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Prison Turns Inmates Green

Get ready for this one – the latest “green” training is happening in prison. Instead of simply containing inmates for their wrongdoings, the Stafford Creek facility in Aberdeen, Washington is teaching individuals how to become contributing members of society.

 

The Sustainable Prisons Project – a collaboration between the Washington Department of Corrections and The Evergreen State College in Olympia – aims to help prisoners understand their impact on the environment, and find ways to reduce it. By growing native plant species in a greenhouse behind the prison, inmates are acquiring skills that can aid them in assimilating back into society through environmentalism.

 

With “green” jobs on the rise, the Sustainable Prisons Project is a way to provide almost guaranteed “green” workers. This program offers people who have strayed from societal norms – and maybe need a little help getting back on track – the means to do so. Instead of releasing these people back into society with no direction, why not steer them toward environmental activism?

 

For more information, visit http://earth911.com.


June 25, 2009 | 11:06 AM Comments  0 comments

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Beetles Eating the Rocky Mountains Alive
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

Wildfires in the forests in the Rocky Mountains can potentially threaten water and power supplies to millions of people across the western United States. The Colorado River, which is an important source of water for residents of 13 states, are in the middle of a 2.5 million acres of dying forests in Colorado and southern Wyoming, according to the U.S. Forest Service official Rick Cables. If these forests are to catch fire it could potentially lead to damaged or destroyed reservoirs, pipes and other infrastructure that supply water to millions of people in the Rocky Mountain region.

This threat is made possible by the largest recorded outbreak of bark beetles in the area. Bark beetles are insects that attack and kill living trees, which subsequently generates very large quantities of dry timber that can easily catch fire and lead to wildfires. These beetle infestations are naturally recurring events in the west; however, the scale of this movement is much larger than usual. This may be due to a lack of freezing weather in the region, which usually reduces the bark beetles population. Also, researchers fear that the situation will worsen due to global warming, which will decrease the amount of freezing weather, thus enabling the beetles population to further expand. According to Barbara Bentz, a research entomologist with the Forest Service, nearly 8 million acres of trees have fallen to the beetles. Canadian forests have also suffered from this outbreak and scientists in Canada believe that the “death of so many trees is altering local weather patterns and air quality.”

As a result of these outbreaks, many forests are being threatened in the west by not only the bugs themselves, but also wildfires, which the beetles indirectly instigate. As of now the Forest Service has received $26 million stimulus funds for the Rocky Mountain region to deal with the beetle-relate problems. However, dealing with the infestation could cost as much as $213 million. The government seems unlikely to provide any more support. The only solution to this problem is for the citizens in this region to unite and provide funding for this program. With your support, the forests of the Rocky Mountains can be preserved.

For More Information Check Out:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31413274/ns/us_news-environment/#storyContinued

http://www.asktheexterminator.com/Beetles/Bark_beetles.shtml

June 18, 2009 | 5:38 PM Comments  0 comments



Government Study Predicts Climate Change to Worsen in the Future
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

The United States Global Change Research Program, a joint scientific venture of 13 federal agencies, has reported that climate change will worsen in the future. This report is based off evidence such as shifting migration patterns of butterflies in the West and heavier downpours in the Midwest and East. Some of the effects being cited in this report are familiar, such as powerful tropical storms and erosion of ocean coastlines caused by the melting of Arctic ice.

However, the study also warns that there will be an increase in drought in the Southwestern United States and more intense heat waves in the Northeastern United States as a result of the continuing increases in the concentrations of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. According to the report, reduced mountain snowpack means earlier melt-offs and reduced stream volumes across the West and Northwest, which will affect residential and agricultural water supplies, habitats for spawning fish, and the reduction of hydroelectric power generation.

However, the speed and severity of these effects in the future are less certain in the report and depend entirely on how nations around the world decide to handle emissions in their countries. Our destiny is in our hands. It is up to the nations of our world to decide what our fate will be.

For More Information Check Out: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/16/science/earth/16climate.html?_r=1

June 17, 2009 | 12:32 PM Comments  0 comments



Algae Invading New York Streams
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

In Esposus Creek, a fly-fishing stream that is an integral part of New York City’s upstate drinking water system has fallen victim to the Didymosphenia geminata, “a fast-spreading single-cell algae that is better known to fishermen and biologists around the world as rock snot.” Investigators confirm that Didymo has spread along 12 miles of the Esopus from Shandaken to the Ashokan Reservoir.

Didymo is considered native to parts of North America, where it is found in high elevations with “cold, nutrient-poor waters.” This single-celled diatom grows upstream in fast-moving rivers and creek, and can spread to other water environments by clinging to fishing equipment. Over the last twenty years, this algae has transformed into a more aggressive invasive species, which has spread from British Columbia to New York. Didymo is not harmful to human health; however, it can grow in mats so thick that it clogs water intakes, which are key to supplying fresh water to cities. It also has a tendency to cover river bottoms from bank to bank, smothering stoneflies, worms, and other organisms that trout and other sport fish feed on to survive.

Recently, rock snot has been found on the east and west branches of the Delaware River, the location of two huge reservoirs in the New York City water system. Leslie J. Surprenant, the New York City State invasive species management coordinator, said there are no known ways to eradicate Didymo once it has been established. The best that can be hoped for, she said, is to slow its spread by informing fishermen and others who use the infected streams. Precautions such as encouraging fishermen to submerge waders (waterproof gear designed to allow people to stand in relatively deep water without getting wet) in a solution of water and bleach to kill cells before they can spread is one option. Didymo is a serious threat to the North American ecosystem and must be stopped from spreading before it destroys many of the species that are indigenous to this continent. There may be no perfect solution to this problem, but as long as precautions are made we can prevent this species from spreading too quickly.

For More Information Check Out:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/16/science/16invasive.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ref=earth

June 16, 2009 | 3:14 PM Comments  0 comments



Green Jobs Are Growing!

Looking for a job? If you are, you’re probably looking in all the wrong places. It’s pretty well-known that “green” jobs are becoming more and more popular socially, but these jobs are also the professions of the future.

While many corporations have been forced to eliminate positions and lay off hundreds of people at once, the renewable energy industry has continued to grow. Not only has this industry flourished, but it has also more than doubled the national rate when it comes to adding job possibilities to the economy. To put this into perspective, the overall job growth average between 1998 and 2007 was 3.7 percent; in the renewable energy industry, it was 9.1 percent. With this information, the government has said it will provide billions to further renewable energy growth.

Although “green” jobs may not be the most high-paying jobs out there, they seem to be the most promising. Feedback from individuals who have shifted from the auto industry to areas such as hydropower are aware of this drop in salary, but they have also noted that these industries are moving in the right direction – Earth Day Network published an op-ed on this topic months ago. So if you’re out there job hunting, get on the green track to help the environment and to help yourself.

For more information, visit MSNBC’s article.


June 16, 2009 | 12:06 PM Comments  0 comments

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