Subjects

Hot dam! The first beaver found in the city in 200 years finally has company after three years of solitude on the Bronx River.

A beaver named Jose is now sharing his life with another buck-toothed mammal - but the relationship is unclear.

"A companion, a friend, a mate, an associate - we don't know what it is," said Rep. Jose Serrano, for whom the first beaver was named after its discovery in 2007.

The White House is going solar after all - a home improvement that carries modest energy benefits but much larger symbolic importance.

It isn't the first time the White House has used solar energy. President Jimmy Carter put 32 solar panels on the roof in the late 1970s, but President Ronald Reagan removed them in 1986. Two grass-roots campaigns have recently been lobbying President Obama to restore them as a sign of his commitment to renewable energy.

WEST BRANCH -- Dan Stevenson stood in the back of the cottage where Iowa native and future President Herbert Hoover was born in August 1874.

He explained to visitors how Hoover's father, Jesse Hoover, built the two-room cottage in 1871 for him, his wife, Hulda, and their oldest child, Theodore.

It is a job that Stevenson, an eighth-grade American history teacher at West Liberty Middle School, said appealed to his love of history.

The newly developed CityCenter community in Las Vegas, Nev. recently added a piece of environmental art to its fine art collection. The 87-foot long, 3,700 pound sculpture hangs horizontally from steel cables above a registration desk. The sculpture depicts the Colorado River, complete with its meanders and swells at Lake Powell and Lake Mead. The sculpture was also made with environmentally conscious materials, being cast in reclaimed silver. It is aptly named "Silver River."

The sculpture’s artist, Maya Lin, reflects on her work by saying "Water is going to become more and more of a debate. I’m asking people to take a look at the natural world around them." Las Vegas’ major source of water is the Colorado River and with increasing droughts and demands for water, there is substantial concern that there will not be enough water to sustain the city in coming years.

This infusion of art and environmental consciousness is one of Lin’s trademarks. Growing up in Athens, Ohio during the 1970s, she was exposed to environmental issues at an early age. In 1969, the Cuyahoga River, located in Ohio, caught on fire as a result of its heavily polluted waters. This initiated a massive public response, making Ohio the focal point of national environmental awareness and legislation that would follow. In addition to her artistic pursuits, Lin also sits on the board of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Her other environmental projects include "Storm King Wavefield," an environmental reclamation project at the site of a former gravel pit in Mountainville, N.Y. For this project she created waves in a field by forming earth and grass mounds. Her more recent work, "What is Missing," is a multisite international project that focuses on habitats and species that are extinct or disappearing and provides information on ways to help protect the environment. The main element of the project is a giant megaphone that plays the sounds of endangered species.

Read the full article

Related Resources:

Using the Landscape to Create Works of Art (Visual Arts, The Arts)

Fractals in Nature and Art (Visual Arts, The Arts, Geometry, Algebra I, Mathematics)

Representations of the Natural World in Art (Visual Arts, The Arts, Social Studies, Language Arts)

Photo: Sam Morris, Las Vegas Sun

Fertilizer run-off and record high temperatures are causing unprecedented outbreaks of algae- known as the green tide- off the coast of Qingdao, China. Clean up crews are now scrubbing an area of about 150 mi sq.

"America’s Hottest Species," a report produced by the Endangered Species Coalition, provides information on 10 of the top endangered wildlife, fish and plants experiencing the impacts of climate change.

The list includes species or groups of related species that are listed as threatened or endangered under the Federal Endangered Species Act or are candidates for listing.

Climate change threatens these species through habitat reduction, increases in disease and lowering of reproduction.

The species making the list were:

1. Kauai Creeper or ‘Akikiki

2. Elkhorn Coral

3. Bull Trout

4. Canada Lynx

5. Pacific Salmon

6. Leatherback Sea Turtle

7. Grizzly Bear

8. Bog Turtle

9. Western Prairie Fringed Orchid

10. Flatwoods Salamander

In addition, the Endangered Species Coalition conducted an online poll earlier this year to determine which species their audience thought was most threatened. The winner: polar bear.

