Council Votes 5-0 To Shut Down Vaunted University Of Washington Study Despite No Evidence Of Environmental Hazards
UW Researchers and USS Hornet Officials Urge Reconsideration, Citing Safety, Transparency, Educational & Environmental Benefits
Communication Gaps Were Key
By Larry Freeman
Alameda has long prided and touted itself as a ‘green,’ environmentally proactive city, with substantial policies based on new structure energy efficiency, a “Climate Action and Resiliency Plan,” an “Urban Forest Plan,” and, closer to home with respect to their Tuesday June 4th vote, a Climate Adaptation And Hazard Mitigation Plan.
That plan focuses on “actions the City of Alameda plans to take to prepare our community for natural and climate related disasters.”
The City Council’s unanimous vote to bring an end to what was, just last April, a national and international headline making Climate Change experiment, sharply reversed course from that tenet of City Government policy.
Defending the decision, Mayor Ashcraft expressed a generalized concern about “potential” (harmful) exposure to aerosols for people in the area, an element that arose back in April, after project launch, from Council person Trish Spencer and, according to her, a number of constituents worried about hazardous impacts.
“We want to know what we are breathing,” Spencer said at the time.
That notion was directly countered by The MCB, which operated the short-lived experiment in conjunction with The Coastal Atmospheric Aerosol Research and Engagement (CAARE) Program.
In a public statement provided ANN, UW project heads, Dr. Robert Wood, Dr. Sarah Doherty, and Silver Lining Executive Director Kelly Warner wrote that “The City of Alameda engaged a team of experts to independently evaluate the health and environmental safety of the CAARE Program’s sea-salt studies, which found that they are not expected to result in any adverse health or environmental effects.
We provided extensive data to their process and all of the experts engaged affirmed the safety of the sea-salt spray involved in the studies. These supported our own evaluation that this is a safe, publicly accessible way to further research on aerosols in the atmosphere.”
The Council’s vote also came as something of a turnabout in events for MCB’s hosts on board The USS Hornet according to Director Of Events and Outreach, Russell Moore.
“Nothing is ever 100% certain but we were cautiously optimistic. We felt that we had addressed their concerns. There will be significant financial impact as well as the loss of a unique educational opportunity for our STEM programs,” he said.
The Hornet will take a financial hit to its operating revenues generated by the use fees that UW was paying to use the historic vessel with rich scientific ties to past and present. “It will have some near term financial implications to some of our other programs-we are still assessing,” said Moore.
LESS WAS NOT MORE WHEN IT CAME TO ‘TRANSPARENCY’ AND FEARS OF AEROSOL HARM
Direct communication between The Hornet, UW, The City Manager’s Office and Council Members prior to the meeting was minimal at best, and for some at City Hall the news came to them the same way it did to the public: through the media.
Once word of the experiment went public, just days after it began, the story went national, including in the New York Times, and then it was no secret to anyone, save for a couple of writers for Politico and The Smithsonian magazine who spun project as clouded in secrecy and surreptition.
Mayor Ashcraft indicated that being in the know was a problem for her as she said she first heard of it through the news, though the Politico article stated that their inquiries in early March, just after initial experiments began, to The Mayor’s Office were referred back to The Hornet.
MCB, CAARES, Silver Lining and The Hornet sponsored a special informational session and meet and greet with the scientists in late April after the city signaled concerns about the experiment’s permissibility under The Hornet’s operation terms of use in its lease from the City.
“Trish Herrara Spencer came aboard and we talked to her as well. CAARE also had a chance to meet with the Mayor prior to the council meeting,” said Moore.
Vice Mayor Daysog and Council member Vella had been invited to the event as well, but did not attend.
Nonetheless, it is clear from what Vella said at Tuesday’s Council meeting that she felt underinformed about matters until the ship was underway, to to speak. “The lack of transparency is problematic for me, and the lack of input from experts before the rollout of this.”
Council member Tracy Jensen indicated that she too felt left in the dark in a text to ANN.
