at that point, I was like, You know what? It's not destined for now. So I guess I'm gonna put it on the back burner.Brian Bienkowski We'll have to stay in touch. Hopefully one of us will get there. Maybe both of us will get there. And so I've been learning the language too, which a Slavic language, is not easy to learn when you are 41 years old. It is not soaking into my brain.Mokshda Kaul That's so interesting, because for Kashmiri, the problem is, it's, it is like from the Indian group of languages. But I don't know, I'm forgetting the word for it, but apparently it sounds a lot like Central American language, Central Asian languages, sorry. So there is, like, a, like, an influx of salvik. And Persian and like, so I have had a lot of friends who are from, like, Central Asia, be like, What did you say? So, like, language is, God. Like, yeah, I am very curious. That's a really cool thing to do, though, because it keeps your brain young. SoBrian Bienkowski it does, yes, it gets that other part of my brain that in music. So moksha. What is the last book that you read for fun? And you do not have to confine yourself to one word or a phrase here.Mokshda Kaul Okay, the last book I read was "Small things like these" by Claire O'keekin, I think what's her name? Very short, very spiffy, very sad. Loved it. And I also listened to audiobooks. So the last audiobook I listened to was Untamed by Glennon Doyle. So yeah, both of those were amazing. And small things like these was just I finished it in a day because it was so well written and so quick. I was like, wow, I need to I'm dropping everything.Brian Bienkowski I love books like that. They are the they are the best. Well, moksha. Thank you so much for your time, for your intelligence, your wit. I really like talking to you about these things and beyond. And just as a side note, you always seem, I know you say you're a pessimist, but you always seem happy and inject humor and lightness, and it's really just lights up a room, and it lit up this call. So thank you so much for being here, and I hope we can have you on again soon.Mokshda Kaul Yeah, thank you so much. This was really wonderful to talk to you.

Energy

Activism

Chemicals

Deja vu comes to Arkansas as lithium follows oil

In the energy towns of Arkansas, the coming lithium rush is bringing with it the risk of repeating the same mistakes and inequities of the past.

This story was supported by the Fund for Environmental Journalism of the Society of Environmental Journalists. In the dusty light of a decades-old lunch counter in Lewisville, Arkansas, Chantell Dunbar-Jones expressed optimism at what the lithium boom coming to this stretch of the state will mean for her hometown. She sees jobs, economic development, and a measure of prosperity returning to a region that needs them. After waving to a gaggle of children crossing the street in honey-colored afternoon sunshine, the city council member assessed the future as best she could. “Not to say that everything’s perfect, but I feel like the positives way outweigh the negative,” she said. Lewisville sits in the southwest corner of the state, squarely atop the Smackover Formation, a limestone aquifer that stretches from northeast Texas to the Gulf Coast of Florida and has for 100 years spurted oil and natural gas. The petroleum industry boomed here in the 1920s and peaked again in the 1960s before declining to a steady trickle over the decades that followed. But the Smackover has more to give. The brine and bromine pooled 10,000 feet below the surface contains lithium, a critical component in the batteries needed to move beyond fossil fuels. Exxon Mobil is among at least four companies lining up to draw it from the earth. It opened a test site not far from Lewisville late last year and plans to extract enough of the metal to produce 100,000 electric vehicle batteries by 2026 and 1 million by 2030. Another company, Standard Lithium, believes its leases may hold 1.8 million metric tons of the material and will spend $1.3 billion building a processing facility to handle it all. All of this has Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders predicting that her state will become the nation’s leading lithium producer. With so much money to be made, Dunbar-Jones and other public officials find themselves being courted by extraction company executives eager to tell them what all of this could mean for the people and places they lead. They have been hosting town meetings, promising to build lasting, mutually beneficial relationships with the communities and residents of the area. So far, Dunbar-Jones and many others are optimistic. They see a looming renaissance, even as other community members acknowledge the mixed legacies of those who earn their money pulling resources from the ground. Such companies provide livelihoods, but only as long as there is something to extract, and they often leave pollution in their wake. The companies eyeing the riches buried beneath the pine forests and bayous promise plenty of jobs and opportunities, and paint themselves as responsible stewards of the environment. But drawing brine to the surface is a