Read the full news article or view the report

Every year, sockeye salmon return to the rivers of western Canada to make their arduous upstream journey to calmer spawning grounds. It is a seasonal touchstone that signifies the approaching end of summer, one that has been observed for centuries.

The only problem is that some years, like in 2009, the salmon don't return.

Dr Andrew Johnson is speaking today (12 July) at the UK National Stem Cell Network annual conference. He and his team from the University of Nottingham have been using a Mexican aquatic salamander called an axolotl to study the evolution and genetics of stem cells – research that supports the development of regenerative medicine to treat the consequences of disease and injury using stem cell therapies.

Sea level is rising in relation to many of the world’s shorelines, and has been for decades. The main reason is that the volume of the ocean is increasing as a result of the melting of land ice and the warming of the sea itself. (Warm water expands, just as warm air does.)

Scientists once thought this volume increase had been going on, in fits and starts, for thousands of years. This widespread belief was often used as a debating point by climate-change skeptics, who argued that sea-level rise was nothing to worry about because it had existed throughout the history of human civilization.

But research in recent years has turned that notion on its head. The matter is not entirely settled, but some persuasive evidence points to the conclusion that the volume of the ocean was fairly stable for the last 2,000 years and began rising only recently, more or less in sync with industrialization. This is important because it suggests that sea level might be pretty sensitive to the greenhouse gases that humans are dumping into the atmosphere.

I made a brief mention of this issue in a long article on Sunday on sea-level rise but did not have the space to go into much detail. Here is some of the background:

Archaeological discoveries that shed light on ancient sea level are prized finds for the experts in this field. One of the most compelling studies of recent years was carried out by an Australian scientist named Kurt Lambeck, who worked with colleagues in Italy. They focused on ancient fish tanks built at the edge of the Mediterranean by the Romans over the 300 years when their civilization was at its height, ending in the second century A.D.

These tanks were sometimes decorative, but mostly they were used as storage pens to keep fish fresh for the lavish banquets that wealthy Romans held in their seaside villas. The tanks, described in some detail by Roman historians, have long fired the imaginations of classicists, since they represent Roman civilization at its decadent height. The tanks made an appearance in the popular Robert Harris novel Pompeii, for instance.

There are more than 70 species of mangrove trees and shrubs. The best known, such as the red mangrove, are highly adapted to an amphibious lifestyle: Their roots shield them from salt intrusion, and their waxy leaves prevent the loss of precious freshwater.

Despite all this, mangroves are one of the most endangered ecosystems on the planet; they are cleared to make way for rice paddies and shrimp ponds in some areas and for condominiums and subdivisions in others. All told, humans have destroyed 20 percent of their global extent since 1980.

On Tuesday, January 8, the former President Bush in his last days in office made an announcement to protect three major marine areas in the Pacific Ocean that has been acclaimed as “one of the most important moves in marine conservation in recent decades." Among the protected marine monuments is the largest live coral cover in the world and Mariana’s Trench, Earth’s deepest underwater canyon. In total, 195,000 square miles are protected in Tuesday’s announcement. The status as a monument protects this area from overfishing, oil drilling, and other environmentally hazardous or detrimental human activity. These areas, previously owned by the Nature Conservancy, will primarily be used for scientific research and exploration of marine ecosystems.

Curricula Links:

A multi-faceted Approach to Biodiversity (Economics, American Government, Biology)
Finding Solutions to the Overfishing Problem (Environmental Science, Biology)
Oceanographic Specialties (Earth Science, Chemistry, Physics)

Photo Credit: Christine Huffard

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia – Endangered orangutans on Borneo island are using fire hoses slung across rivers by humans to help them move around isolated forests to potentially meet new mates and boost the species' chances for survival, an environmental group said Monday.

Malaysian authorities are building more of the makeshift bridges after some orangutans were spotted using them over the past year, said Marc Ancrenaz, co-founder of French-based conservation group Hutan, which is working with Malaysian state wildlife department officials on orangutan protection.

Conservationists estimate about 11,000 orangutans live in Malaysia's Sabah state in Borneo, but many are isolated from each other because swaths of forest have been cut for development, logging and oil palm plantations.

