RoguePundit

Carbon Colonialism

Time for the faux outrage of the day.

The UN Copenhagen climate talks are in disarray today after developing countries reacted furiously to leaked documents that show world leaders will next week be asked to sign an agreement that hands more power to rich countries and sidelines the UN's role in all future climate change negotiations.

The document is also being interpreted by developing countries as setting unequal limits on per capita carbon emissions for developed and developing countries in 2050; meaning that people in rich countries would be permitted to emit nearly twice as much under the proposals.

The so-called Danish text, a secret draft agreement worked on by a group of individuals known as "the circle of commitment"--but understood to include the UK, US and Denmark--has only been shown to a handful of countries since it was finalised this week.

The agreement, leaked to the Guardian, is a departure from the Kyoto protocol's principle that rich nations, which have emitted the bulk of the CO2, should take on firm and binding commitments to reduce greenhouse gases, while poorer nations were not compelled to act.

Good grief...how many years now have various industrialized nations been pushing for everyone--and especially major polluters like China--to have emissions goals in future protocols?  My favorite quote was in the Financial Times.

Andy Atkins of Friends of the Earth said: "The Danes holding secret backroom meetings with a few select countries is also deeply disappointing - the world expects the host country to be neutral. Instead, we have Denmark colluding with other rich nations to stitch up the talks."

Progress is never made in the open sessions at climate talks.  These are classic international negotiations, full of backroom meetings, secret alliances, backstabbing, on and on.  And obviously, nations hosting negotiations are under no obligation to be neutral.  None of this is news to Atkins...he's a long-time social justice activist who's been championing treating climate change as a poverty issue.  For him--and most developing nations, it's about the money, not climate change. 

Switching articles again...

National aid budgets dedicated to reducing global poverty would be raided to establish a "climate fund" to help developing countries to adapt to climate change, under a British plan tabled yesterday in Copenhagen.

Money earmarked for education or health would be diverted into projects such as solar panels and wind farms.

The proposal has angered developing countries, which are demanding that all the money in the climate fund be additional to the 0.7 per cent of income that industrialised countries have pledged to give as overseas aid.

Poor nations had hoped that the British plan, devised with Norway, Australia and Mexico, would establish the principle that the climate fund be entirely new money.

Goodness, another plan developed in private by a select handful of nations...how deeply disappointing.  And by the way, few industrialized nations actually give that 0.7 percent of income.  The U.S. doesn't come close (previous blog here).

Returning to the original article...

A confidential analysis of the text by developing countries also seen by the Guardian shows deep unease over details of the text. In particular, it is understood to:

• Force developing countries to agree to specific emission cuts and measures that were not part of the original UN agreement;

• Divide poor countries further by creating a new category of developing countries called "the most vulnerable";

• Weaken the UN's role in handling climate finance;

• Not allow poor countries to emit more than 1.44 tonnes of carbon per person by 2050, while allowing rich countries to emit 2.67 tonnes.

Gee, and let's fail to acknowledge that the unease was even deeper before the obvious compromising there's been on the harder-line going-in positions of several industrialized nations.  Regarding that climate finance reference, what the Danish text actually does is specify that the climate fund will be managed by the World Bank rather than the UN.  That should reduce the amount of money lost to corruption, help make developing nations more accountable for their debt, etc.  Yep, those are goals worth fighting.

I wonder how much President Obama knew about the development of the Danish text.

ClimateGate and Funding for Foreign Aid

ClimateGate has clearly exposed some scientific fraud, the extent of which is still being determined.  But, let's ignore the fraud and concentrate on how it was discovered.   

UN officials have likened the theft of e-mails from university climate researchers to the Watergate scandal, after claiming computer hackers were probably paid by people intent on undermining the Copenhagen summit.

Jean-Pascal van Ypersele, a vice-chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said that the theft from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit (CRU) was not the work of amateur climate sceptics, but was a sophisticated and well-funded attempt to destroy public confidence in the science of man-made climate change. He said the fact that the e-mails were first uploaded to a sceptic website from a computer in Russia was an indication that the culprit was paid.

I'd like to think that van Ypersele--who has a PhD in physics--is upset that this fraud has cast a pall upon honest scientists and quality research.  But in attacking the messengers and offering a conspiracy theory, it's obvious that what matters to him more is politics rather than science.

