Newtok, Alaska, is one of the first places to dramatically feel the effects of increasing global energy consumption, as temperature shifts, storm surges and a melting permafrost chip away at the infrastructure of a community of nearly 350 on the state’s central west coast.

 During a window-rattling storm there Friday, July 3, I crossed paths with Stanley Tom, tribal administrator for the Newtok Traditional Council and the driver on finding funding to make the village's move to higher ground a reality.

Fifty mph winds, persistent rains and slapping waves on the broadening Ninglick River were keeping most of the Yupiit inside their modest wooden homes as rows of drying fish outside struggled to hang on. But I had made it to the TC office, looking for information on the (delayed) incoming flights for me and Anna York to board now that our reporting work had concluded for the week.

Stanley popped in, shook off, asked for confirmation on the day's top Alaskan news, the surprise resignation of Gov. Sarah Palin, and then said to me, “You know, nobody has ever documented a storm like this here before.”

This was a storm that had been raging all morning and into the early afternoon on these wetlands near Baird Inlet, battering the shoreline that has seen devastating erosion over the last 10-20 years, bringing residents to routinely describe the vast changes they have seen in the landscape (Return to this site soon for our full report on this aspect.).

So when Stanley made that observation, I heard it as a challenge to my journalistic duty. I pushed my way back to our rental housing on the eastern end, along the broken and now slick boards of the maze of wooden sidewalks that keep walkers and ATVers above the soggy ground.

I wrapped my video camera in its rain gear, outfitted with furry microphone wind cover, and mounted it to a carbon fiber tripod that I feared would not stand up well to the rigors of the crosswinds. I darted straight out to the one spot where I could reach a view of the coast without waders, fortunately only about 150 yards from the house.

A spry Alaskan malamute with one brown eye and one blue who had been following me for a few days as I moved about the village, appeared, just one of the hardy survivors unfazed by conditions in this treacherous part of the country. It was one thing to see a work dog out in the rain, but I did not expect when I came back near the closest row of houses that I would encounter two friendly residents of Newtok, curious what I was up to, and happy to endure the whipping winds to talk to me on camera!

With this short video, get a feel for the type of weather event that happens even in summer near the Arctic Circle, with more regularity now than ever—likely human-caused climatic chaos.

(Note to self: Next time carry a chamois!)

Is giant cane (Arundo donax) likely to become an important next-generation biofuel?

Arundo grows rapidly—as many as 3 inches a day in the summer—which may mean its cellulosic, woody makeup is ideal as a non-food biomass for producing fuels. Yet along southern state waterways, where cane sucks up resources and shuts out other species, state botanical departments, the USDA—even Homeland Security—are hunting for ways to control the plant's tenacious habit of spreading.

Can the perennial grass known for yielding saxophone reeds in its native Mediterranean (notably Var, France) get past its status in the U.S. as a noxious weed? Tensions around using an invasive species as a feedstock for biofuel can quickly be found.

To understand the potential for Arundo as a biofuel, I visited a field research lab at University of Texas at Austin. In central Texas, the desert conditions are hospitable to cane. It can be seen in clumps along riparian environments such as Town Lake and Shoal Creek, the Colorado River, even along roadsides. Some confuse it with corn, though its bright green stalks and drooping leaves tower up to 30 feet tall.

It is far less abundant here than along the Rio Grande River, but when the USDA called upon Brackenridge Field Laboratory (BFL), to propagate a tiny wasp that can weaken the reed, they built a new greenhouse and lined up rows of small potted cane plants. BFL—known for its work with biocontrol of fire ants—is situated near patches of Arundo, convenient for technician Jay Falk (above) to collect offshoots and rhizomes and bring them back to the greenhouse. The Tetramesa romana is a parasite to Arundo; the wasp produces galls, or swellings in the plant tissue, when it deposits its eggs in the stalk. The larvae develop, wasps emerge, and the cycle continues. Good for the wasp, bad for the cane.

While making a video report for Powering A Nation, I spied the 6 mm parasite just once (it is a slow time for the lab), but not while the camera was rolling. "They are horrible fliers," Falk said. "They seem to just bob around."

Falk's job is the mass rearing of these insects—the more galls he can produce, the more wasps he can ship to southern Texas to be released among the acres of Arundo. "It can't be eradicated. If you cut it down, it grows back, healthier than ever. But through biocontrol, we can weaken the plant," Falk said.

Sounds like something that might interest those banking on biofuels.