water-intensive process, and similar operations in Nevada aren’t expected to create more than a few hundred permanent jobs. It’s high-paying work, but often requires advanced degrees many in this region don’t possess. Looking beyond the employment question, some local residents are wary of the companies looking to lease their land for lithium. It brings to mind memories of the unscrupulous and shady dealings common during the oil boom of a century ago. For residents of Lewisville, which is majority-Black, such concerns are set against a broader history of bigotry and the fact that even as other towns prospered, they have long been the last to benefit from promises of the sort being made these days. Folks throughout the area are quick to note that the wealth that flowed from the oil fields their parents and grandparents worked benefited some more than others, even as they lived with the ecological devastation that industry left behind. Dunbar-Jones is confident that, if nothing else, concern about their reputation and a need to ensure cordial relations with community leaders will sway lithium companies into supporting local needs. “All I can say is right now it’s up in the air as to what they will do,” she said, “but it seems promising.” Lewisville sits just west of Magnolia, El Dorado, and Camden, three cities that outline the “golden triangle” region that prospered after the discovery of oil in 1920. In an area long dependent upon timber, the plantation economy transformed almost instantly as tenant farmers, itinerant prospectors, and small landholders became rich. Within five years, 3,483 wells dotted the land, and Arkansas was producing 73 million barrels annually. Although the boom created great wealth, Lewisville remained largely rural, and its residents labored in the fields that made others rich. Still, the oil economy, coupled with the timber industry, brought a rush of saloons, itinerant workers, and hotels to many towns. Restaurants, supermarkets, and other trappings of a middle-class community soon followed, though Lewisville always lagged a bit behind. That prosperity lasted a bit longer than the oil did. The first wells ran dry by the end of the 1920s, but the Smackover continued producing 20 to 30 million barrels annually until 1967, when it began a steady decline. These days, it offers about 4.4 million a year. A fading map of Arkansas on a building in Lafayette County. Grist/Lou Murrey The shops that once served Lewisville and the furniture and feed factories that employed those who didn’t work the fields have long since gone. Jana Crank, who has lived here for 58 years, came of age in the 1960s and remembers prosperous times. She runs a community gallery in what’s left of downtown, where most buildings sport faded paint and cracked windows. “It used to be a TV fix-it shop,” Crank, a retired high school art teacher, said of the space. As she spoke, a group of friends painted quietly. Canvases showing sunsets, crosses, and landscapes lined the walls. The scenes, bright and cheerful, stood in contrast to Lewisville, where retailers have moved on, the hospital has closed, and the schools have been consolidated to save money. Fewer than 900 people live here, about half as many as during the town’s peak in the 1970s. They tend to be older, with a median household income of around $30,000. “People are just dying out, their children don’t even live in town,” Crank said. “They have nothing to come back for.” That could change. Jobs associated with mining rare-earth minerals are highly compensated and highly sought-after, many of them netting as much as $92,000 per year. State Commerce Secretary Hugh McDonald believes the state could provide 15 percent of the world’s lithium needs, and Sanders has said Arkansas is “moving at breakneck speed to become the lithium capital of America.” A few steps in that direction already have been taken around Lewisville, the county seat of Lafayette County. It is home to 13 lithium test wells, the most in the region. They’re tucked away behind pine trees, fields of cattle, and, occasionally, homes. The dirt and gravel roads leading to them have been churned to slurry by heavy equipment. A dirt road in Lafayette County leads to a lithium test well. Grist/Lou Murrey Those who own and work the wells arrived quietly last year, their presence indicated by the increasing number of trucks with plates from nearby Texas and Louisiana, sparking rumors throughout the region. They officially announced themselves to Mayor Ethan Dunbar last fall, in visits to local officials, mostly county leaders, to initiate friendly relations and establish the basis for economic partnerships. Mayor Dunbar and the Lewisville City Council were invited to a public meeting where lithium company executives discussed their plans and took questions. The town’s motto is “Building Community Pride,” something Dunbar-Jones, who is the mayor’s sister, takes seriously. She and others have hosted movie nights, community dinners, and, in a particular point of pride, clinics to help people convicted of crimes get their records expunged. Meanwhile, the city council, joined by a number of residents, has