Science Friday - Agricultural Bees, China’s Energy Future, Frankenstein In Class. Feb 2, 2018, Part 1

Episode Date: February 2, 2018

China's thirst for energy is rising. But to save its cities from suffocating pollution, leaders are looking to carbon-free energy sources and electric vehicles. Click here for more information about China's energy future. We need domestic bees. But what happens to wild bees when they share a space? We discuss the good and the bad in the latest installment of Good Thing, Bad Thing. Plus, Ira checks in with the SciFri Book Club. This week, the club receives a call for help and discuss how Frankenstein is still relevant to today’s high school students. And Maggie Koerth-Baker of Five Thirty Eight gives Ira a tour of this week's science headlines in our weekly News Round-up. Subscribe to this podcast. Plus, to stay updated on all things science, sign up for Science Friday's newsletters.

This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato. A little bit later in the hour, we'll talk about China's energy ambitions. Yes, lots of coal, but also floating solar farms, record-breaking wind installations, and all sorts of electric vehicles zipping around. But first, Cape Town, South Africa, a population of almost 4 million people, will run out of water in less than 80 days. The region is in the middle of a three-year drought, the worst in over a century. The city's reservoirs are down to 13% capacity, but despite soon facing a day zero, when all water will officially be cut off, some residents have been dragging their feet to meet conservation goals set by city and government officials. Joining me to tell us more about that story and other short subjects in science is Maggie Kerth Baker, senior science reporter for 538.com. Welcome back, Maggie. Hi, thanks for having me. So give us an update on this situation on the ground right now in Cape Town. Well, so right now, day zero is set for April 16th. That'll be the day when the tap water in your house gets turned off,

and residents are forced to wait in line for a daily water ration of about six and a half gallons per person. But that date also changes a lot, and that's because it is based not on an absolute, this is when it's going to happen, but on the level of water in the residence. reservoirs. So it's possible that you could still sidestep day zero and have it never actually come to pass, though city officials are telling local media in Cape Town that there's about a 60% chance now of day zero happening. So they've instituted water conservation efforts, but what I'm hearing is that the people, not everybody's listening to that. Yeah, yeah. The water conservation efforts actually became more strict yesterday. Yesterday,

the limit went from about 20 gallons a day a person to 13 gallons a day per person. But 45% of Captonians were already exceeding the 20 gallons a day limit. And that's even with fines to the tune of about $350 a person, you know, whenever you get caught. I mean, it's something where attention is on this, but compliance still isn't great. Yeah, I guess so you just have to wait for the weather. there's nothing going to turn it around. The drought, I mean, is there? Yeah, I mean, conservation is the main thing that they're saying could really turn it around.

At this point, even if you got like a good storm, it really wouldn't be enough because it's gone on for so long. And this is something that is really strongly connected to climate change. You know, there are wet and dry years in Cape Town, but this is a dry climate. And since 1960, it has on trend been getting drier and drier, and droughts like this big one are likely to become more common. The new numeral, as they say. Okay, let's move on to France, where researchers have taught an orca whale to mimic saying hello. This is what it sounds like. Hello.

It doesn't sound a whole lot like hello to me. Did it sound sort of? Well, yeah, I mean, it didn't. And that is one of the things that's interesting about this. I mean, Wiki's, Wiki is the name of the orca whale. Her mimicry is not perfect. But it's really impressive if you consider the physiological differences between how humans and because speak, right? So we speak by having air kind of forced through our throats. They're speaking

with air forced through like these little passageways and holes in the upper part of their head. So like she's trying to a really hard to adapt to something that's completely different than the way that her body even works. And it's a pretty impressive feat when you get right down to it because there's only a handful of other mammals that have ever been able to mimic human speech at all. So the Yorker's not speaking through its mouth, it's speaking through its blowhole? Is that what's happening? Well, it's speaking through its mouth, but the way that it makes sounds is different from the way that we make sounds. The sounds come from a different place.

Yeah, okay. Like speaking through your nose. I can do that. Okay, up next. Exactly. There's a lawsuit that California that may require a cancer warning when you come in for your next cup of Java. How is coffee connected to cancer? Well, so this is super interesting because it ends up.

demonstrating to me this how scientific decision-making about personal risk can be as much about philosophy as evidence. So anytime you roast coffee, you get as a side effect this chemical called acrylamide. You know, it's in all coffee. The exact amount varies. It seems like the longer and darker you roast the beans, the less it has. But acrylamide has been shown to be dangerous in some circumstances. So if you feed rodents really high doses of it, they'll get cancer, or increase their risk of cancer, rather. And it also has been used in industrial processes and has been shown to cause nerve damage and workplace exposures.