The following was a vastly more reasoned response to the issue...by someone whose educational background is in social work.

Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, said that the stolen e-mails looked "very bad" and were fuelling scepticism, but said the media scrutiny was not unwelcome. Mr de Boer said: "I think it's very good that what is happening is being scrutinised in the media because this process has to be based on solid science. If quality and integrity is being questioned, that has to be examined."

But make no mistake, the science isn't that important to him either.

The UN climate chief has encouraged negotiators to complete work in the first week so a historic pact could be agreed to fight climate change.

...

Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of UN Framework Convention on climate change, said, "First of all we need, in terms of the short-term finance, a list of pledges from individual industrialized countries specifying what each individual country will contribute. So not a collective promise where you don't know who will be paying what at the end of the day but individual announcements of contributions from individual countries. Secondly, we will have to ensure that we establish a clear and effective tracking mechanism that allows us to be absolutely sure that individual industrialized countries are meeting their financial commitments."

First comes the money for developing nations...essentially an industrialized nation tax that his organization would get to administer.

Mining and Smelting and...

Sept-Îles is a town of about 25,000 on the north shore of the St. Lawrence Seaway.  It's so far northeast of the major population centers in Quebec that it's actually south of Labrador (the blue area on the map below).  In that remote and frosty location is Canada's third busiest port by tonnage.

Back in the '50s, the region boomed with the opening of a couple major iron ore mines to the north.  They were connected by rail to what was then a sleepy, deep water fishing port of about 2,000 people.  From this link...

The most ambitious of the projects, [the Quebec North Shore and Labrador Railway] was opened in 1954 by the Iron Ore Company of Canada (IOC) for the transport of iron ore from Schefferville, Labrador to the port of Sept Îles, a distance of 359 miles (573km). In 1958, a 36 mile (58km) branch was added from Emeril Junction (also called Ross Bay Junction) to the iron ore deposits of the Wabush area around Labrador City; the distance from Labrador City to Sept Îles is 257 miles (414km).

By 1982 the Schefferville deposit was worked out. The IOC workforce was transferred to Labrador City, and iron ore traffic ceased on the line from Emeril Junction to Schefferville.

 

Between that and the decline in iron ore prices, Sept-Îles took an economic hit early '80s.  But, the area isn't that far from the continent's second largest hydroelectric plant, Churchill Falls in Labrador.  The cheap and plentiful power eventually attracted an aluminum smelter to the port area--Aluminerie Alouette--the fifth largest in the world.

Today, the Aluminerie Alouette consortium is made up of the following five shareholders: Rio Tinto Alcan (Canada, 40%), Austria Metall (Austria, 20%), Hydro Aluminium (Norway, 20%), SGF (Quebec, 13.33%) and Marubeni (Japan, 6.67%).

Nonetheless, the economy in Sept-Îles still isn't what it was.  That's what has stirred up the following.

The Quebec government is resisting calls for a moratorium on the development of uranium deposits in the province despite threats by doctors in Sept-Îles to quit over plans to open a mine near the town.

Premier Jean Charest's government tabled a new mining act earlier this week that failed to order a moratorium on uranium exploration as provinces such as B.C. and Nova Scotia have done.

Physicians in the North Shore community spent the last year fighting mining company Terra Ventures Inc.'s exploration activities. The doctors, municipal officials, community organizations and residents are worried about potential radioactive contamination of the town's water supply.

The company recently received government permits to build an access road to a uranium deposit 13 kilometres from the town, near Lake Kachiwiss which flows into the municipal water supply. In the absence of a moratorium, 20 family doctors and specialists say the projected mining activities will eventually become a public-health threat.

Those 20 doctors, one-third of the total employed in the city's lone hospital, have threatened to quit if the uranium exploration isn't stopped.  They've said they'll leave the region, if not the province.  By law, they have to give two months notice, which they haven't done yet.  Wonder how many of them own homes there.  Anyway, from the most recent link...

The doctors are concerned about radon and other so-called "decay products" of uranium, which can contaminate air and water around a mine and cause lung cancer in humans. The letter adds that even residents of Montreal, Quebec City and Sherbrooke should be concerned about exposure to radiation because of widespread uranium mining across Quebec.