come together to nail down just what the lithium boom will mean for the town and to ensure everyone knows what’s in store. That’s particularly important, Dunbar-Jones said, because 60 percent of the town’s residents are Black. “Typically in minority neighborhoods, people are not as aware of what’s going on, because the information just doesn’t trickle down to them the way it does to other people,” she said. “At the meetings with the actual lithium companies, there may be a handful of people of color there versus others. So that lets you know who’s getting that information.” Chantell Dunbar-Jones talks her town’s future in the Burge’s restaurant, Lewisville’s only thriving business. Grist/Lou Murrey A representative of Exxon, the only company that responded to a request for comment, said it has strived to build ties with communities throughout the region. “We connect early and often with elected officials, community members and local leaders to have meaningful conversations, provide transparency, and find ways to give back,” the representative said. It has opened a community liaison office in Magnolia and has worked with the city’s Chamber of Commerce to sponsor community events. It also established a $100,000 endowment for Columbia and Lafayette counties to provide grants for “education, public safety, and quality-of-life initiatives.” Folks in Lewisville would like to see more of that kind of attention. In March, the city, working with the University of Arkansas Hope-Texarkana, hosted a town hall meeting so residents could speak to lithium executives and express concerns. The mayor recalls it drawing a standing room-only crowd that expressed hope that the industry would bring jobs and revenue to town, but also worried about the environmental impact. Folks called on Exxon and other companies to support new housing and establish pathways for young people to work in the industry. Venesha Sasser, who at 29 is the chief development officer of the local telephone company, sees the coming boom providing an opportunity to build generational wealth for families and resources, like broadband internet access, for communities. Any company that can invest $4 billion in a lithium operation can surely afford to toss a little back, Sasser said. “We want to make sure that whoever is investing in our community, and who we are investing in, actually means our people good.” Sasser followed a trajectory common among young Black professionals from the area: She left to pursue an education, then returned to care for loved ones. As she got more involved in the community, she often found herself being treated a little differently, an experience Mayor Dunbar delicately described as bumping up against “old systems.” Lewisville is a majority-Black town in a majority-white county, and as of 2022, had a poverty rate of 23 percent. Although community leaders say they work well with colleagues in other towns and with county leaders, they also feel that they’ve had to elbow their way into conversations with lithium companies. They worry that the dynamics of the oil days, when Black men worked alongside whites but often in lower-paying, less desirable jobs and most of the money stayed in wealthier cities like El Dorado, will repeat themselves. “You had people from Magnolia and El Dorado and Spring Hill and other places coming in and doing the work and reaping the benefits, and then when it was gone, they were gone,” said Virginia Perry, a retired school teacher who grew up in Lewisville and lives in Little Rock. Her ex-husband drilled for oil years ago, and the experience left her with a sour taste in her mouth. “I’m thinking it’s going to be pretty much the same,” she said. “They’re going to ease in, they want to do all this work and create all these jobs for somebody and then ease out when it’s done in a few years. Then here we’ll be with soil that can’t grow anything, contaminated water, and a whole bunch of kids with asthma.” Mayor Dunbar, who is midway through his second term, is trying to balance reservations with optimism. “‘Imagine the possibilities.’ That’s my tagline,” he said, settling into a chair at City Hall. A blackboard behind him outlined his priorities: housing, recreation, education. He hopes support from companies like Tetra Technologies, which is developing a 6,138-acre project not far away, will finance those goals and give people a future that’s more stable than the past, one in which Lewisville’s children can pursue the same opportunities that kids in nearby, better-resourced communities can. “Think about Albemarle in Magnolia,” he said, referring to the bromine plant about 30 miles up the road. “Get a job at Albemarle, you stay there 25 years, you earn a decent salary, you’d have a decent retirement. You can live well. Quality of life is good. We are hoping to see the same thing here.” Ethan Dunbar, mayor of Lewisville, sits in front of a blackboard filled with notes on his priorities as mayor. Grist/Lou Murrey Many of the people poised to benefit from the lithium beneath their feet seem ambivalent about climate change. In El Dorado, in a bar called The Mink Eye, an oil refinery worker grimaced