But we don't really know much about what that means when it comes to the health risks of coffee drinking. You know, this is something that is much, much lower doses than what those rats are getting. And humans metabolize this chemical in really different ways than rodents. But because it has these laboratory-based risk, exposure risks, it's on this list with the state of California as a chemical that people should be warned about. And so about eight years ago, this activist group called the Council for Education and Research on Toxics started suing companies that sell coffee for failing to provide warning labels about acrylamide. There's now been about 13 different defendants who have settled

out of court most recently, and why this is in the news again, with the 7-11 stores. So they'll pay fines and they'll start to post some warnings. But we don't really actually, you know, whether that actually makes sense or not is less about science than about sort of how you feel about personal risk. You know, two people could look at the same amount of evidence on acrylamide and coffee,

and one person might see an uncertainty that could hide danger and they'd want a warning, and another person could see an uncertainty that suggests there's not really a problem, and they might think a warning is asinine. Yeah. And quickly, I know if NASA lost something and an amateur astronomer actually found it? Yes, NASA lost a space satellite, a research satellite in 2005, and it turned back up again this month or last month.

And they're now trying to reestablish contact with it and figure out whether its old technology can actually communicate with our new technology. Things have changed so fast that it might not be able to. Go, yay, amateur scientists, amateur astronomers. Thank you, Maggie. Yes, thank you so much. You're welcome, Maggie Kurt Baker, senior science reporter for 538. And now it's time to play, good thing, bad thing, because every story has a flip side. You know, for years now, we've been watching the saga of declining bee populations around the world.

Whole hives disappearing, struggle of farmers and commercial beekeepers to keep their colonies alive, to pollinate the crops and produce the honey we all like. And there are solutions that seem like they could help reducing pesticide use, battling the bee's biggest enemy, the varroa mite. But some researchers are starting to discuss something else. Like, are all these domesticated bees even good for the wild bee ecosystem, for the whole ecosystem? My guest, Rachel Malinger, as assistant professor of pollinator ecology and conservation at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. Welcome to Science Friday. Hi.

Hi, thanks for having me. So let's talk about this. From a wild bees perspective, what's good about domestic bees? Yeah, so I think what's good about domestic bees from the perspective of the wild bee is that it raises awareness of bees and it raises awareness of the importance of pollination. And when we go about trying to conserve bees, many of the things we do to help the domestic bees also help wild bees. So whether that's reducing pesticide use or regulating pesticide use, planting flowers, conserving flowers, all of those things can help both domestic bees and wild bees. So I think from the wild bees' perspective, domestic bees do help raise awareness of bees and bee conservation and increase our awareness of the importance of bees and the role they play in pollination. But there's a downside, though, for the bees and the wild bees, domesticated bees.

Right, yeah. So the downside is that these domestic bees, first of all, many of them are used outside of their native or natural range. And so they would be considered an exotic species where they're used. And in general, these domestic bees, whether they're used in their native range or whether they're used outside of it as an exotic species, they can compete with wild bees. And so when they're present in really high densities, they compete for the same flowers. And there's also research that suggests that they can spread. diseases to the wild bees. Yeah, and I follow Tom Seeley's research on wild bees. It talks about all the time about the need to make sure the wild bee population is healthy. Right, exactly, yeah. And so we've started monitoring diseases as well

as pests and pathogens and trying to figure out are these managed bees spreading diseases in what context and what ways, and also what is their competitive effect? How much do they compete with these wild bees? And how much do they? I mean, what are some of the results of this? Yeah, so

So in terms of competition, some of the results do suggest that they can compete with wild bees and they affect wild bees, but how large of an effect and whether that's causing any wild bee declines is still fairly unknown. So, for example, a study might show that when you have managed bees in an area, you see fewer wild bees on a given plant or flower. Does that mean that the wild bee populations are declining in that area, or does it just mean that they're choosing to forage on something else? They say, oh, there's no honey bees over here. We're going to go forage over here, and they're just fine. So we do see that there's evidence of competition, but how much of an effect does that have? Is that causing wild bee declines? That all remains a bit unknown.

Well, is there any way we can protect the wild bees while still relying on the domestic bees? Yeah, definitely. So I think one thing people can do is support large-scale conservation, so conserving parks, conserving native natural lands, donating to conservation. organizations, places and people in organizations that are relatively natural and native and conserving those. I think people can also do things in their own yards. They can plant flowers.

A lot of states will have lists of flowers that are attractive to bees that you can plant. And then reducing pesticide use around your home and in your yard, especially if you're planting those things that are attractive to bees, you want to be most careful with those. You don't want to be spraying a flower that is going to attract a bee. So I think there's those things you can do locally. but then also supporting the large-scale conservation. I think land use change, so development and agriculture, destroying a lot of those natural habitats that the bees rely on,

that's probably one of the biggest factors that could contribute to bee declines. So supporting those natural areas is really important. Yeah, because we think the honeybees, you know, they're all guests here, right? All the honeybees were imported some time ago. Exactly, yeah, it's a European. The European honeybee is what we have here in the U.S. So as its name suggests, it's not native. It's native to Europe.

