NPR: ” When a group of engineers and researchers gathered in a warehouse in Mukilteo, Wash., 10 years ago, they knew they were onto something big. They scrounged up tables and chairs, cleared out space in the parking lot for experiments and got to work. They were building a battery — a vanadium redox flow… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: Climate Change
More than half of data deficient species predicted to be threatened by extinction
Borgelt, J., Dorber, M., Høiberg, M.A. et al. More than half of data deficient species predicted to be threatened by extinction. Commun Biol 5, 679 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-022-03638-9 “The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species is essential for practical and theoretical efforts to protect biodiversity. However, species classified as “Data Deficient” (DD) regularly mislead practitioners due… Continue Reading
Mapping the Coolest Spots Inside the World’s Sweltering Cities
Bloomberg: “The cement, glass and steel that give shape to urban life have also turned modern cities into dangerous heat sinks. Scorching sunlight gets absorbed, stored and slowly emitted in a bubble of warmth that can push city temperatures as much as 3°C (5.4°F) above the surrounding countryside. This dynamic, combined with the increasingly extreme… Continue Reading
Open-source flight trackers have been repeatedly used to break news over the last few weeks
Vice: “More than 700,000 people were tracking the flight path of the U.S. military plane believed to be carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi this morning. She touched down in Taiwan at 10:50 pm local time, making Pelosi the first high-ranking American official to visit the self-governing island in 25 years, amid threats of a military… Continue Reading
The consciousness of bees
The Washington Post – “Experiments indicate that bees have surprisingly rich inner worlds…And now we are learning just how smart insects can be. As I show in my new book, “The Mind of a Bee,” the latest research indicates that even tiny-brained bees are profoundly intelligent creatures that can memorize not only flowers but also… Continue Reading
How flood maps can illuminate the risk from toxic waste sites
Fast Company: Climate science is clear: “Floodwaters are a growing risk for many American cities, threatening to displace not only people and housing but also the land-based pollution left behind by earlier industrial activities. In 2019, researchers at the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigated climate-related risks at the 1,571 most polluted properties in the… Continue Reading
The uneven energy costs of working from home
The Verge: “The COVID-19 pandemic has given us a sneak peek into how working from home changes electricity demand and what that might mean for Americans’ utility bills. The picture it’s painted so far isn’t very pretty, particularly for anyone who’s already struggling to meet their needs. The transition to remote work is changing our… Continue Reading
U.S. Will Plant One Billion Trees to Combat Climate Change
Smithsonian Magazine: “To help revitalize millions of acres of burned and damaged forests across the American West, the U.S. Department of Agriculture aims to plant more than one billion trees over the next decade. Wildfires and other issues have devastated U.S. woodlands in recent years, and Forest Service arborists can’t keep up with replanting lost… Continue Reading
Seven Key Provisions in the Climate Deal
Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 Summaries Inflation Reduction Act – One Page Summary Tax Summary Prescription Drugs Summary Energy Security and Climate Change Investments Summary Summary from the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Summary from the Committee on Environment and Public Works The National Law Review – Summary of the Inflation Reduction Act of… Continue Reading
NOAA tool now brings disaster risk, vulnerability down to community level
NOAA – “A comprehensive update to NOAA’s Billion Dollar Disasters mapping tool now includes U.S. census tract data – providing many users with local community-level awareness of hazard risk, exposure and vulnerability across more than 100 combinations of weather and climate hazards. The enhanced interactive maps from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) cover… Continue Reading
Trash or Recycling? Why Plastic Keeps Us Guessing
The New York Times – “…The universal symbol for recycling, known as the “chasing arrows” logo, is stamped on so many things. But that doesn’t mean they’re recyclable. Manufacturers can print the logo on just about any product. That’s because its main purpose isn’t to say whether it’s recyclable, but to identify the type of… Continue Reading
Biden Administration launches Heat.gov with tools for communities facing extreme heat
NOAA: “Today, the Biden Administration through the interagency National Integrated Heat Health Information System (NIHHIS) launched Heat.gov, a new website to provide the public and decision-makers with clear, timely and science-based information to understand and reduce the health risks of extreme heat. Heat.gov will provide a one-stop hub on heat and health for the nation… Continue Reading
