Earthquake alert app buys critical time for California cities

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A new early warning system helped save lives as a powerful earthquake hit California’s northern coast Tuesday morning, officials told the Los Angeles Times.

Two elderly people were killed in the violent quake and 12 were injured. The newspaper reported that warnings reached about 3 million people just 10 seconds before the intense shaking began.

This was enough time for many people to get down to the ground or to a place of safety – even when the quake hit the walls of homes and knocked out power for thousands of residents.

“The system worked as well as we hoped, and we’re working on designing it,” Mark Gilarducci of the California governor’s office of emergency services told reporters, according to the Times.

The ShakeAlert mobile app — a USGS product — sends users who may be in danger an immediate notification advising them to “Drop, cover, wait. Protect yourself,” according to the paper.

The Northern California earthquakes’ may be the biggest real event we’ve ever seen [for the system] So far, Robert DeGroote of ShakeAlert’s operations team told The Times.

The system does exactly what it should be. That’s really a huge success for us,” DeGroot added.

But while warnings limited loss of life, the earthquake still damaged major bridges, water lines, and power lines.

More than 13,000 residents of Humboldt County, California, were left without power Wednesday afternoon in the aftermath of a massive 6.4-magnitude earthquake — about 18 percent of those who lost power, according to tracking website PowerOutage.us.

The Associated Press reported that many small communities were relying on portable toilets and boiled or bottled water because of the damage to their drinking water.

Welcome to Equilibrium, we are Saul Elbin and Sharon Odasen.

Today we’ll see why an upcoming arctic storm could come with an increased risk of carbon monoxide poisoning, followed by a look at how unprepared California nursing homes may be to handle wildfire emergencies. Plus: why those in the market for an electric car might want to buy one too soon.

The “bomb cyclone” increases the risk of carbon monoxide death

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) warned on Wednesday that an upcoming winter storm set to hit the central United States could also increase the risk of carbon monoxide deaths.

Kill in minutes: The so-called “bomb tornado” is expected to bring heavy snow, below-freezing temperatures and dangerous wind chills.

Conditions like these that can lead to power outages and increased use of portable generators, according to the CPSC. Portable generators pose risks [carbon monoxide] CPSC said in a statement that was also circulated before the storm last week.

Why is carbon monoxide so deadly? The agency explained that carbon monoxide, also known as CO, is an “invisible killer” because of its colorless and odorless nature.

People exposed may pass out before experiencing symptoms of nausea, dizziness, weakness – and sometimes death.

Weather update: The storm is expected to cause these hazards as a strong high-pressure system in the Arctic “dives south” toward the Central Plains on Wednesday, the National Weather Service (NWS) said.

The severe winter storm will produce “a large number of weather hazards” and generate “life-threatening wind chills”. Temperatures are poised to drop 20 degrees Fahrenheit or more in a few hours.

Happy Holidays: “What better way to mark the official start of an astronomical winter than with the many winter weather hazards affecting the majority of the nation,” stated the NWS.

Wind chill hazards can drop to -70 degrees Fahrenheit in parts of the central high plains. Meanwhile, widespread wind chills below zero could extend as far south as Texas.

And carbon monoxide relationship? These hazardous conditions are likely to lead to an increase in power outages and generator usage, which the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) confirmed would lead to a sharp rise in incidents of carbon monoxide poisoning.

Approximately 85 consumers died annually from 2011 to 2021 in the United States from carbon monoxide poisoning from portable generators, according to CPSC data.

What can he do? In the event of a power outage, the CPSC has recommended that you refrain from running a portable generator inside the home, garage, basement, crawlspace, or shed.

Portable generators should only operate outside, at least 20 feet from the home, with exhaust directed away from the building. Only portable generators that have an automatic safety feature that shuts off in the event of high carbon dioxide levels should be used.

To see more storm preparedness tips from the CPSC, please click here.

You may want to buy that electric vehicle now

The Associated Press reports that Americans looking to buy an electric vehicle (EV) may want to hit up a dealership between January 1 and March.

During that short window, electric vehicles assembled in North America—using battery minerals mined and refined outside the region—could qualify for the $7,500 tax credit offered by the Inflation Control Act.

After March, most “if not all” electric vehicles will not qualify for the full credit, according to the Associated Press. The Inflation Control Act extended the electric vehicle tax credit beyond its previous quota-based limits that made car buyers from companies like Ford, Toyota and Tesla ineligible for credits.

But there’s a catch: The clean energy stimulus package includes a controversial requirement. To qualify for the full tax credit, electric vehicle battery components must have been produced and assembled in the United States

This measure is intended to accelerate the development of the domestic battery industry, but it is one that few, if any, American manufacturers can currently cater to. To take one example, GM expects buyers to get only $3,750 — half the total — once the rules take effect.