The asbestos mining in Thetford Mines, Quebec (recent blog here) presents an ever greater health risk, and Quebec fights hard to keep it going.  One of those cold, hard, ugly facts is that unemployment isn't exactly good for many people's health either.

By the by, Terra Ventures of Vancouver BC is a penny stock on the TSX Venture Exchange.  It's a highly speculative little firm which has no production, but does has a few irons in the fire in hopes of striking it rich. 

The Politics of Asbestos Jobs

Canada remains the second leading exporter of chrysotile asbestos, the type that's linked to mesothelioma--a vicious type of lung cancer (previous blog here).  The nation has long fought against international rules limiting or banning the trade of chrysotile because of the political influence of its asbestos miners, especially in Quebec.  They're part of the Quebec Steelworkers Union, which gives them more clout than their numbers would indicate.  Add the chronically high unemployment in the province and the constant angst over a secessionist movement, and it's standard operating procedure for many Canadian politicians to pander to the miners.

Yet, Canada uses little asbestos domestically because of health concerns.  And, chrysotile mining has long been on the decline.  At some point...

For eight months, the Quebec government has been holding on to a report that explores the link between asbestos-related cancer and Canada's only community that still mines the substance.

The study is believed to be the first Canadian research to look at asbestos-related cancer in a specific region, examining the risk of disease in and around Thetford Mines, Que. Quebec's public health institute delivered the completed report to regional officials and the provincial Health Department in March.

But the study, and its potentially alarming conclusions, still hasn't been made public. Officials say that will finally happen this month.

Gee, what happens to the health care budget if lots more people suddenly seek treatment for possible asbestos-related issues?

Dozens of Canadian health experts signed a letter Wednesday to federal Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq, demanding that she tighten the country's asbestos exposure limits for workers, which they say are 10 times higher than any Western country.

Since it takes 25 to 40 years after exposure for many asbestos-related diseases to surface, experts predict the death toll will continue rising for years as Canada experiences the lingering effects of its asbestos boom.

...

For decades, the children of Thetford Mines used to scale the local tailings piles, many of which are as tall as a house.

In winter, locals would toboggan down the dirt mounds with their kids, who affectionately referred to them as "The Asbestos Dumps."

Chrysotile only presents a danger if one inhales fine particles.  So, are those tailings constantly wet and/or covered with vegetation?  And even if they are, kids could bring home mud on their clothes and shoes which could dry and be stirred up when, for instance, mom was preparing to put the clothes in the washer.  Asbestos has certainly killed the family members of workers at the mines in Libby MT. 

Sources figure that the report will be published by the middle of the month.

By that time, the provincial legislature will have stopped for its winter holidays and Premier Jean Charest will be in Europe for the climate-change summit in Copenhagen and a side trip Russia.

It figures.

Vehicle Fuel and the Bottom Line

Our nation is littered with examples of governments at various levels converting some of their vehicles to run on various forms of natural gas...and then quietly retreating from the failed experiment.  In most instances, politicians pursue such initiatives to greenwash their image while funneling taxpayer dollars to key constituents...who then return a portion of them as campaign donations.  The stakeholders promise that this green leadership will provide an essential foundation for an eventual economy of scale that will make such "investments" pay-off.  Eventually, politicians push for a revenue increase to pay for what they should have been spending those taxpayer dollars on in the first place. 

The U.S. government has been promoting similar initiatives elsewhere.

The LPG Autogas Delegation, comprised of United States manufacturing representatives with extensive international experience in liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) autogas issues, participated in a nine-day, seven-city tour of major Indian cities from December 9 – 17, 2002. The purpose of the trip was to discuss with key stakeholders the expanded use in India of LPG as a domestic auto fuel. The trip was sponsored by the US Department of Energy’s International Clean Cities Program. The trip itinerary and Delegation meetings were arranged and coordinated by the United States/Asian Environmental Partnership (USAEP).

Clean Cities International, modeled after the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) domestic Clean Cities Program, aims to replicate the successful U.S. program in cities internationally. The environmental benefits of using alternative fuels are clear. All nations can profit from cleaning their air, producing their fuels domestically, and enhancing local economic activity. Clean Cities International is successfully using its experience in more than eighty North American cities to help international communities realize the benefits of alternative fuel vehicles (AFVs). Clean Cities International works with foreign governments, organizations, and individuals to help establish foundations for viable alternative fuel markets in their major cities.