Environmental groups and wildlife authorities have been hooking up old fire hoses strung together between trees on different sides of rivers to help orangutans — which cannot swim — swing or walk across them. The first bridge was set up seven years ago, but it was only last year that an orangutan was captured on camera using one of them.

Witnesses have seen others doing so since then, prompting officials to build more bridges.

"It takes a while for the animals to get used to it. ... If we are not able to reconnect them, they will go extinct very soon," Ancrenaz said.

INAKADATE, Japan — Nearly two decades ago, Koichi Hanada, a clerk in the village hall, received an unusual request from his superior: find a way to bring tourists to this small community in rural northern Japan, which has rice paddies and apple orchards, but not much else.

Mr. Hanada, a taciturn but conscientious man, said he had spent months racking his brain. Then, one day he saw schoolchildren planting a rice paddy as a class project. They used two varieties of rice plants, one with dark purplish stalks and the other bright green ones. Then it struck him, why not plant the colored varieties in such a way as to form words and pictures?

 DAVIS, Calif. — To Ron Ringen, a retired veterinarian, roadkill is a calling. Nearly every week for the last seven months, Mr. Ringen, 69, has driven the roads north of this college town near Sacramento, scanning the pavement for telltale bits of fur and feathers.

Pulling over, Mr. Ringen gets out, snaps photographs and uses his GPS device to record the precise location where creatures met their end. He has logged more than 1,400 animals, from the miniature (one-ounce song sparrows) to the gargantuan (a 1,500-pound black Angus bull).

HONOLULU — The federal government has turned to a 130-year-old Hawaii sugar grower for help in powering the Navy and weaning the nation off a heavy reliance on fossil fuels.

It will spend at least $10 million over the next five years to fund research and development at Maui cane fields for crops capable of fueling Navy fighter jets and ships.

 

SYDNEY - The world's oceans are virtually choking on rising greenhouse gases, destroying marine ecosystems and breaking down the food chain -- irreversible changes that have not occurred for several million years, a new study says.

The changes could have dire consequences for hundreds of millions of people around the globe who rely on oceans for their livelihoods.

"It's as if the Earth has been smoking two packs of cigarettes a day", said the report's lead-author Australian marine scientist Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg.

New research confirms the existence of a huge plume of dispersed oil  deep in the Gulf of Mexico and suggests that it has not broken down rapidly, raising the possibility that it might pose a threat to wildlife for months or even years.

The study, the most ambitious scientific paper to emerge so far from the Deepwater Horizon spill, casts some doubt on recent statements by the federal government that oil in the gulf appears to be dissipating at a brisk clip. However, the lead scientist in the research, Richard Camilli, cautioned that the samples were taken in June and circumstances could have changed in the last two months.

Magnificent and wild, the grizzly bear of the American west has a fearsome reputation. But as a population boom forces them from their deep wilderness habitat of the Rocky Mountains, their increasingly close encounters with humans are altering their lifestyles, making them lazy and fat, conservation experts say.

"We've got bears spending the whole summer eating oats in the field, out there with the elk and the deer, and getting fatter and fatter," said Jamie Jonkel, a grizzly manager and wildlife conflict specialist with Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks, the state government's conservation agency.

"They've started really loving the good life, much like the average American," said Jonkel, who led a tour of reporters from the Society for Envornmental Journalists.

"Some of them still move into the high country in the summer, but some of them just set up shop and don't move. You can see grizzlies out there in the fields all day lazing about grazing on alfafa while a kid is kicking a soccer ball around," he said.

A recent census by scientific agencies put the grizzly population in Yellowstone national park and surrounding areas of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho at 603.

That is more than three times the population in 1975 when hunting was outlawed, and grizzlies were protected as an endangered species. Wildlife experts suspect it could be even higher.

The population rise has put pressure on the grizzlies' food source in high wilderness areas. So too has a beetle infestation which has killed off huge swaths of pine across the Rockies, and with them the pine nuts that the grizzlies rely on in late summer and autumn.

Hot dam! The first beaver found in the city in 200 years finally has company after three years of solitude on the Bronx River.

A beaver named Jose is now sharing his life with another buck-toothed mammal - but the relationship is unclear.