Okay. Thank you. That was great. So thank you, Rachel. Dr. Rachel Malinger, assistant professor of pollinator ecology and conservation at the University of Florida. We're going to take a break and come back and talk about China. It needs more energy to grow its economy. We're going to talk about how it can keep growing without suffocating its cities with dirty coal,

how it is moving toward green energy. It's got floating windmills, all kinds of stuff. And we'll talk about how it's changing the way it. Drive cars over there with green cars. We'll talk about it after the break. Stay with us. This is Science Friday. I'm Ira Flato.

The Trump administration is proposing to slash clean energy research budgets by 70%, as reported by the Washington Post, cutting money for fuel efficiency research, biofuels, solar, and focusing instead on fossil fuels and what the president refers to as beautiful clean coal. Meanwhile, in China, they are burning a lot. lot of coal at almost 70% of their energy mix, but China's leaders are investigating all these alternatives that the president is slashing, plotting a pivot towards electric vehicles, carbon-free energy sources. They've installed more wind power than the world's wind energy leaders, the U.S., Germany, and India combined, and they're planning to build nuclear power plants.

And while China has been manufacturing other countries' solar panels for years, they're installing a lot of their own now, too, including innovative ideas. like a floatovoltaic solar farm, floating atop a lake where a coal mine used to be, a symbol of things to come. My next guests have witnessed some of these changes firsthand, and they're here to talk about China's energy transformation. Let me first introduce Denise Mouserall. She's Professor of Environmental Engineering and International Affairs at Princeton.

Welcome to Science Friday. Glad to be here. I understand that you just got back from a trip to China. Any big changes? you noticed on this latest trip? There was a huge improvement in air quality. I've been in China starting back as far as 1990, and in the previous 10 years when I've been there, the air pollution has been so bad that you could often not see across the street

clearly, and two blocks away would be blurred out by the air pollution. This trip, I was in Beijing, and you could easily see. 10 miles. You could see the mountains that I had never been able to see from downtown before. And what do you attribute this to? What do they attributed to? I think there's a number of factors that have contributed to this improvement this winter. From the emissions perspective, one thing that the government has done has been to greatly reduce the use of coal in small stoves that are often used for heating in the residential areas in the Beijing region. And there's been a move towards much more stringent vehicle standards and much more stringent standards for power plants. And in addition to that, meteorology has helped them this winter.

And so rather than getting dirty air coming up from southern China, they're getting clean air coming in off of the Arctic down from Siberia and ventilating the city. So it was great. Yeah, I remember I was there a few years ago and in the hotel rooms. You've got a pair of smoke, what do you call it, gas masks you could wear because they knew that you were going to go outside sometime. Right, yeah. When I was there last November, I was handed face masks from some Chinese professors before we went out to dinner. It's a standard thing to put on as you walk down the street. Well, let's talk about some of that good news you were talking about.

I want to bring on Fred Beach, Assistant Director of Energy Policy at the Energy Institute, University of Texas at Austin. Welcome to Science Friday. Thank you for having me. Glad to be here. Denise touched on automobiles, and that's one of the big changes happening in China, how people get from A to B, right? Is the automobile age hitting China now? It's more than hit.

I believe for the last few years running now, Chinese on an annual basis, buy more new automobiles than Americans do, which is kind of not an inauspicious goal to have or be number one in the world for. Does that mean that auto emissions, a lot of tailpipe pollution, is going to go up? It is going up, and particularly in the large urban areas. We think of a big city in the U.S. being a couple million people. They've got more than a dozen cities with more than 20 million people. So you can think of L.A. on steroids, and there are several cities like that in China. Are they trying to encourage the development of electric cars or alternative vehicles like that?

From what I've seen, I think so. I've visited several automobile manufacturers in China over the years, in particular B-Y-D is one of the largest, and I think they realize they need to, to electrify transportation to help mitigate their pollution problem going forward. And somewhat like solar PV, I think they want to kind of own that market space. As the world in general goes that way, I think they want to get ahead of the curve and be one of the leading suppliers globally and for themselves. And Denise said that one of the big issues of people adopting electric vehicles is not enough places to charge them. Is that an issue in China?