“I am concerned by The UW and Silver Lining non profit sponsor of lack of transparency. The question for me is whether it is safe for humans and animals to inhale high concentrations of imitation sea salt molecules over extended periods of time. That question has not been answered,” she said, notwithstanding the studies presented to the Council by City Staff and UW.
Moore acknowledged as much saying, “We thought this was a minor, completely safe, cool scientific study that was also a rental opportunity for the ship. We were excited about the educational activities part of it.
We had reached out to the city ahead of time but as we have apologized to them multiple times for, we didn’t get into nearly enough detail because we didn’t think it was a big deal. That in retrospect was a mistake.
DOUBTS OVER SCIENTIFIC CERTAINTY WERE KEY
Despite the communication gap, the bedrock science vs popular imagination lies at the heart of the dispute. The Hornet and UW just did not convince the jury, so to speak.
Spencer sent a number of internet site links that focus on a garden variety of perils and illnesses discussed by The Asthma And Allergy Foundation Of America and one that terms the microscopic salt molecules emitted on the Hornet as “salt flecks.”
The “Marine Cloud Brightening (MCB) Program” did not use salt flecks, but instead sought to infuse microscopic, pure sea salt particles with purified water to generate a salt-air plume to determine the behavior of the mixture ( ie. dispersion, particulate concentration etc.) in hopes that the data could be used to help clouds become better solar reflectors in the upper atmosphere.
Enhancing Marine Cloud Reflectivity could, hypothetically, add cloud mass and reach to help cool sea waters below by reducing the amount of sunlight hitting the ocean surface and cooling them by a few degrees.
“The Only Two Ingredients Used In The Experiment Are Pure Water And Salt With No Additives Of Any Kind“
Dr. Robert Wood, Program Co-Lead
The aerosol emissions on board the USS Hornet’s flight deck are massively lower in terms of particulate matter than the natural sea air folks breathe on the deck of the ship, according to multiple scientific measures.
The generated air is also cleaner than that of the natural surroundings.
The only two ingredients used in the experiment, according to one of the MCB Program’s Co-Leads, Dr. Robert Wood who interviewed with ANN, are pure water and salt with no additives of any kind.
Even basic table salt is not suitable for use in MCB experiment as it is adulterated with other additives, he said.
He added that the aerosol emanating from the vaporizing device dissipates rapidly and does not infuse or remain in the air past the immediate vicinity of the ship.
“The air is less salty than what you get at the beach on a day with breaking waves, ” said the project’s other Co-Lead, Dr. Sarah Doherty in an earlier interview with ANN.
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION
Alameda and The Hornet had been specially chosen by The UW team as it is
a unique micro environment ideally suited for its Westerly Sea breezes needed for optimal testing.
Mayor Ashcraft expressed qualms about the selection of location at the Council meeting saying,
“In all of the Puget Sound and University of Washington area, there wasn’t a museum and stretch of area with (proper) wind and whatnot?”
From the Hornet’s perspective, it is a different matter when it comes to Alameda’s place on the map.
“We are Alameda’s #1 tourist attraction so there might be an impact-not sure really. Same for the city,” said Moore.
But at the end of the day –or rather another long, deep into the night meeting for The Alameda City Council that went past 1:00 am– the matter was not about Alameda’s taking a shot at fighting Global Warming, Alameda’s big- small town panache, tourist draw and notoriety for The Hornet or the UW’s gratitude “ for the support we received from many people, including Indigenous People, and youth, scientific and political leaders, and members of the Alameda community.”
For The Mayor it had to do with her view that “I don’t have a burning desire to be on the cutting edge of everything,”
For now, both the Hornet and UW hope that the matter can be reopened for further discussion.
Moore was not “cautiously optimistic” in this case, saying that, “We don’t know but we are going to try to see if there is more information we could provide to them.
UW said that “While we are already exploring alternative paths forward for the CAARE research, we urge the City of Alameda to reconsider today’s decision.”
And so the climate in Alameda, at least from a political standpoint, did change in the wake of one Council decision.