"A companion, a friend, a mate, an associate - we don't know what it is," said Rep. Jose Serrano, for whom the first beaver was named after its discovery in 2007.

New research confirms the existence of a huge plume of dispersed oil  deep in the Gulf of Mexico and suggests that it has not broken down rapidly, raising the possibility that it might pose a threat to wildlife for months or even years.

The study, the most ambitious scientific paper to emerge so far from the Deepwater Horizon spill, casts some doubt on recent statements by the federal government that oil in the gulf appears to be dissipating at a brisk clip. However, the lead scientist in the research, Richard Camilli, cautioned that the samples were taken in June and circumstances could have changed in the last two months.

Fertilizer run-off and record high temperatures are causing unprecedented outbreaks of algae- known as the green tide- off the coast of Qingdao, China. Clean up crews are now scrubbing an area of about 150 mi sq.

HONOLULU — The federal government has turned to a 130-year-old Hawaii sugar grower for help in powering the Navy and weaning the nation off a heavy reliance on fossil fuels.

It will spend at least $10 million over the next five years to fund research and development at Maui cane fields for crops capable of fueling Navy fighter jets and ships.

 

SYDNEY - The world's oceans are virtually choking on rising greenhouse gases, destroying marine ecosystems and breaking down the food chain -- irreversible changes that have not occurred for several million years, a new study says.

The changes could have dire consequences for hundreds of millions of people around the globe who rely on oceans for their livelihoods.

"It's as if the Earth has been smoking two packs of cigarettes a day", said the report's lead-author Australian marine scientist Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg.

The country’s largest solar-powered boat competition got underway last Friday in California. 700 Southern California students from 42 schools began the seven-month long process to see who will be crowned winner of the Solar Cup Competition in May of 2011.

“We started Solar Cup nine years ago to promote clean recreation on our drinking-water reservoirs and to increase educational outreach to high-school students,” said Solar Cup Coordinator Julie Miller. “The competition has now evolved into a great opportunity for kids to learn about green technology and alternative energy sources. Solar Cup also promotes career development in clean energy, by encouraging kids to consider careers in engineering, construction, or as solar techs.”

All 42 student teams begin by assembling the same boat—identical canoe hulls made of marine-grade plywood. Roughly half of participating students gathered to build their boats Friday with the remaining teams scheduled to meet and assemble on Nov. 13.

Once the boats are assembled, students return to school and work for the next seven months outfitting the boats with solar panels, batteries, lights, rudders and steering systems—and, in some cases, snazzy paint jobs.

Student teams will reconvene at Lake Skinner in Temecula Valley on May 13 – 15, 2011, for the Solar Cup Competition.

Sea level is rising in relation to many of the world’s shorelines, and has been for decades. The main reason is that the volume of the ocean is increasing as a result of the melting of land ice and the warming of the sea itself. (Warm water expands, just as warm air does.)

Scientists once thought this volume increase had been going on, in fits and starts, for thousands of years. This widespread belief was often used as a debating point by climate-change skeptics, who argued that sea-level rise was nothing to worry about because it had existed throughout the history of human civilization.

But research in recent years has turned that notion on its head. The matter is not entirely settled, but some persuasive evidence points to the conclusion that the volume of the ocean was fairly stable for the last 2,000 years and began rising only recently, more or less in sync with industrialization. This is important because it suggests that sea level might be pretty sensitive to the greenhouse gases that humans are dumping into the atmosphere.

I made a brief mention of this issue in a long article on Sunday on sea-level rise but did not have the space to go into much detail. Here is some of the background:

Archaeological discoveries that shed light on ancient sea level are prized finds for the experts in this field. One of the most compelling studies of recent years was carried out by an Australian scientist named Kurt Lambeck, who worked with colleagues in Italy. They focused on ancient fish tanks built at the edge of the Mediterranean by the Romans over the 300 years when their civilization was at its height, ending in the second century A.D.

These tanks were sometimes decorative, but mostly they were used as storage pens to keep fish fresh for the lavish banquets that wealthy Romans held in their seaside villas. The tanks, described in some detail by Roman historians, have long fired the imaginations of classicists, since they represent Roman civilization at its decadent height. The tanks made an appearance in the popular Robert Harris novel Pompeii, for instance.