That is an issue. I mean, for the internal combustion engines, China has been imposing stricter and stricter emission standards. And so you no longer see emissions coming out of the tailpipes from the internal combustion engines. But in addition to that, you see a major transition, I think, to electric vehicles ranging from the small scooters, the two-stroke engines that used to spew black smoke out are gone. And they've been electrified, small truck-like devices that used to, be really dirty or excluded from the city and they're going electric. The power charging stations are being deployed now and you can charge your electric vehicle

with an app. So you just pay with your phone. But there's some concern that they need to build a lot more in order to support the electric vehicles they plan to build. Their target right now is over a million vehicles for 2018, electric vehicles and $7 million by 2025. So they're going into this big time. Our number 8447-248255

if you want to talk about clean energy and what China, how China is working on changing the way they make energy. You can also tweet us at Cy Frye, S-C-I-FRI. Fred, how much is China's electricity demand going up in step

with their economic growth? And can they meet it with switching to renewables? It's pretty much going up in lockstep, as we've seen in most developing countries during their industrialization area, energy use goes almost in lockstep with GDP growth. So if they're recording 6 to 7 percent per annum GDP growth, their energy use is going up 6 to 7 percent. And in fact, electricity goes up even a little bit higher.

We all want energy. We all want to use more energy. But what we really want is electricity because it's such a flexible form of energy to use. So their energy load growth is going up even faster than their GDP growth. And, Denise, where do Chinese leaders, President Xi and other? top officials stand on all this? Do they think renewables are the future? President Xi Jinping has made a commitment to a beautiful China, as he calls it. They have declared a war on air pollution, and they've committed China to peaking their carbon dioxide emissions by

2030 or sooner. In fact, if you look at the CO2 emissions from China over the last few years, they've actually been fairly constant. They grew extraordinary. fast over the previous decade or so and surpassed the United States as the largest emitter in 2006. But they're flat now. And in my conversations with government officials while I was there last week, there seems to be a fairly sizable debate as to whether they've already peaked or if the economy as it grows will lead to further increases.

Right now they have excess coal capacity and they have a moratorium on building coal-fired power plants at the moment. And they are going gangbusters on building solar PV and wind farms. So it's an open question. Yeah, well, let's talk about that a little bit. Fred, can you contextualize for us the move by the Trump administration to cut clean energy research with how China's leaders view clean energy? They're going in the opposite direction. It is kind of ironic, not just research within clean energy, but research, government-funded research in general. I mean, we've got over a hundred-year history in the U.S. of being very ardent supporters of government-funded basic research. So to cut that at all, let alone within the clean energy sector, is kind of, you know, it just

doesn't make sense. China is doing just the opposite. They understand the value of research and development, and a lot of money for that often does come from the government as opposed to the private sector. So I would say at the moment, if I had to characterize it too, I'd say they got it right. We're about to perhaps get it wrong. And Denise, I know you were just meeting with energy officials in China. And we just heard about the Trump administration putting a 30% tariff on solar panels. Is that going to do anything to the Chinese solar producers? Well, that's an interesting question. The perspective over there is that the world is their market. And they're looking outwards right now. And they say that the U.S. is less important to them

than we might think it might be. And that they'll be fine. The other thing they point out is that a 30% tariff, which is what has just been placed on imported solar panels, would take us back to prices in early 2016 because the price of solar panels has been dropping so fast that a 30% tariff may not appear as onerous domestically as if the prices, for example, were going up. So they think it may slow things in the U.S., uptake of solar in the U.S., but it won't be a big deterrent to them. Yeah, and I guess the people will get hurt in this country are the installers who will have to raise the price of their panels. Maybe you still feel. Well, it's kind of ironic, though, here in the U.S.

We've still got a 30% income tax credit on solar PV installation. So it's kind of odd that we put a solar, a 30% tariff on the panels. At the same time, we're handed back a 30% income tax credit for people who install them. And it's also interesting that both these, the tariff and the ITC, are four-year phaseouts over the next four years. They're almost in lockstep going down. Sounds very well thought out. It also seems very strange that there's this war on renewables here, as opposed to a war on air pollution there. I mean, if we're going back to dirty coal, we're really going backwards, whereas China is looking ahead, recognizing its past problems and developing an industrial policy that will make them a leader in the world on clean energy.