...

US-AEP’s mission is to promote a "clean revolution" in Asia.

LPG sales in India are at record levels, largely driven by cooking demand.  When one either lacks or has unreliable electricity, LPG can be a great option in the kitchen.

As of last year, India had about half a million vehicles which could run the fuel...most of which has to be imported.  Supporting those vehicles were 560 LPG stations in 250+ cities.  But with what's happened to prices, both diesel and compressed natural gas (CNG) vehicles are now cheaper to drive.  Vehicles which can run both LNG and CNG are becoming increasingly available there.

Yesterday in Calcutta, which has some of the nation's most expensive LPG...

An effort launched four years ago to cleanse the city's air of some of its poison fume has been given a silent burial.

The 60-odd LPG-run taxis that hit the road with fanfare in 2005 have all been allowed to switch to diesel apparently because there are not enough refilling stations in the city.

"Not a single LPG taxi now plies in the Calcutta Metropolitan Area," said an official in the public vehicles department. "A few months ago, the owners of the LPG taxis had asked for permission to switch to diesel as there are not enough refilling stations. All were allowed to convert."

The article went on to explain that there are now 9 LPG stations in Calcutta and another 6 in the surrounding towns.  Note that Greater Calcutta has about 7 million people. Some complained that 15 stations, most of which don't operate around the clock, wasn't enough.  But, it's not like there were large volumes of drivers to serve.

Despite financial incentives offered by the city, few people could afford to buy new LPG vehicles.  Conversion kits aren't cheap, and they don't provide nearly the emissions savings as installations in new vehicles.  Plus, part of the way that most LPG engines reduce emissions and boost mileage is by scrimping on acceleration. Few find that desirable in congested cities.  It's reminiscent of compact fluorescent bulbs that save energy in part by producing less light.

With all the poverty, sanitation problems, etc. in Calcutta...

The Super Crematorium and Hearse

Zealand is a large island in eastern Denmark that's home to the nation's capital, Copenhagen.  The cost of reducing emissions from crematoriums there is driving some economies of scale.

A new plan to build one super crematorium in Ringsted to replace seven smaller ones in the Zealand region will reduce carbon emissions and save on money, but relatives are concerned by the plan to transport up to four bodies together to the facility.

Environmental authorities will introduce a requirement from the start of 2011 that all crematoriums must have mercury filters, and the cost of installing them has proven more expensive than some dioceses can afford, reports DR News.

The crematorium in Slagelse on Zealand is facing an 18 million kroner [$3.6 million] bill, to be covered either by the church tax or the relatives of those being cremated.

The new super crematorium will have the necessary mercury filters (blame dental fillings), produce half the carbon emissions per body of the old crematoriums, and provide cheaper service.  

Andersen said a special hearse will be used that could transport up to four bodies at a time to the crematorium, sometimes travelling up to 100 kilometers [62 miles] away.

...

Vicar Poul Joachim Stender was worried about the prospect of several bodies being transported together, adding he wouldn’t like to see his elderly mother become one of them.

"It may be irrational, but as a relative you're very vulnerable and aware of the smallest things. The way you treat your dead is also the way you treat the living," Stender said.

Denmark is one of several nations that has an official church and a tax to support it (previous blog here).  Membership in the Church of Denmark (Folkekirken)--a Lutheran body--is voluntary.  82.1 percent of Danes are members, though less than 5 percent of them attend weekly services.  All Danes end up paying something to the Church.  From this link...

The members of Folkekirken pay a church tax, which varies between municipalities, but can be as large as 1.51%. The tax is generally in the vicinity of 1% of the taxable income. The tax doesn't cover the entire budget of the church.  An additional 13% is paid by the government...

Even Danes who prefer burials get to help pay for incinerations.

Food Waste-Lines

Food production per capita has trended higher for decades.  With that in mind...

Just before Thanksgiving a new study shows that Americans are throwing away more food than ever. Since 1974 the amount of food Americans [waste] per capita has risen by approximately 50 percent, according to a new study in PLoS ONE. Researchers found that food waste is adding to America's greenhouse gas emissions and accounts for over one quarter of the nation's freshwater consumption every year.