WASHINGTON — Google and a New York financial firm have each agreed to invest heavily in a proposed $5 billion transmission backbone for future offshore wind farms along the Atlantic Seaboard that could ultimately transform the region’s electrical map.

The 350-mile underwater spine, which could remove some critical obstacles to wind power development, has stirred excitement among investors, government officials and environmentalists who have been briefed on it.

Sports arenas and stadiums are all about getting the most number of people to spend the maximum amount of money in the shortest amount of time possible. But a growing number of sports buildings from Boston to Los Angeles are becoming efficient in other ways, by saving energy and reducing waste with solar panels, low-flush toilets and composting.

On Thursday, the Philadelphia Eagles will announce perhaps the most ambitious green initiative yet: the installation of about 2,500 solar panels, 80 20-foot-high wind turbines and a generator that runs on natural gas and biodiesel so that Lincoln Financial Field, the Eagles’ home, will be the first stadium capable of generating all its own electricity.

Becoming self-sufficient in energy is the latest in a string of environmentally friendly measures the Eagles have taken since they opened their stadium in 2003. (Coincidentally, the team’s primary color is green.) Since then, many teams have introduced similar efficiency programs, and the four major sports leagues have set up programs to help their teams share information about how to use less energy, reduce waste and save money.

On Tuesday, January 8, the former President Bush in his last days in office made an announcement to protect three major marine areas in the Pacific Ocean that has been acclaimed as “one of the most important moves in marine conservation in recent decades." Among the protected marine monuments is the largest live coral cover in the world and Mariana’s Trench, Earth’s deepest underwater canyon. In total, 195,000 square miles are protected in Tuesday’s announcement. The status as a monument protects this area from overfishing, oil drilling, and other environmentally hazardous or detrimental human activity. These areas, previously owned by the Nature Conservancy, will primarily be used for scientific research and exploration of marine ecosystems.

Curricula Links:

A multi-faceted Approach to Biodiversity (Economics, American Government, Biology)
Finding Solutions to the Overfishing Problem (Environmental Science, Biology)
Oceanographic Specialties (Earth Science, Chemistry, Physics)

Photo Credit: Christine Huffard

In a recent report, it was announced that the United States is now the leading producer of wind-power. Based on the amount of wind energy produced in 2008, the United States took Germany’s place as the leading producer of wind energy. With the new administration emphasizing the importance of alternative energy, solar panel development is also expected to rise in 2009, likely to top the solar-production list as well. While the United States produces more wind energy in net amount, Spain, Germany and Denmark currently lead the relative amount of wind energy produced compared to fossil-fuel sources of energy in their respective countries.

Though the current financial crisis is expected to slow development, alternative energy remains a priority among leading politicians and many expect these energy options will have overall growth over the course of the year in the United States. The European Union is also promising more emphasis on alternative energy, pledging to double the current amount of renewable energy produced from 10% of total energy consumption to 20% by 2020.

Curricula Links:

The Photoelectric Effect in Photovoltaic Cells (Physics, Chemistry)
Power Politics Concerning Alternative Energy (American Government, Environmental Science)
Environmental Chemistry and the Burning of Fossil Fuels (Chemistry)

Back to "In the News" Archive

Rachel Cernansly of Planet Green reports-

For all its weaknesses and criticisms, DOE is doing some great stuff to encourage a clean energy future.

National Geothermal Student Competition
Launched yesterday, this competition challenges students to "conduct extensive research on the geothermal energy potential of the Rio Grande Rift geologic province located in southeastern Colorado and northeastern New Mexico."

It's meant to stimulate geothermal technology development—along with funding of other geothermal technologies—as well as increase geothermal education.

DOE will award as much as $100,000 to up to 10 college teams, which will have to use their research to produce data assessing the geologic, engineering, environmental, land use, policy, and cultural issues that all must be addressed as part of geothermal development in the U.S.

