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Senator CASE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for letting me interrupt. I thank you, sir. You are a fascinating witness. There is no question

about that.

Dr. NEWELL. Thank you.

SST FUEL PROBLEM

I should like to make one additional side comment on the pollution problem. We have to look at not just the pollution introduced by the SST alone, but the possible pollution introduced by the additional effects necessary to achieve the fuel necessary for the SST.

We have talked rather glibly for a long time about the SST fuel use. If one takes the numbers put out by the FAA or Boeing, and one uses 28,000 pounds of fuel per hour, per engine, then one could very easily calculate on the back of an envelope that this requires about 340 million barrels of fuel per year.

This is perhaps 20-percent accuracy. We can compare that with the present jet fuel production which is, taking numbers out of a newspaper, somewhere between 200 million and 250 million barrels per

year.

So the future SST requirements for fuel will exceed the present jet uses. If we look at the various countries with which we have been concerned about the problem over the last few weeks on oil prices, what is the value of how much are they producing per day?

Just taking these out of the press, New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, Indonesia produces .9 million barrels per dav; Libya, 3.2 million; Algeria and Iraq, 2.4 million; Venezuela. 3.7 million. Our total oil just is about 14 million barrels per day and West Europe's is about the same.

W have discussed building a pipeline from Alaska with all its environmental consequences. The amount involved is about 2 million barrels per day. We plan to use for the SST about 2 million barrels per day.

The SST could actually use all of the new production from Alaska. We have been made aware of the additional environmental problems connected with this by the debate about whether we should use a pipeline or ships and so on. I think we should also ask whether this additional jump in the demand for oil is going to put the prices up

even more.

I am interested in this as a homeowner. I think a lot of people are. There has been growing evidence of the squeeze on oil supply and prices in the past few months. One point about which I feel strongly is the rate of use of natural resources. It has gone too high over the past few years.

FUEL RESERVES

Our proved reserves in the United States are about 30 billion barrels. We use about 5 billion barrels per year. If we take the five and divide it into 30, we have a time of about 6 years.

If we go to the globe, the proved reserves are about 600 billion barrels, and if we take a global prediction use rate of about 17 billion, we get about 35 years. This number has not increased over the past 5 or 10 years, this number of 35 years ahead.

In addition, not only are we planning to use fuel this way, but we are planning to use it on an ever-increasing scale for the plastics industry.

A lot of people would argue that this is as beneficial use as burning it. In fact, people in the plastics industry would argue that.

GLOBAL POLLUTION PROBLEM

In this respect, I want to make one comment from my article in the "Scientific American." I had occasion last year at the invitation of the Department of Management at MIT to give a summary of the global pollution problem to some 100 executives in the country that came to MIT for a 2-day symposium on air pollution.

As part of that, the article that I have in the January "Scientific American" was written, because of that, because I was asked to give that summary.

My closing comment was that I must mention in closing that one cannot take the global view of pollutants without feeling some concern about the rate of use of natural resources and the rate of generation of pollutants. Both could be slowed down considerably by a serious effort to use every pound of fuel in the most efficient manner possible.

MEASURE OF EFFICIENCY PER GALLON OF FUEL

I want to quote for the record the measure of efficiency in terms of passenger-miles obtained per gallon of fuel which was produced in the February issue of the review of the MIT Alumni Journal. A double-decker suburban train, 200; buses, 120; cars, 15 to 30; 707, 21; 747, 22, a little better.

The projected numbers used by this professor whose name is quoted for the SST was 13.6 passenger-miles per gallon, which meant that that was the most inefficient use of fuel in terms of passenger-miles per gallon.

The claims on the DOT budget this year, which are published every month or so in "Railway Age," are right now running at about $2 billion, whereas, for the most efficient rail transit systems the funds available for the next 2 years, and I think it is the latest number, though I think $600 million was appropriated for this year, are $400 million, allocated by the Bureau of the Budget.

There was a shortfall there. According to this table, the rail transit is the most efficient use of fuel. The SST is the most inefficient.

Yes we find that the public sector of the economy, local governments coming to Washington backed by local citizens, are pursuing a policy of natural resources and minimization, of global pollution, whereas the private sector is asking that funds be spent at the opposite end of the scale.

POLLUTION INCREASE RELATED TO RESOURCE DEPLETION

The final point I want to make may seem a little out of place. In a sense it is a comment on global pollution problems which comes essentially from Professor Forrester of MIT, its rate of use of resources and its relationship with global pollution problems, popula

tion, capital investment and quality of life. He presented this testimony to the House Banking Committee last October and some of you may have read it in the record.

He applies systems dynamics based upon computer modeling to study the change with time of these five factors. There are clear interactions between the factors. Pollution increases as rate of natural resource depletion increases and quality of life goes down. There are obvious interactions here, but many of the interactions are more subtle and Professor Forrester shows it is not always the short-run action that leads to optimum long-run conditions. His work raises serious questions about the desirability of across-the-board technological progress at the present rate and in his analysis he finds growth conditions we have been having for the past number of years can give way to an equilibrium situation (constant population, high quality of life, and constant pollution). One of the prerequisites of the equilibrium change to growth is that the natural resources be used at a lower rate than the present.

I would respectfully suggest that all those concerned with political decisionmaking consider his arguments and discuss them. It is quite possible, as I outline here, that a more efficient use of the funds could lead to an improvement in the quality of life for a larger number of people and I am sure you heard this argument before.

UNEMPLOYMENT AND AIRLINE ECONOMICS

I would make one additional comment which I don't make in here and which is often brought to scientists who talk about pollution in the stratosphere. People say you are arguing against jobs. I say I am not arguing against jobs. This is not the issue of my testimony, as I am sure you all know.