Brief pause: The Treasury Department announced earlier this week that it will need until March to finalize rules that oversee where battery components must be sourced to receive the full federal tax credit.

For now, that “would allow some consumers to get an electric vehicle a little cheaper than they might have otherwise,” Chris Harto, an analyst who covers transportation for Consumer Reports, told the Associated Press.

Brands beware: While more electric vehicles may qualify for discounts, auto dealers may increase prices to cover the difference — which means customers need to be careful they’re actually getting a deal, Harto told the Associated Press.

He added, “The electric vehicle market has had limited supply and I don’t expect that to change in the next couple of weeks, so that’s the real risk – that this extra tax credit is eaten up by dealer pricing.”

What shocked researchers from university textbooks

Climate change may be a crisis — but that’s not what college-level biology textbooks portray, according to a study released Wednesday.

The amount of school real estate devoted to climate change has increased steadily since the 1990s, according to the paper published in PLoS. But during that same period, that material moved even further into the back of books, becoming increasingly detached from practical solutions, the scientists found.

“We were shocked that textbook paragraphs dealing with climate change have remained so short, even in recent decades, and that coverage of solutions has actually declined,” North Carolina State University researchers said in a statement.

“The information in these textbooks educated generations. The minimal amount of content related to climate change reflects how little value the subject has,” they added.

Read the rest of the story here.

Nursing homes in fire zones are poorly equipped: a study

A new study finds that California nursing homes located in areas with wildfire risks are less prepared for emergencies than facilities without such risks.

Sadly unprepared: Despite being located in fire-prone areas, these nursing homes show relatively poor compliance with Medicare’s emergency preparedness standards, according to the study, published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Association.

“Emergency preparedness in nursing homes must be commensurate with local environmental hazards to ensure the safety of residents,” a statement from the magazine read.

Vulnerable to fire: Yale researchers investigated homes that received certification from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and were located within 5 kilometers (3.1 miles) of an area at risk from wildfires.

Of the 1,182 identified facilities, the authors then determined that 495 were considered ‘exposed’ and 687 were ‘not at risk’. They defined exposed as those homes with a “moderate” to “very high” wildfire risk, using designations from the California State Bureau of Fire Forces.

How unprepared were they? The authors found that exposed facilities had a greater percentage of at least one shortfall in emergency preparedness — 83.9 percent versus 76.9 percent.

The total number of emergency preparedness deficiencies also tends to be higher for exposed facilities than for uncovered locations. California nursing homes were probably deficient in their use of emergency systems and backup power.

This is particularly problematic: Blackouts are directly linked to negative outcomes among residents of nursing homes, according to the study.

The authors stressed that many of these individuals depend on electrical healthcare equipment and struggle to tolerate temperature fluctuations.

Opportunity for improvement: “Our study suggests that there may be opportunities to better align nursing home emergency preparedness with local wildfire risk,” said first author Natalia Vista, of Yale University School of Medicine, in a statement.

To see how Festa and colleagues recommend resolving these issues, please click here to read the full story.

Wed Wildlife

Animals prepare for the winter storm with life-saving naps, the dangers of selling turtles online, and how a federal spending bill threatens whales.

Wild animals also prepare for the extreme cold

As an arctic storm prepares to batter the Rocky Mountains the next day, outdoor news site OutThere Colorado explores how wild animals are adapting to protect themselves from the dangerous cold. Their actions — such as entering a temporary hibernation phase — allowed them to survive “outdoors on their own for millions of years without human intervention,” a parks official told OutThere Colorado.

Online sellers fail to disclose that baby turtles cannot legally be sold as pets

Baby turtles cannot legally be sold as pets due to the risk of spreading salmonella infection, but about half of all online retailers fail to provide information about the law or the disease, according to a new study in PLoS ONE. The authors noted that children are particularly at risk because of their tendency to put things in their mouths. The January 6 Commission released transcripts of the first 34 witness testimonies. Five major moments from Zelensky’s speech to Congress

Maine lawmakers are seeking to quietly repeal rules protecting whales

And according to the Washington Post, an appropriation in the government budget could sacrifice Atlantic right whales for Maine lobstermen. “It’s not an exaggeration to say that this rider will condemn the right whale to extinction,” said a representative for Defenders of Wildlife, referring to language that excludes lobsters from following new federal laws about the use of lobster traps.

Please visit The Hill’s Sustainability section online for more information and to view our other newsletters here. OK see you tomorrow.

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