Clean Energy for Small Businesses
DOE announced $57 million last month to support commercialization of clean energy technologies for 33 small businesses in 16 states. The projects, led by small businesses, are partnerships with universities, national labs, and large businesses, and include developing technologies like a biodiesel from algae in Tennessee to self-erecting wind turbines that can be manufactured on site.

Energy efficiency in the federal government
DOE awarded 31 individuals or teams across the federal government for improving energy, water, and/or vehicle fleet efficiency—initiatives that DOE says collectively saved taxpayers nearly $42 million in one year alone, and saved the equivalent of 190,000 tons of CO2 emissions. Energy Secretary Steven Chu recognizes the symbolic significance of this. He said, "As the single largest consumer of energy in the country, the federal government has a responsibility and an opportunity to lead by example in implementing clean energy projects that save taxpayers money, create new jobs, and reduce carbon pollution."

The Arctic is moving into "a new climate state" and a return to previous Arctic conditions is "unlikely," according to a new assesment from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. One consequence of a warmer Arctic could be colder winters in other parts of the Northern Hemisphere.

The basic facts have been reported widely and often:

The area covered by sea ice hovered near its historic low this summer. In Greenland, record-high temperatures this year have helped accelerate the melting of the country's massive ice sheet. Throughout the Arctic, permafrost is warming and the blanket of snow is shrinking. Those changes appear to be long-lasting, said an international team of climate experts who wrote the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report. [...] "The Arctic is a system, and the system is changing," said Don Perovich, a sea ice expert with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers who worked on the report. "It's not just that sea ice is being reduced. There's changes in Greenland, the atmosphere, the ecosystem, and these changes are affecting human activity."

What is increasingly apparent, as researchers have warned for years, is that "polar amplification" is causing many of these changes to feed on themselves, amplifying each other year after year. In this regard, what is happening to Arctic sea ice is in many ways key.

As the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) pointed out earlier this month, Arctic sea ice is not just diminishing in extent -- the four lowest levels have been in the last four years -- but it is also younger and thinner. That makes ice easier to melt each year, which in turn exposes greater areas of heat-trapping ocean, which causes further melting, making it more and more difficult for sea ice to recover to previous levels.

SERENGETI NATIONAL PARK, Tanzania - Every spring, out here on this endless sheet of yellow grass, two million wildebeest, zebras, gazelles and other grazers march north in search of greener pastures, with lions and hyenas stalking them and vultures circling above.

It is called the Great Migration, and it is widely considered one of the most spectacular assemblies of animal life on the planet.

But how much longer it will stay that way is another matter. Tanzania's president, Jakaya Kikwete, plans to build a national highway straight through the Serengeti park, bisecting the migration route and possibly sending a thick stream of overloaded trucks and speeding buses through the traveling herds.

Scientists and conservation groups paint a grim picture of what could happen next: rare animals like rhinos getting knocked down as roadkill; fences going up; invasive seeds sticking to car tires and being spread throughout the park; the migration getting blocked and the entire ecosystem becoming irreversibly damaged.

"The Serengeti ecosystem is one of the wonders of the planet," said Anne Pusey, an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University. "It must be preserved."

But it is election time in Tanzania, one of the poorest countries in the world, and Mr. Kikwete is embroiled in what political analysts say is the feistiest presidential race this country has seen.

While wave power often seems like the poor cousin of the renewable energy world, and frankly doesn't have the practical potential of wind or solar power, tapping the power of the sea does have its place and this next one is worth a bit of hand clapping: One of Ocean Power Technologies' PowerBuoys can claim to be the first wave power device to deliver electricity to the US grid.

The newly developed CityCenter community in Las Vegas, Nev. recently added a piece of environmental art to its fine art collection. The 87-foot long, 3,700 pound sculpture hangs horizontally from steel cables above a registration desk. The sculpture depicts the Colorado River, complete with its meanders and swells at Lake Powell and Lake Mead. The sculpture was also made with environmentally conscious materials, being cast in reclaimed silver. It is aptly named "Silver River."

The sculpture’s artist, Maya Lin, reflects on her work by saying "Water is going to become more and more of a debate. I’m asking people to take a look at the natural world around them." Las Vegas’ major source of water is the Colorado River and with increasing droughts and demands for water, there is substantial concern that there will not be enough water to sustain the city in coming years.