at the mention of electric vehicles. The next morning, retired oil workers gathered at Johnny B’s Grill scoffed at the idea of a boom. A waitress admitted that she’d bought stock in lithium companies, but said any faith that the industry will bring renewed prosperity does not necessarily mean folks are on board with the green transition. “These men drive diesels,” she said, pointing toward her customers. Still, she said, any jobs are good jobs. That attitude pervades the state capitol in Little Rock, where politicians who don’t give much thought to why the energy transition is necessary cheer the state’s emerging role in it. The governor, who has cast doubt on human-caused climate change, has appeared at industry events like the Arkansas Lithium Innovation Summit to proclaim the state “bullish” on its reserves of the element. “We all knew that towns like El Dorado and Smackover were built by oil and gas,” Sanders told the audience. “But who knew that our quiet brine and bromine industry had the potential to change the world.” Much of the world’s lithium is blasted out of rocks or drawn from brine left to evaporate in vast pools, leaving behind toxic residue. The companies descending on Arkansas plan to use a more sustainable method called direct lithium extraction, or DLE. It seems to be a bit more ecologically friendly and much less water-intensive than the massive pit mines or vast evaporation ponds often found in South America. It essentially pumps water into the aquifer, filters the lithium from the extracted brine, then returns it to the aquifer in what advocates call a largely closed system. Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, in a report prepared for the Nature Conservancy, said that “DLE appears to offer the lowest impacts of available extraction technologies.” Still, the technology is relatively new. According to Yale Environment 360, Arkansas provides a suitable proving ground for the approach because it has abundant water, a large concentration of lithium, and an established network of wells, pipelines, and refineries. But there are concerns about the amount of water required and the waste material left behind, despite repeated assurances from lithium companies that the process is safe and sustainable. Although DLE doesn’t require as much water as brine evaporation, in which that water is lost, “it is a freshwater consumption source,” Patrick Donnelly, of the Center for Biological Diversity, said in an interview with KUAF radio in Fayetteville, Arkansas. The waste generated by the process is another concern, he said, “in particular, a solid waste stream. It’s impossible for them to extract only the lithium.” Locals are well aware of the impact brine can have on the land. Before anyone realized its value, oil and gas producers didn’t worry much about it leaking or spilling onto the ground, literally salting the earth. Some are concerned that the pipelines that will carry brine to refineries might leak, as they did in the oil days. Such fears are compounded by the fact the state Department of Environmental Quality relies on individuals to report problems and doesn’t appear to do much outreach to residents. A churned-up entrance to a lithium test site in Lafayette County. Grist/Lou Murrey There’s also a lot of skepticism about how many jobs the boom may create. So far, Standard Lithium’s plant in El Dorado employs 91 people, said Douglas Zollner, who works with the Arkansas branch of the Nature Conservancy and has toured the facility. No one’s offered any projections on how many people might find work in the budding industry, but a lithium boom in Nevada suggests it may not be all that many. Construction of the Thacker Pass mine, which could produce 80,000 metric tons of lithium annually, is expected to generate 1,500 temporary construction and other jobs — but it will only employ 300 once operational. Those jobs pay well, but typically require advanced training. Public universities like Arkansas Tech University are revising science and engineering curricula to meet the lithium industry’s needs, hoping to connect students with internships in the field. However, locals worry that disinvestment in schools in rural and largely Black communities will leave those who most need these jobs unable to attain the training necessary to land them. Just how much money might flow into local communities remains another open question. Fossil fuel companies lease the land they drill and pay landowners royalties of 16.67 percent of their profit. Any oil pumped from the land also is taxed at 4 to 5 percent of its market value. This fee, called severance tax, is paid to the counties or towns from which the resource was extracted. None of these things apply to lithium. So far, there is no severance tax on the metal, though the state levies a tax of $2.75 for every 1,000 barrels of the brine from which it is extracted. The state Oil and Gas Commission continues haggling over a royalty rate, though it seems unlikely the fee will be as high as those paid on oil and gas leases. When the state sought a double-digit royalty, the industry balked, arguing that extracting and processing