Today Americans waste 1400 calories of food per person every day: 150 trillion calories per year. On average people require 2000 calories a day. This means that every American throws away enough food daily to nearly feed one extra person (70 percent of the 2000 calorie average).

That's interesting data, but the reporter left out some absolutely critical context.  In this study, the definition of food waste includes Americans eating more than necessary.  Exclude that, and the percentage of food that Americans allow to spoil, throw away, etc. is trending downward. 

It's rather obvious that the weight of the average American is trending upward.  The researchers noted that both increased consumption and decreased activity play roles in that weight gain.  They should have also mentioned a related issue...that the average American is still getting taller.  And then quoting the study...

The calculated progressive increase of food waste suggests that the US obesity epidemic has been the result of a "push effect" of increased food availability and marketing with Americans being unable to match their food intake with the increased supply of cheap, readily available food. Thus, addressing the oversupply of food energy in the US may help curb the obesity epidemic as well as decrease food waste, which has profound environmental consequences.

Gee, if only food wasn't so plentiful and cheap. Maybe not surprisingly, the researchers offered nothing on how to reduce the oversupply of food, what the impacts of such a reduction might be, etc.  Returning to the original article...

The paper further argues that the rise in food waste is contributing to climate change. According to the study, food waste in America consumes approximately 300 million barrels of oil every year from the fossil fuels used in farming. In 2003 this was 4 percent of the nation's total oil consumption. The study does not incorporate greenhouse gases emissions due to land-use changes, such as deforestation, for growing the food that is ultimately wasted.

The researchers note that another hidden factor in the link between food waste and global warming is rotting food, which "produces substantial quantities of methane—gas with 25 fold more potent global warming potential than CO2 which would have been the primary end product had the food been eaten and metabolized by humans."

In addition, at a time when water scarcity is becoming increasingly a problem worldwide, food waste in America is a massive consumer of water. The paper states that "assuming that agriculture utilizes about 70% of the freshwater supply, our calculations imply that more than one quarter of total freshwater use is accounted for by wasted food."

How long has it been since deforestation played a role of any significance in increasing farm production in the U.S.?  Heck, the percentage of forested land here has growing for decades.  And after all the research and publicity there's been on methane production in landfills, the recycling of food waste, etc. we're supposed to pretend that food waste is a hidden factor behind global warming?  Right.

Nonetheless, food for thought. 

Mercury in Sockeye Smolts

The following research was done on sockeye salmon in Alaska's Wood River Basin, in the SW part of the state.  It flows into Bristol Bay, which is part of the Bering Sea.

Spawning salmon also carry methylmercury, which they bioaccumulate while at sea, where they gain up to 95% of their adult weight. Ecologists used to see this vector-borne transfer of mercury inland from the oceans as a one-way delivery. In a recent ES&T paper, Matthew Baker and colleagues investigate the return route. Their findings indicate that about 12% of the methylmercury brought by adult sockeye to spawning grounds is returned to the ocean by their progeny, called smolts.

...

Salmon eggs are virtually free of methylmercury, Baker says. Instead, smolts pick it up from their diets, mainly zooplankton and different invertebrate species. Relying on data corresponding to 15 "brood years" (which relate offspring to parents from a single spawning season) gathered by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, Baker and his colleagues sampled both incoming adults and outgoing smolts for mercury levels. These were converted into gross import and export volumes for each brood year under investigation.

One would figure that the more returning salmon there are, the more mercury the smolts return to the sea.  That's true to a point.  The Wood River system is fairly pristine, and thus can--in a sense--be overwhelmed by returning salmon in some years.  Smolt numbers plateau at the carrying capacity of the Basin.

In the bigger picture, Sockeye salmon only move a tiny amount of mercury as compared to--for instance--what the air brings in.

Annual mercury deposition from the atmosphere in this 3590-square-kilometer [1386 square mile] region amounts to 2.1 kilograms [4.6 pounds]. By contrast, the yearly contribution of methylmercury to the area from sockeye salmon (excluding the exported fraction) adds up to just 71 grams [2.5 ounces]—an infinitesimally small amount considering that up to 1.3 million adults escape to these spawning grounds every year.

Mercury levels in the fish are less than 10 percent of the regulatory limit.  That's good to see, especially considering that the river basin and adult feeding grounds are seeing additional mercury from emissions in China, North Korea, etc.

