Today, the company again finds itself in troubled waters.

courtesy photo

A new report from Environment Texas titled “Dirty Energy’s Assault On Our Health: Mercury” released this week suggests CPS Energy’s coal-fired plants housed at Calaveras Lake are the 11th dirtiest in the state. With an estimated 16,350 pounds of mercury emitted in 2009 in Texas alone, the state ranks number one nationally.

While Calaveras’ coal plants Spruce 1 and 2 and Deely 1 and 2 have cut their mercury pollution essentially in half, (down from 760 pounds in 2000 to 440 pounds in 2009), the debate still rages on between environmental groups like the Sierra Club and the SEED Coalition over Deely, the utility’s oldest and dirtiest coal plant that came online in the late ’70s before mandated federal emission limits. Even as the report suggests that a gram-sized drop of mercury can contaminate an entire 20-acre lake, and pollution from coal-burners also produce sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, carbon dioxide, and lead, contributing to thousands of respiratory illnesses and premature deaths each year, environmental groups don’t seem bent out of shape that the utility hasn’t lived up to its 2005 promise of a $565 million retrofit that would install sulfur-scrubbing emission reducers at “Dirty Deely.”

Instead, they’re hoping for an early retirement of Deely inspired by CPS Energy CEO Doyle Beneby’s concern over coming Environmental Protection Agency toxic air pollution standards to be announced in March and the fact the plant is already past half its life expectancy.“Things are looking better, but we need a statewide mandate for what they can and can’t do and that’s where the EPA comes in,” said Alejandro Savransky, field organizer for Environment Texas, at a press event outside the power plant.While Beneby’s commitment to expanding solar in San Antonio is just the sort of thing environmental groups like to hear (the utility is gunning for 100-megawatts of pollution-free solar by 2020), nuclear is still not off the table, pointed out Karen Hadden, executive director of SEED. While the city remains a 7-percent partner in a proposed doubling of the South Texas Project nuclear complex outside Bay City (and NRG officials are lobbying hard in Austin and elsewhere to create more buy-in and enhance their position for possible future federal loan guarantees), an early Deely retirement could prompt discussions about buying more deeply into the project.Still, CPS spokesperson Lisa Lewis insists the half a billion set aside to address Deely’s dirty deed won’t be diverted to already-in-motion solar projects, and any decision about an early retirement won’t be made until 2013. “Ideally, we’ll get through this latest round of EPA mandates and another legislative session before a decision is made, but money from A won’t go to B,” Lewis said. “We just don’t know what environmental regulations are going to take place in the next couple of years and we’re already over compliant, so does it make sense to spend half a billion dollars when you’re not sure what’s going to come down the road?”

Originally published in the San Antonio Current, January 28, 2010

With a name like The Whiptails, you’d expect nothing less than a band that can ramble with the best of ‘em and boy can they, but they sure can waltz too.

Singer Jeanne Sinclair, who pulls double duty on a Gretsch lap steel and twangy hollowbody, packs non-stop cry-me-a-river, yet somehow still wicked-slick diddlys into wayward tunes about needed whiskey to make it through. It’s clear bass player Chris Cessac can’t wait to play along; Violent Femmes bass riffs drifting into the air between songs, but he swears he was raised on punk and bluegrass too. Then there’s the barefoot drummer, aka Garrett T. Capps, who wields lighting rod wooden brushes to keep the train beat steaming right along.

It’s Patsy Cline meets Elvis Costello…

and yes, they rock Cline’s “Walking After Midnight.” With a slew of primitive country covers (Think Johnny Cash and June Carter’s “Jackson” or Melba Montgomery and John Prine’s “Milwaukee Here I Come”), opening slots for Ray Wylie Hubbard, and a newly pressed five-song EP recorded in a small college town nestled on the outskirts of Interstate 35, this trio is heading for higher ground and coming soon to a speakeasy or hootenanny near you.

Ralph the Cactus Planter, created by artists Scott Wade of Austin and Furly Travis of San Marcos.

The Supreme Court is showing no love for South Texas in another case of free speech woe, this time refusing to consider the immemorial question: “Is it junk or is it art?”

If the Johnny Cash Trio played punk, it would be Fear Snakeface, bottled and brewed into heartache and the gospel of tortured-driven blues.

Maybe it’s the simple drums, the hand raised, slamming down with an unstoppable driving beat sparred on by Phillip Luna or Antonio Ronconi decked out in cowboy boots riding a steady stream of fender basslines complimented by the raspy voice of Sid St. Onge that make them the quintessential punk ballad trio.

They’ve got the storytelling down. Then there’s the wacky jingle, but instead of a pieced together Caddy, it’s all about corn. But, for just one moment, forget the hi-jinx punk gimmicks and floor wailing that goes on at live shows because there’s a softer side always waiting to come through.

While St. Onge would claim Elliott Smith’s aching self-loathing melodies as his own rite of musical passage into songwriting, he gravitates toward the sunnier side of life’s tormented offerings.

There’s not a lot of hidden meaning, just the interior of one’s own personal love-capades set to tense musical verse and swashbuckling ride-a-longs. He’s wondering what’s taking you so long just like the rest of us.

It’s the perfect soundtrack for breakups, getting drunk, throwing neurotic fits and not hurting anybody but yourself, foot still tapping along of course.