Well, that's another one that's ironic, then, when we say a war on coal and coal, I'm really not sure if it's a war on coal power plants or a war on coal production in the U.S. If it's a war on coal power plants or coal production may just turn into exports to China. Interesting. Our number 8447248255, let us go to Cincinnati. Robert, hi, welcome to Science Friday. Well, I don't know if you touched on this question already, but where is China getting the energy for the electric cars? and that we reach the tipping point where if there are more electric cars there, they will get in their sources from renewable sources,

and that will force the United States to do the same. Good question. Yeah. So right now, a lot of the power that they're getting for their electric vehicles is coming from coal, and that may increase in the short term their CO2 emissions from vehicles. But the longer term picture is much more promising, because if you have an electric vehicle, you can power, with renewable energy. And as they increase the fraction of their electricity supply that comes from renewables,

their electric vehicles will become cleaner and cleaner in terms of CO2 emissions, lower and less and less CO2 emissions. And what's this I hear about a floatovoltaic solar farm? I love that word. They've been around for a while. Japan, I think, was one of the leaders in developing those. It's just a method of instead of installing solar panels on a roof or some kind of solid structure. you basically install them on floats in a lake or a pond. It has a couple of benefits. It's not taken up land that can be wise used for agriculture. And two, solar panels do get hot when the sun is shining on them.

That decreases their efficiency during the daytime. And by having floating on top of the lake, that serves as a thermal sink that actually helps the back of the panel stay cool, keeps their efficiency more even. And there's actually a lot of aquaculture in China as well in these large ponds and lagoons. I don't think the particular case you're talking about was such as that. But, again, it gives a way to have actually dual use of land, or in this case, water surface for solar PV, electric generation, as well as aqua farming underneath. And I mentioned they've installed more wind power than the world's wind energy leaders, U.S., Germany, and India combined? I could believe that they've always been a huge consumer of their own wind turbine production.

Companies like Goldwind have actually had a hard time getting into the international market, so it was almost domestic demand that drove them. They've only in the last couple of years gotten to that state with solar. solar. Most all solar PV manufactured than China was exported over the years. And in a way, they used our markets to drive down the manufacturing cost and price, and now they're more, became their own internal consumer of their solar PV production. This is Science Friday from PRI, Public Radio International. Casey just joined us. We're talking about China and its energy future with Denise Mouserall, Professor of Environmental Engineering and International Affairs at Princeton,

and Fred Beach, insistent, Director of Energy Policy at the Energy. Institute, U.T. Austin. Our number 844-724-8255. Now, Denise, China, though, is bullish on nuclear power, right? So China is one of the only countries in the world that's currently still building new nuclear power plants. And that's another question that's open at this point as to whether they are going to go forward even more into nuclear. in the future or not. I was told that that's a very high-level decision that's likely to come down in the next couple of months. But there are certainly people there who see nuclear as a clean air pollution and CO2 free form of electricity, despite its drawbacks of what to do with radioactive waste and, of course, national security issues.

Here's a tweet from Taylor Haskins who says, you should mention that Tesla is all over the map in China, building more chargers all the time. is a worldwide phenomenon actually deserves to be noted, which I guess we just did. Have you seen any charging stations, Denise, and China? I did see the charging stations. I didn't see who was putting them in, but I did see them. And as I mentioned, they're cool in the way that you pay for the electricity with an app on your phone. It's all quite seamless.

Yeah. All right, let's go to Minneapolis. to Catherine. Hi, Catherine. Hi, Catherine. Hi, good morning. Home with the Super Bowl. I have a couple questions. Number one is renewable energy is great, but in China, we have seen reports about the hydro power being a problem because they flood environmentally sensitive areas, and villagers and farms are relocated often with unfavorable compensation terms. So, you know, what's the story with the renewable on the hydropower?

And the second question is, you hear about the electric power in the cities, but is this also going to be available in the countryside, in the rural areas? Do they have the charging stations and the vehicles out there? So I'll listen from the answer. Okay. Happy Super Bowl. Yeah. Denise? Sure. So hydropower does have environmental consequences.

Certainly flooding areas makes them vanish. putting up dams does change river ecosystems. So there is a cost there. On the other hand, it is air pollution and CO2-free form of electricity. And it's also an excellent form of energy storage, because with pumped hydro, as they call it, where you can pump water uphill back into the dam when you don't need it for electricity and let it out when you do need the electricity, it gives you a very inexpensive way of storing power. So that's very attractive.

As far as the electricity in the countryside goes, China is fully electrified. So there is electricity to almost every home in China, which is quite different than most developing countries. But the issue of where the charging stations are is real right now. They're not sufficient charging stations in the countryside for people to feel comfortable driving their cars long distances. but China is able to move extraordinarily fast on infrastructure development. And the expectation is that if they're pushing as part of their industrial policy development of electric vehicles, that they will go ahead and match that with deployment of more charging stations. They put their money where their mouth is instead.

We're going to take a break and come back and talk more with Fred Beach and Denise Mouserall. Our number 844-724-825. Lots of people want to talk about this. I see, I see we have a solar installer on the line. Maybe we'll talk to him about what he thinks of the solar panel issue. We'll be right back after the break. Stay with us. This is Science Friday.

I'm Ira Flato. We're talking this hour about China's growing energy needs, including its electric car market and power. We're coming from solar cells, other kinds of places with Denise Mouserall and Fred Beach. Our number 844-724-8255. Is this correct? Charles, are you there? Yes, sir.