A New and Unnecessary Fee for Some Oregon Businesses

There are a number of areas where the state could wisely spend a small amount of time and money on things that would benefit the environment.  Collecting greenhouse gas emission data from a select minority of businesses for a non-existent cap & trade system certainly isn't one of them.  But leave it to our job-destroying governor to push for it anyway.  

Oregon environmental regulators are proposing fees ranging from $54 to $6,000 a year for 180 businesses required to report greenhouse gas emissions beginning in 2010.

The Department of Environmental Quality's proposal would apply to sources from electric power plants to paper mills to landfills. It goes before the Environmental Quality Commission next month.

DEQ says the fees will pay for two staff members to implement the reporting program, provide workshops and technical assistance and audit emitters' reports. The agency's annual budget for greenhouse gas reporting is $330,000.

Costs for businesses are capped at the lower of 15 percent of the air permit fees they currently pay or $6,000, whichever is less. Fourteen businesses would pay the maximum $6,000 charge, DEQ says. Thirty-seven would pay less than $200.

Gee, let's raise the cost of doing business here in Oregon for absolutely no benefit....and sneak the proposal out just before Thanksgiving in hopes that no one will notice.  The goal is for it to take effect in just over a month.

What's the point of building a bureaucracy in anticipation of regulations that might someday be implemented?  And don't forget that in addition to paying the fee, the businesses will have to spend time and money getting folks trained, gathering and reporting the data, etc.

The best way to cut fat from the government is not to add it in the first place.

Wasting Green on Green Buses

Vancouver was consumed with greenwashing its image even before it got the upcoming Winter Olympics.  The same goes for nearby Whistler, which will host a number of the alpine events.  It's gotten so bad that even David Suzuki--Canada's Al Gore--is criticizing some of the efforts.  In the following, I've converted loonies into American dollars.

As the world's largest fleet of Hydrogen powered buses is set to roll in Whistler, a leading environmental group is questioning the economic sense of the project.

"It is fine to scope out potential technologies of the future, but the reality is B.C.'s public transit services are on life support as far as the financial needs go,” said Ian Bruce, climate-change campaigner for the David Suzuki Foundation.

"B.C. government should re-evaluate and come out with a financial plan to make the BC transit plan become a reality."

The 20-hydrogen bus project is funded with $42.6 million from the federal government and $42.1 million from the province and B.C. Transit, the crown agency responsible for co-ordinating the delivery of public transportation within B.C., outside of Metro Vancouver.

The money covers both capital and operating costs until 2014.

The hydrogen buses cost $2.0 million apiece, about four times the cost of standard buses.  When it comes to fuel and maintenance, they cost more per mile to drive.  Plus...

Added to the question of costs is the fact that the hydrogen has to be bused in from Quebec, as it cannot be produced in B.C. in great enough quantities.

This reduces green house gas emission savings from using hydrogen from 100 per cent to 62 per cent.

"When it comes to public transit, the case is unclear whether it will be a potential solution and certainly right now there are a lot more cost-effective solutions for reducing emissions and getting more people on to public transit," said Bruce.

The investment in fuel-cell buses is expected to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 1,800 tonnes per year in B.C.

What's with the pretense that driving hydrogen buses is emission-free?  Besides the fact that their exhaust--water vapor--is our most common greenhouse gas, all hydrogen production methods--even those which separate it from waste streams--consume energy.  Heck, about 95 percent of the hydrogen produced in the U.S. comes from natural gas.  Some of the rest comes from the gasification of coal.

Canada is working to produce more of its hydrogen from renewable sources.  For instance, "hydro-hydrogen" is made via hydrolysis (splitting water molecules) using hydroelectric power.  Both BC Hydro and Hydro Quebec have explored making hydrogen with off-peak power...but how often is either organization forced to spill water around their hydroelectric generators during off-peak hours?  Meanwhile with as expensive and wind and solar energy are, you can imagine what their use does to the price of hydrogen.

Also note that hydrogen transport over long distances is even more inefficient than the article indicates.  I question whether there would be any emissions savings at all when shipping the fuel across the continent from Quebec.  And the cost of that...ouch.

Unless public transportation has sufficient ridership, it can be more efficient not just financially but from an emissions perspective to avoid manufacturing and using it.  How busy and full will those hydrogen buses be once the Olympics are over?