This infusion of art and environmental consciousness is one of Lin’s trademarks. Growing up in Athens, Ohio during the 1970s, she was exposed to environmental issues at an early age. In 1969, the Cuyahoga River, located in Ohio, caught on fire as a result of its heavily polluted waters. This initiated a massive public response, making Ohio the focal point of national environmental awareness and legislation that would follow. In addition to her artistic pursuits, Lin also sits on the board of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Her other environmental projects include "Storm King Wavefield," an environmental reclamation project at the site of a former gravel pit in Mountainville, N.Y. For this project she created waves in a field by forming earth and grass mounds. Her more recent work, "What is Missing," is a multisite international project that focuses on habitats and species that are extinct or disappearing and provides information on ways to help protect the environment. The main element of the project is a giant megaphone that plays the sounds of endangered species.

Read the full article

Related Resources:

Using the Landscape to Create Works of Art (Visual Arts, The Arts)

Fractals in Nature and Art (Visual Arts, The Arts, Geometry, Algebra I, Mathematics)

Representations of the Natural World in Art (Visual Arts, The Arts, Social Studies, Language Arts)

Photo: Sam Morris, Las Vegas Sun

New research confirms the existence of a huge plume of dispersed oil  deep in the Gulf of Mexico and suggests that it has not broken down rapidly, raising the possibility that it might pose a threat to wildlife for months or even years.

The study, the most ambitious scientific paper to emerge so far from the Deepwater Horizon spill, casts some doubt on recent statements by the federal government that oil in the gulf appears to be dissipating at a brisk clip. However, the lead scientist in the research, Richard Camilli, cautioned that the samples were taken in June and circumstances could have changed in the last two months.

Drought in Australia's main food growing region of the Murray-Darling river system has worsened, with water inflows over the past two years at an all-time low, the government's top water official said on Tuesday. The drought will hit irrigated crops such as rice, grapes and horticulture the hardest, but would have less impact on output of wheat, which depends largely on rainfall during specific periods and is on track to double after two years of shrunken crops.

Curricula Links:
Economics and Drought (Economics)
Understanding Droughts (World History, U.S. History, Geography)
Cultural Characteristics Influence a Region's Character (Geography, Economics, Science)

Back to In the News Archive

The White House is going solar after all - a home improvement that carries modest energy benefits but much larger symbolic importance.

It isn't the first time the White House has used solar energy. President Jimmy Carter put 32 solar panels on the roof in the late 1970s, but President Ronald Reagan removed them in 1986. Two grass-roots campaigns have recently been lobbying President Obama to restore them as a sign of his commitment to renewable energy.

Rachel Cernansly of Planet Green reports-

For all its weaknesses and criticisms, DOE is doing some great stuff to encourage a clean energy future.

National Geothermal Student Competition
Launched yesterday, this competition challenges students to "conduct extensive research on the geothermal energy potential of the Rio Grande Rift geologic province located in southeastern Colorado and northeastern New Mexico."

It's meant to stimulate geothermal technology development—along with funding of other geothermal technologies—as well as increase geothermal education.

DOE will award as much as $100,000 to up to 10 college teams, which will have to use their research to produce data assessing the geologic, engineering, environmental, land use, policy, and cultural issues that all must be addressed as part of geothermal development in the U.S.

Clean Energy for Small Businesses
DOE announced $57 million last month to support commercialization of clean energy technologies for 33 small businesses in 16 states. The projects, led by small businesses, are partnerships with universities, national labs, and large businesses, and include developing technologies like a biodiesel from algae in Tennessee to self-erecting wind turbines that can be manufactured on site.

Energy efficiency in the federal government
DOE awarded 31 individuals or teams across the federal government for improving energy, water, and/or vehicle fleet efficiency—initiatives that DOE says collectively saved taxpayers nearly $42 million in one year alone, and saved the equivalent of 190,000 tons of CO2 emissions. Energy Secretary Steven Chu recognizes the symbolic significance of this. He said, "As the single largest consumer of energy in the country, the federal government has a responsibility and an opportunity to lead by example in implementing clean energy projects that save taxpayers money, create new jobs, and reduce carbon pollution."