lithium is expensive and officials ought to wait until production begins in earnest before deciding what’s fair. Companies cannot extract and sell the metal for commercial use until the commission sets a royalty rate, a process expected to drag on for some time. On July 26, the major players in the Arkansas lithium industry filed a joint application seeking a rate of 1.82 percent. The South Arkansas Mineral Association — which represents the majority of landowners, which is to say, timber companies, oil companies, and other corporate interests — demanded a higher share. Small landowners still hope to benefit, and the lack of clarity around royalties hasn’t done much to engender trust among locals wary of the companies looking to lease their land. Some folks, already offered terms, are using online forums to determine if they’re being stiffed. Others fear efforts to wrest land from the few Black families who own property, often passed between generations informally without a deed or title. Such land, called heirs’ property, accounts for more than one-third of Black-owned property in the South, and without the documentation required to prove ownership, land can be subject to court-ordered sales. Many in Lewisville, say they regularly receive calls and texts from people interested in buying land, and Perry has seen people checking out properties and attending auctions. During a visit to the Lafayette County courthouse archives, I noticed a woman thumbing through mineral rights records. Although she wouldn’t identify herself, she politely explained that she was checking such documents throughout Arkansas, Texas, and Louisiana, bringing to mind the speculators who, during the oil boom, did the same before approaching naive residents who may not know about the riches under their land. Beyond the timber companies with holdings in the region, most of the major landowners are white and wealthy, and any spoils, Perry suspects, will simply pass from one affluent family or powerful company to another, with no benefit to people like her. “What land, honey?” she said with a small, sardonic laugh. “That’s a pie in the sky type dream to me.” Despite the concerns, the hype and fanfare surrounding the possibility of an economic revival remains high. City officials in Lewisville, and the people they lead, are trying to remain open-minded and easygoing even if unanswered questions linger about how many jobs might be coming, how the boom will benefit their town, and what it will mean for the environment. “You know, it’s kind of frustrating because the questions get asked at these meetings,” Dunbar, the mayor, said. But he feels the lithium companies often meet questions with the same pleasant, if unhelpful, answer of “We can’t talk about it.” They’re always so careful in their responses. ”They deliberately did not say anything until they knew what they wanted to do and say, that’s the same with what they want to provide communities,” Dunbar said. Mayor Ethan Dunbar stands outside Lewisville city hall. Grist/Lou Murrey As for the $100,000 commitment from Exxon, no one’s sure exactly who will receive that money or how allocations will be made. The mayor, discussing that point, showed some frustration. He said he has tried, and will continue to try, to get the companies to put their promises of jobs and support for local infrastructure in writing. The balance of goodwill that he is trying to maintain between everyone involved is delicate: the lithium companies, whose jobs and support his community desperately needs; the county officials he must work with; the residents of Lewisville; and the mayors he collaborates with on grant applications. These towns are small, and word spreads quickly; relationships are as precious as the riches deep below the ground. As Dunbar-Jones, the city council member, finished her turkey sandwich in the late afternoon light of the diner, she spoke of her faith in the ties between the people of Lewisville. “It’s hard to get a group of people to work together, period, especially when they don’t know each other,” she said. “But we all know each other.” Despite her confidence, she knows she’s dealing with relationships in which companies take what they can and leave, where the question of what they owe the communities that enrich them is naive. Her father benefited from his job at Phillips 66, but it couldn’t last forever. When the oil was gone, those who profited from it were, too. From their perspective, she said, it’s a question of “How long am I going to support a community I’m no longer in? It would be unrealistic to think that there will be some long-term benefits from it.” The same is true of lithium, and the companies that will mine it. At some point, they will leave, and take their jobs and their money with them. Dunbar-Jones only hopes they leave Lewisville a little better off once they’ve left. Editor’s note: Climeworks is an advertiser with Grist. Advertisers have no role in Grist’s editorial decisions. This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Deja vu comes to Arkansas as lithium follows oil on Sep 25, 2024.

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