Herein lies the genius of songs sung into the wee hours of the morning long after the band has left the stage.

Originally published in No Depression, September 19, 2010.

Animal experimentation. Government involvement. Objector whistleblowing. Sound more twisted than a Bobo the Chimp caper?

It’s the continuing saga of the 200-plus chimpanzees housed at the Alamogordo Primate Facility at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. Some are descendants of the infamous Coulston Foundation colony, the so-called space chimps used to test the effects of zero gravity and life-support systems aboard the Mercury capsules prior to manned space flights. (That’s “Ham” in his “biopack couch” at right getting ready for the Mercury-Redstone 2 rocket launch in 1961.)

This time ‘round, they face medical research experimentation, mainly for sought-after HIV cures and an ever-elusive Hepatitis C vaccine, when they arrive in our backyard at San Antonio’s Southwest National Primate Research Center as early as next year.

For nearly a decade, the chimps were safely housed at APF, a strictly research-free military facility, as part of an agreement with the National Institutes of Health. But the vegetable-foraging, sun-soaking life the chimps have grown accustomed to is in jeopardy (Flo, the oldest, turns 53 on September 29. Happy birthday Flo!), as an agreement with the private for-profit Charles Rivers Laboratories, who held the 10-year, $42.8 million dollar contract to manage the chimps while housed at APF, expires in 2011.

It’s heartbreaking enough that even the primate-saving Jane Goodall chimed in with a letter she wrote to the health institute stating, “My most immediate concern is for the well being of these particular chimpanzees who will surely suffer considerable physical and emotional distress from this plan.”

The move has sparked outrage among animal rights groups, including the Humane Society of the United States, the Humane Society Legislative Fund, and Animal Protection of New Mexico, which is seeking a permanent sanctuary for the soon-to-be ex-APF chimps.

“This particular group of chimps has spent most of their lives in dire conditions, but the first step is to see them permanently retired from invasive research,” said Laura Bonar, program director with Animal Protection of New Mexico.

The chimps’ plight has garnered the attention of New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, Senator Tom Udall and — surprise, surprise — PETA, members of which marched on the steps of the Department of Health and Human Services building in Washington D.C. on September 14.

Clad in ape suits, members locked themselves in cages and hoisted signs reading, “No More Tests, No More Torture” and “Sanctuary, Not Suffering.”

“The NIH hasn’t exactly been public with this move and we want to raise awareness of this issue,” Justin Goodman, associate director of laboratory investigations for PETA, said. “It’s shocking that the U.S. is the only country left in the world still permitting invasive testing on these animals.”

And this at a time when Congress is considering the Great Ape Protection Act of 2010, or S. 3694, which would phase out invasive research on federally owned chimps and shut down testing altogether.

What illicit mischief will Bobo uncover now?

Originally published in the San Antonio Current, September 17, 2010

Every band hopes people will get off to their music but a few more hope people will get off their anti-eco ways. That’s why Reverb, a non-profit musicians-for-change and fans-for-grassroots-movements, has put out a call for musicians and their fans to get on the green bus.

In exchange for working green areas at local outdoor venues and collecting signatures for local non-profits such as the Sierra Club and Texas Campaign for the Environment, fans are granted free concert tickets, outfitted with an official Reverb volunteer t-shirt, and of course, they will receive eternal gratitude from Reverb, who also supplies an online resource guide for fans looking to carpool to and from shows.

For the musician, Reverb (who has greened more than 91 tours to date) custom builds green band Websites, helps musicians convert gas-guzzling tour vans into eco-friendly biodiesel, and instills local organic fare menus for an eco-alternative to the awful road food starving musicians are usually susceptible to, and they will even create a custom made green rider so instead of asking for the proverbial pet monkey no one is sure to produce, bands can opt for say, a five-course vegetarian meal that will be waiting at back stage check-in instead.

To date, the Dave Matthews Band, Arcade Fire, Sheryl Crow, Jack Johnson, Ben Folds Five, Norah Jones, a slew of others, and of course Guster founding member Adam Gardner, and his wife, environmentalist Lauren Sullivan, creators of Reverb, have signed on to advocate the musician’s green movement, they just need a few more fans to help out.

VOLUNTEER HERE.

Originally published San Antonio Express-News blogs, September 11, 2010

Normally a glorious excursion to the Mayans Pyramids can be expensive. Or it could cost nothing if WWOOFing is involved.

WWOOF – Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms – is an international network of family farmers seeking part-time help. In exchange for a few hours of farmhand labor like plowing fields, tending goats or chopping wood, would be volunteers get free room and board, and all the locally grown healthy foods found on said farms.

Many of the organic families associated with WWOOF live a sustainable lifestyle and welcome anyone willing to share and learn. For as little as a week or as long as three months, the land is open range for anyone willing to provide a bit of free labor.

Volunteers are encouraged to sign up with WWOOF, and for just $30 per year, opportunities in more than twenty countries await, complete with contact information for each farm and their specific requirements.

But it’s not all work and no play. During free time, visitors are welcome to explore remote villages, take in the culture, become a master gardener, learn another language or just travel the world.

Oh, a passport might help too.

Originally published San Antonio Express-News blogs, September 7, 2010