Office of Audits, Office of Inspector General, U.S. General Services Administration A201018/P/4/R2308. Audit of GSA’s Response to COVID-19: PBS Faces Challenges to Meet the Ventilation and Acceptable Indoor Air Quality Standard in GSA-Owned Buildings. GovExec: “The federal government’s landlord has struggled to maintain air quality standards in its buildings thus putting occupants at risk for… Continue Reading
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Category Archives: Environmental Law
Google Flood Hub
“Flood Hub – “How it works – Flood Hub provides Google’s flood alerts to the general population. If you are in a flood prone area, open Flood Hub and see the current flood information in your area. If not, open Flood Hub, zoom out/in to find your area of interest and see the relevant flood… Continue Reading
Is That Climate Change? The Science of Extreme Event Attribution
CRS, Is That Climate Change? The Science of Extreme Event Attribution. June 1, 2023: “Climate change attribution is the study of whether, or to what degree, human influence may have contributed to extreme climate or weather events. Scientists can now estimate whether human activities have influenced extreme weather or climate events and changed how likely… Continue Reading
World Energy Investment 2023
MIT Technology Review: “The world saw about $2.8 trillion of investments in energy in 2022, with about $1.7 trillion of that going into clean energy…” See also: “The report provides a global benchmark for tracking capital flows in the energy sector and examines how investors are assessing risks and opportunities across all areas of fuel… Continue Reading
Safe and just Earth system boundaries
Rockström, J., Gupta, J., Qin, D. et al. Safe and just Earth system boundaries. Nature (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06083-8 [free PDF download] “The stability and resilience of the Earth system and human well-being are inseparably linked yet their interdependencies are generally under-recognized; consequently, they are often treated independently. Here, we use modelling and literature assessment to quantify… Continue Reading
‘Stars to completely disappear from night skies’
The News: “Scientists warn that, in 20 years time, humans may not be able to see a starry sky at night at all due to increasing light pollution. British astronomer Martin Rees, while talking with The Guardian, said that light pollution conditions have “rapidly worsened” over the past few years, quite significantly since 2016 when… Continue Reading
Google Flood Hub is expanding to 80 countries
Google Blog: “Natural disasters, like flooding, are increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change, threatening people’s safety and livelihood. It’s estimated that flooding affects more than 250 million people globally each year and causes around $10 billion in economic damages. As part of our work to use AI to address the climate crisis,… Continue Reading
The Supreme Court Is Hiding Important Decisions From You
Politico: “As the Supreme Court begins to release its written opinions from its most recent term, much of the public’s attention is focused on high-profile cases on affirmative action, election law and environmental regulation. But according to Stephen Vladeck, a professor at the University of Texas Law School, this narrow focus on the most headline-grabbing… Continue Reading
Parking Reform Network
“The Parking Reform Network, a US-based nonprofit that aims “to discourage the building of too much parking supply,” has compiled a map and dataset of ~1,400 relevant local mandates. They focus on policies that reduce or eliminate minimum parking requirements for new developments, or set maximums. For each mandate, the dataset provides a summary and… Continue Reading
USDA Climate Hubs Go Global
“For more than a decade, USDA’s Climate Hubs has been at the forefront of supporting climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts for U.S. farmers, ranchers, and forest landowners. Last week, the department significantly boosted its efforts globally, by launching the International Climate Hub. The new hub builds on the experience with 10 regional Climate Hubs… Continue Reading
6 Facts About How Bees Learn, Think and Make Decisions
Hos Stuff Works: ” As trees and flowers blossom in spring, bees emerge from their winter nests and burrows. For many species it’s time to mate, and some will start new solitary nests or colonies. Bees and other pollinators are essential to human society. They provide about one-third of the food we eat, a service… Continue Reading
Turning off the Tap: How the world can end plastic pollution and create a circular economy
UN Environment Programme – Turning off the Tap: How the world can end plastic pollution and create a circular economy – The report proposes a systems change to address the causes of plastic pollution, combining reducing problematic and unnecessary plastic use with a market transformation towards circularity in plastics. This can be achieved by accelerating three… Continue Reading