Hot dam! The first beaver found in the city in 200 years finally has company after three years of solitude on the Bronx River.

A beaver named Jose is now sharing his life with another buck-toothed mammal - but the relationship is unclear.

"A companion, a friend, a mate, an associate - we don't know what it is," said Rep. Jose Serrano, for whom the first beaver was named after its discovery in 2007.

New research confirms the existence of a huge plume of dispersed oil  deep in the Gulf of Mexico and suggests that it has not broken down rapidly, raising the possibility that it might pose a threat to wildlife for months or even years.

The study, the most ambitious scientific paper to emerge so far from the Deepwater Horizon spill, casts some doubt on recent statements by the federal government that oil in the gulf appears to be dissipating at a brisk clip. However, the lead scientist in the research, Richard Camilli, cautioned that the samples were taken in June and circumstances could have changed in the last two months.

Some 40 miles out into the Gulf Of Mexico, I jump off the boat into the thickest patch of red oil I've ever seen. I open my eyes and realize my mask is already smeared. I can't see anything and we're just five seconds into the dive.

Fertilizer run-off and record high temperatures are causing unprecedented outbreaks of algae- known as the green tide- off the coast of Qingdao, China. Clean up crews are now scrubbing an area of about 150 mi sq.

Every year, sockeye salmon return to the rivers of western Canada to make their arduous upstream journey to calmer spawning grounds. It is a seasonal touchstone that signifies the approaching end of summer, one that has been observed for centuries.

The only problem is that some years, like in 2009, the salmon don't return.

Declining ice thickness and what is looking like the second lowest coverage on record means that Arctic sea ice may well have reached its lowest levels ever in terms of total volume.

Curricula Links:
Northwest Passage Reopens Shipping Routes (Economics, World History)
Video Showing Ice Coverage for Past 40 Years (Geography, Earth Science)
Lesson on Surface Area and Volume (Mathematics, Geometry)

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Sea level is rising in relation to many of the world’s shorelines, and has been for decades. The main reason is that the volume of the ocean is increasing as a result of the melting of land ice and the warming of the sea itself. (Warm water expands, just as warm air does.)

Scientists once thought this volume increase had been going on, in fits and starts, for thousands of years. This widespread belief was often used as a debating point by climate-change skeptics, who argued that sea-level rise was nothing to worry about because it had existed throughout the history of human civilization.

But research in recent years has turned that notion on its head. The matter is not entirely settled, but some persuasive evidence points to the conclusion that the volume of the ocean was fairly stable for the last 2,000 years and began rising only recently, more or less in sync with industrialization. This is important because it suggests that sea level might be pretty sensitive to the greenhouse gases that humans are dumping into the atmosphere.

I made a brief mention of this issue in a long article on Sunday on sea-level rise but did not have the space to go into much detail. Here is some of the background:

Archaeological discoveries that shed light on ancient sea level are prized finds for the experts in this field. One of the most compelling studies of recent years was carried out by an Australian scientist named Kurt Lambeck, who worked with colleagues in Italy. They focused on ancient fish tanks built at the edge of the Mediterranean by the Romans over the 300 years when their civilization was at its height, ending in the second century A.D.

These tanks were sometimes decorative, but mostly they were used as storage pens to keep fish fresh for the lavish banquets that wealthy Romans held in their seaside villas. The tanks, described in some detail by Roman historians, have long fired the imaginations of classicists, since they represent Roman civilization at its decadent height. The tanks made an appearance in the popular Robert Harris novel Pompeii, for instance.

There are more than 70 species of mangrove trees and shrubs. The best known, such as the red mangrove, are highly adapted to an amphibious lifestyle: Their roots shield them from salt intrusion, and their waxy leaves prevent the loss of precious freshwater.

Despite all this, mangroves are one of the most endangered ecosystems on the planet; they are cleared to make way for rice paddies and shrimp ponds in some areas and for condominiums and subdivisions in others. All told, humans have destroyed 20 percent of their global extent since 1980.