Pollution Control

Environmentalists and industry representatives pleaded their case with federal regulators Tuesday over rules that would slash toxic emissions from cement kilns, the top source of mercury emissions in California. The Environmental Protection Agency issued proposed regulations for Portland cement kilns earlier this year, after more than a decade of pressure from environmental groups.

reporting from washington President Obama moved on two fronts Monday to force automakers to produce more fuel-efficient vehicles, including a major step in permitting California and other states to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. Lawmakers and environmentalists said the president's actions paved the way to development of a national carbon standard for automobiles. Such a standard already is in force in Europe and Japan.

It sounded like a good deal: The Port of Los Angeles offered to pay $20,000 incentives as part of its Clean Trucks Program, launched Oct. 1 in conjunction with the neighboring Long Beach port to reduce pollution from trucking fleets serving the harbor. That sent Vic La Rosa into overdrive. The owner of Total Transportation Services Inc.

In a victory for independent truckers, a federal judge on Wednesday blocked part of a program to cut diesel emissions by phasing out 17,000 old big rigs at the nation's busiest port complex. U.S. District Judge Christina Snyder's preliminary injunction halted some new rules, including one that prohibits drivers at the Port of Los Angeles from being independent contractors. That was a provision sought by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

Docked in Long Beach on Wednesday with a fresh load of oil from Valdez, the Alaskan Navigator didn't look like much of a trailblazer. The massive tanker sat silently, with a few thin cables draping down to some gray metal boxes. Missing was the incessant rumble of diesel engines, which on an average cargo ship would be running constantly to keep electrical systems going -- burning quite a bit of diesel fuel and generating a significant amount of pollution.

The standing joke about the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach used to be that they were like the diesel version of elephant graveyards: the place where old trucks went to die. But lately, they have become a proving ground for technology that produces little or no pollution. On Tuesday, the first of 25 heavy-duty all-electric trucks rolled off a new Los Angeles assembly line. All are slated to work at the Port of Los Angeles or to make short hauls to and from the harbor.

If regional water quality officials approve a proposed ban on septic systems in central Malibu as expected, residential property owners in the affected area would be on the hook for $1,000 a month to pay for a centralized wastewater treatment system, city officials said Monday. Commercial property owners benefiting from the treatment system could be required to lay out significantly more, the city said. Malibu said in a statement that such a system would cost $52 million, more than three times the $16.7-million projection that the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board has suggested at recent community workshops.

Facing forecasts of wet weather that could flush tons of urban trash out to sea and onto local beaches, Los Angeles County authorities scrambled Thursday to reinstall a boom across the outlet of the Los Angeles River to keep debris out of Long Beach Harbor. The boom had been decommissioned Monday because the county Department of Public Works ran out of money to keep it operating.

The Western Climate Initiative, touted as a model for national global warming legislation, will strain the region's electricity grid and prolong the economic recession, a business group asserted Tuesday. The initiative was launched in September by seven Western governors, including California's Arnold Schwarzenegger, and four Canadian provincial premiers. It seeks to slash regional greenhouse gas emissions by about 15% below 2005 levels in the next 12 years.

In the latest step in its green offensive, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is launching a Web-based tool to help identify new ways to make its operations more environmentally friendly. Cleantech Group, a small Michigan company that links inventors of sustainable technologies with investors, will solicit ideas for Wal-Mart to address such diverse problems as the reuse of vegetable fats from the retail giant's deli fryer and more efficient batteries for the company's thousands of forklifts.