Are you saying you living in China? Yeah, I'm in Arkansas on vacation, but yeah, I live in China. And what's your question? Well, in our apartments, you see all around people utilizing small personal energy devices, whether it's little solar panels or these things on the roof, so I'm not sure what they do. They're like water tanks in the sun. But the question is, are they doing anything about a fish,

in rooms. Like our apartment is basically a concrete room, no double-paid windows, and some of the doors, while they may look pretty, they don't completely seal. So in the wintertime, it is cold. So are they doing any research into holding this energy that they're consumed? Denise, Mouser-Rolling? So that's a good question. I have the same question. I don't have the answer. I noticed in the hotel I was staying in. It was a holiday in. It was very nice holiday in. But there was a lot of cold air that felt like it was coming through the exterior wall and the windows. And so I've asked the same question.

I'm not sure. They certainly seem like they have a lot of opportunity to improve their energy efficiency and building. Fred Beach, do you have any thoughts on? Same, just casual observation for visiting there. I mean, it is interested in a communist country. Obviously, they decide when the heat gets turned on in the winter and when the gets turned off in the spring. I'm usually there in March when it's starting to warm up. And the heat is still on.

you can't open a window or turn on the AC because it's not available. So, I mean, they do have that level of control. But, yeah, as far as building standards, I'd say it's pretty rudimentary in general. Let's go to the phones to Rochester, Minnesota this time. Mika, hi, welcome to Science Friday. Hi, thank you. Go ahead. I'm not sure if I've got a question or, I guess, a comment.

So China's put in more solar in the last year than the United States has ever put in. and they've got, of course, huge leader in wind and putting that in all the place. These power plants have an infrastructure cost, but once that's paid off, they get free fuel for their entire life. If the United States doubles down on fossil fuels, our electric rates are going to continue to go up because fossil fuels aren't getting any easier to get out of the ground. So I guess my concern is if their electric rates continue to fall with free fuel and ours continue to go up because the fuel gets more and more expensive, what's that going to mean for manufacturing? and the economy, and are we hampering ourselves for the next 10, 20, 30 years in those sectors?

My screener says you're a solar installer, is that correct? I am. Is it worrying you, then? It worries me a little bit. It worries me more from an economic standpoint, is, you know, us and any other business tries to stay in business and keep our costs down. if we're competing on a global scale with companies that pay half as much electricity as us, then that could be a real challenge. I tell you not to worry too much.

I don't see anybody in the U.S. who actually buys electricity doubling down on fossil fuels. We have a lot of political rhetoric in this country, but in general, the people follow the economics, and what you just stated is absolutely true. So most large commercial, industrial, and utilities in general are not double. down on fossil fuels, if anything, we're marching in the opposite direction. I live in a small town north of Austin where we're 100% renewable as a utility. So I would say that is still the macro trend in the U.S., and if anything, we've probably got a lead on China in going cleaner and less expensive in our fuel sources than they are.

I'm sorry, go ahead, Denise. I was going to say I do view this effort at the federal level to emphasize fossil fuels and coals as being a long-term handicap for the United States. I fear that the plans to cut funding for renewable energy research and development is a major disadvantage to long-term prospects in the U.S. because China will move in and will be left behind. We'll move in and do what? Move into selling renewable energy to the world. We'll move as the caller pointed. out to having, in the long-term, cheaper electricity with lower emissions of air pollution.

In the U.S., the Department of Energy had a report that I believe there's something like 60 million jobs in coal and over 200 million in solar right now. And so this idea that you could protect jobs by protecting coal, I think, is misguided. Well, I think it's not just misguided. It's wrong and unrealistic, so I don't really see an issue. But does China see it? It's interesting. you mentioned the studies that there is a vacuum here now, does China realize this and know it's going to move in?

And become a world leader. You know, we pulled out of the Paris Agreement. China said, hey, that was Sardicelli. Yes, it sees this as an opportunity. I think the U.S. pulling out is not going to deter China from moving forward with renewables. I think it has this new international trade plan called Belt and Road Initiative, where they are, planning to take advantage of a global vacuum left by the U.S., and they plan to expand trade on renewable energy and electric vehicles. That seems curious. I mean, we've pulled out of the Paris Accords yet our emissions are coming down year-on-year. China is still a part of the Paris Accords, but their agreement is to continue increasing emissions year-on-year.

So I don't see how we're giving up or going away from anything. All right. But we'll leave it right there because there's a lot more to talk about, and we'll take some other time to do that. We've run out of time. Denise Mouserol is Professor of Environmental Engineering and International Affairs at Princeton, and Fred Beach, Assistant, Director of Energy Policy at the Energy Institute at UT Austin Hookham Horns for you there. Have a great weekend. Thanks.