I would like to quote one sentence from a statement by Mr. Halaby in which he was discussing this morning the airline economics. He said to the reporter, discussing last year's results when Pan American made a loss of $48 million, that another major factor was a substantial increase in interest expense to $46 million last year from $26 million in 1969. Pan American has been adding to its overall debt level largely to finance its fleet of Boeing 747 Jumbo jets, each of which carries a $23 million price tag.

This is pertinent to the previous testimony about the rate of improvement of transportation systems perhaps being too great. This is related directly to Professor Forrester's argument, one is if the airlines, having taken Professor Forrester's view would have made this investment 3 years previously. One other item brought to me in discussing pollution is the item which came up earlier in the discussion this afternoon. This is the last item and then I will make a closing paragraph.

RAIL TRANSIT: RUSSIA VIS-A-VIS UNITED STATES

We don't want to be behind the Russians. One of the comments that I can't help making to people in discussing rail transit, and it has been made by others, too, that we are rather a long way behind the Russians in rail transit. If you look at the Russian capital investment for 1971 in rail transit you find that it is $3.2 billion in equivalent

dollars. The United States is $1.8 billion. They are building 255 miles of new mainline this year. We have built over here roughly 620 new mainlines which is a big step in the minimization of pollution if one now accepts the fact that the latest in technology can remove sulfur from the powerplant stack and this is being done in several places throughout the country.

So, to finish that table, the miles of U.S. electrification for comparison was 7 miles. The U.S.S.R. expects a billion passenger miles, 140 billion passenger miles this year and we expect ten.

The point is we have accepted, in some areas, the second place. I am very unhappy that we have accepted second place in this particular item, not because I don't like flying. I have traveled to Argentina nonstop on Mr. Halaby's airlines and I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. It gave me a delightful opportunity to see the large scale global circulation, a 5,500 mile flight nonstop from New York to Argentina. I think a number of us enjoy going to a space science meeting to argue about the upper atmosphere many years ago.

REMOVAL OF POLLUTANTS: TROPOSPHERE AND ATMOSPHERE

My closing statement-I have discussed the delicacy of the balance between solar radiation, chemical constituents, reactions, infrared radiation, and this is the main thrust of my statement here plus the fact that a troposphere can remove pollutants whereas the stratosphere cannot and this should be understood before any long-term changes are made.

OPPOSITION TO TECHNICAL DEVELOPMENT

My position on this is I oppose all technological developments which will ultimately introduce qualities of materials into the stratosphere large enough to influence the natural balance. To my knowledge, the SST program is the first of man's efforts which have involved sufficiently large amounts of material to be comparable to large amounts involved and could be avoided by deliberate action now.

Carbon dioxide introduction is not actually presently necessary for survival, whereas SST development is not.

That statement does not preclude development of closed cycle systems for stratospheric transport as came out in the discussion with Senator Magnuson and that obviously falls outside of that statement. I add that parenthetically as something which is not in the record. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

EFFECT OF VAPOR INJECTIONS IN ZONE ON RADIATION ON EARTH

Chairman ELLENDER. What effect on the ozone would injections of vapor in the stratosphere have on solar radiation in relation to the earth's surface?

Mr. NEWELL. One can do a straight forward calculation to show that shortest wave lengths of the solar radiation which normally penetrate to the earth, there would be an increase in the intensity of the shortest wave lengths which penetrate down towards the surface so this is the region of the spectrum between 2,900 angstroms and 3,000 angstroms. The region that is normally cut off if we reduce ozone wouldn't be cut off so much, so the intensities of those wave lengths will increase.

EFFECT OF DECREASE OF OZONE

Chairman ELLENDER. What effect will it have on temperature? Is that your concern?

Mr. NEWELL. No.

Chairman ELLENDER. Is it radiation?

Mr. NEWELL. No, this is not the point of this particular comment. There have been some claims if we increase ultraviolet to the surface we will increase skin cancer. I say that is outside the realm of my competence. I am saying if we do decrease ozone, we will increase UV at the surface. My concern in decreasing ozone is we would change the radiated heating rate in the stratosphere.

Chairman ELLENDER. What effect would that have on the earth? Mr. NEWELL. As far as ozone is concerned, we don't know without going through this complicated dynamic model. As far as the particles are concerned, we can say what happened in the case of previous volcanic eruptions. That is the closet analogy on earth when there was extra heating in the stratosphere there was extra cooling in the troposphere.

Perry Wexler, former Director of Research for the U.S. Weather Bureau, proposed a theory which you heard before, a theory of climatic change which suggested that volcanos put in extra gases or particles into the stratosphere which increased the heating in the stratosphere, but which decreased the heating rate at the surface of the earth, thereby leading to colder temperatures at the surface of the earth.

There was obvious evidence after the volcano in 1913 or 1914, because that was known in the records here as the year without a summer. The temperaatures were much colder. This was a case where fairly large amounts of gas or particles are introduced into the stratosphere. Although it is heating at the high levels, it is cooling at the low levels.

POLLUTION RETARDANTS

Chairman ELLENDER. You agree if any damage is to come from this in the future, it might be possible to modify an engine to reduce the vapor?

Mr. NEWELL. My informants in the mechanical engineering department tell me it is completely impractical. The mass involved is too large and the economics, the range would be so much shortened that it would be disastrous for the range problem.

So, I have not had an independent mechanical engineer tell me this, but they said it was impractical to put a gadget on the engine to take out the water vapor.

EFFECT OF SST ON OZONE

Chairman ELLENDER. Are there any other questions?

Senator PROXMIRE. I would like to ask you is it conceivable the ozone could be reduced by 6 percent or 9 percent or 4 percent? Could you give us an estimate on what the reduction in the ozone would be based on the assumption you would have 500 supersonic transports flying in roughly the same air corridors?

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