Thank you. Just a quick note, Denise Mouserol wanted to correct the figure she quoted during this segment. He says, according to the Department of Energy, 375,000 people work in solar and 160,000 in coal. So solar electricity generation employs twice as many people as coal power. The SciFRI Book Club will now come to order. Thank you. We've been reading Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which was published 200 years ago in 1818. And like any good book club, we've been asking for your thoughts, your discussion questions.

like, is Frankenstein good or bad as a, you know, as Victor Frankenstein as a scientist? What are the modern versions of Victor Frankenstein and his monster? So we would be asking you to think about that. And of course, we're really quite excited about all things Frankenstein. So we wanted to share. We opened up a telephone voicemail box for your comments. And to our surprise and delight, one of our book club members was a little more excited. Decided than most. Book Club producer Christy Taylor tells the story.

It begins with a name we would get to hear a lot. Tony Gonzalez, shot on Apple, California. Tony is a high school at New Technology High School in Northern California. And when we invited listeners to call us with their thoughts about Frankenstein, Tony decided to call in with a different request, help on his homework. We're doing a project in class, a reading chart in Frankenstein, and like, he doesn't mind helping me with it because I'm a little behind. as you can please call me back.

I appreciate that. Thank you. This chart he's talking about, it needs to cover symbolism, plot, motifs, all of that good high school English stuff. And he keeps asking us for days. Hey, Tony Azale. Shout out of California. This is day two. I still need a home.

Hey, it's Tony Gonzalez. You guys have not returned my calls, and I haven't asked for it. Oh, okay. This is day four, and you guys haven't called. I might go to another radio station and I believe they say seven or eight. Call me back. This is Tony Gonzalez, signing off. Tony, we are really, really sorry. To be honest, we didn't call back because it seemed like a prank.

Sometimes there was a laughter in the background, and we really probably wouldn't have been much help with your homework anyway. Luckily, it turned out Tony didn't really need us after all. So I finally caught up without your help because you wouldn't call me back. So we're actually going to be calling you later today, so expect my call you, okay? Two hours later, we got a call, plus about 50 others. Hello, my name is Isabel de Blois. Brandon Montel. Yeltschievous.

Amadowski. Yeah, another one. It turns out Tony Gonzalez's entire 10th grade English class was calling us. And each of them gave us a one to two minute statement about the themes that they saw in both Frankenstein and in modern life. We actually, in my community class, are reading Frankenstein and learning about the Industrial Revolution. And we're creating creatures that represent the ethical considerations of contemporary innovation. My class is just reflecting exactly what you're asking. Frankenstein and modern day scientists share many traits.

We get tunnel visions with the idea of progress rather than considering ethical dilemmas. With the rise of artificial intelligence, we never know when we could have the same thing happen in our own backyard. Originally created for better communication, people tend to distance themselves from each other by using their smartphones. What could have been a great technological advancement from the world only sent Victor's world into chaos. starting with the death of his brother William. We have used our intellectual ability to create horrible technologies, like weapons of mass destruction. iPhones or smartphones, for that matter. And it isn't until after he achieves his goal of creating a life that he thinks whether or not this is really the best idea for the world to be introduced to.

Thank you for letting me share my thoughts. And we were really impressed with these answers. Some of these were the same questions we've been debating ever since we started the book club, plus some that we haven't. And yeah, true to his promise, Tony also gave us a call. As humans, we're always making progress, whether it be in technology or science. But as we've seen in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and the Industrial Revolution, progress can lead to negative outcomes. Thank you for letting me share my thoughts. Tony G. signing off.

And that's how one classroom is handling the really complex ethical questions that we've been reading about in Frankenstein era. Producer Christy Taylor is here with me. Thanks for sharing the story, Christy. And we got to meet the English class, don't we? We sure do. after all those phone calls, we pretty much had to call Tony back. It would have been rude not to and hear more about his project. And he's actually joining us on the show today, along with his English teacher,

who should get credit for starting the entire thing himself. But we're not going to be spoiling anything about the book for Tony Harris class, are we? No, no, no. So they actually just turned in their Frankenstein projects yesterday. I got to see some samples, and the timing is really perfect for us to talk about it now. Wonderful. Thank you, Christy, for bringing us that story reader producer, Christy Taylor. And now without further ado, let's hear from the famous Tony G himself about his thesis.

Tony Gonzalez is a 10th grade student, New Technology High School in Napa, California. And also with him is Chris Bach, English teacher at New Technology High. Welcome to Science Friday, Tony and Chris. Thank you. I appreciate you having up on the air, I wrote. You're welcome. Tony, I'm sorry we didn't help with your assignment. Sounds like you got caught up in time, though. You did pretty well on your own.

How did it go? Well, yeah, it's fine, first of all, but thank you for just reaching out. It went good. I got caught up with my work, and we had a good final product. Yeah, we heard part of the statement from your voicemail, but I want you to tell us again what you think the biggest thing you really felt that Frankenstein taught us about progress. Well, what I saw was that progress, we're always making progress,

but it doesn't always lead to positive outcomes. So, like, in Frankenstein, I saw that Victor made a huge step for science just by animating this creature. But it also had its downsides, like, where it cost the lives of people, and it also ended up blackmailing Victor. Very interesting. You really did read the book very well. This is Science Friday from PRI, Public Radio International. Talking with a couple of Science Friday Book Club members.

Chris back, Frankenstein turned 200 years old this year. So why teach it in 2018? Why did you assign the book? Yeah, it's an interesting question, especially with sophomores. Frankenstein is a difficult read, and the language can be difficult. But what's interesting about Frankenstein is the thematic topics, nature versus nurture, knowledge, progress, the ethical considerations, and alienation. These are all themes and ideas that students today are thinking.

about in relation to themselves and the society of which they're apart. So it's so helpful for these students to read a text and see that these ideas have been things that people have been thinking about for hundreds of years, and it helps them better situate themselves and better understand how they can make a difference in their communities and in the future of the world. And, you know, we've been talking about how Mary Shelley was just a teenager, she was just 18 when she wrote the book. Absolutely.

Is that something your students could relate to? Yes, we have a lot of students who are, you know, in their own ways, like young victors. They, you know, grand ideas about the world and their place in it. And it's so exciting for them to be able to kind of learn about the ultimate origin story, both of the Frankenstein mythos, but also just of a novel. I mean, the creation of this or the writing of this story was so interesting. Tony, were you impressed of how an 18-year-old could have written a book like this? Yeah, I was really impressed.

because just looking at my writing and I'm looking and just imagining how in a few years, that was the age of Mary Shelley when she was writing this novel. Do you think this is a book that relates to your life at all? Yeah, I can see how I could relate that to my life. At first, I was really confused when I was reading this book, but now that I've understood it and I've read it all, I can see how I can relate this to my life. You know, one of the things that surprised me when I read the book for the first time, maybe it surprised you, is that, you know, we'd all seen the Frankenstein movies. This book is so much different, isn't it?

Yeah. I mean, were you surprised by that, too? Yeah, well, what I was telling my teacher was that I didn't realize that it was so dark at some point so that Victor had some dark moments in this story. Yeah, and Chris, did you realize that, too, when your students were reading it? Absolutely, and I think what's so interesting about reading Frankenstein with students is that, you know, a lot of them from television, movies, games, they have this certain perception of the story, and then to watch them as they kind of discover, you know, Robert Walton and that, you know, they're in the Arctic, and then, you know, learn more about Victor and the creation of the creature and then ultimately shift perspectives to the creature itself. it's such an interesting way for students to start to understand how they relate to the world and for them to think about the ethics of just how you treat each other and then how we kind of deal with science and progression as we look forward to the future

and some of the really cool innovations that are students focused on in this project. You know, we got a lot of students calling in. I guess all of your students, we haven't talked to all of them, they all talked about how it affected their lives. And we really did see that. I mean, the most obvious is with smartphones. Students today have a lot of experience using smartphones, and in one way or another,

it changes the behavior of how they interact with each other and with their parents in the community. That's really interesting. Thank you both for taking time to be with us today, Chris Spock, who's an English teacher at New Technology High School in Napa, California. Tony Gonzalez, thank you both for joining us. We also want to thank the whole class.

We had more than 50 students calling in. Wow, that was something. Thanks for joining us today. And you can check out more responses from Chris Box class on our website, ScienceFriety.com slash students. And we only have one more week left with Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. I've got some reading to do to finish it up. I got about halfway through,

and we're going to wrap up next Friday with author Elizabeth Bear, bioethesis, Josephine Johnston, and your questions and comments. And like Tony and his classmates, you can call. all our voicemail at 567 243-2456. We especially want to air from students and young people this week. How does Frankenstein fit into the modern world and your modern life? That number again, 567-243-2456.

Also check out our book club at ScienceFriiday.com slash book club and join the newsletter and additional reading all about it. Charles Berkwurst, our director, senior producer Christopher Taliatta. Alexa Lim, our associate producers, Christy Taylor and Katie Heiler, technical engineering from Rich Kim, Sarah Fishman, and Jack Harwitz. And, of course, we're all over all week of Science Friday now. So we have to say goodbye. We'll see you next week.

I'm Ira Flato in New York.