ONE October-December 2017

Issues November 13, 2017

October-December 2017 (ONE)

Articles Nature & Environment

Ozone pollution in US national parks is nearly the same as in large cities

“Another glorious day, the air as delicious to the lungs as nectar to the tongue” John Muir, My First Summer in the Sierra (1911) Most Americans associate U.S. national parks with pristine environments that represent the very best of nature.…

Articles Last Exit

Dallol

Dallol is a village located in the Danakil Desert, northern Ethiopia. Known as the hottest place year-round on Earth, Dallol holds the official record for record high average temperature for an inhabited location (35°C). Extreme weather conditions coupled with complete…

Articles Solar

How land under solar panels can contribute to food security

At a recent solar energy conference in Minneapolis, attendees unwound at happy hour tasting free pints of a local honey-based India Pale Ale called “Solarama Crush.” Minnesota-based 56 Brewing makes the smooth IPA using honey from hives located on solar…

Articles Nuclear

Mapped: The US nuclear power plants ‘at risk’ of shutting down

Nuclear power plants generate more than half of the US’s low-carbon electricity. However, record low gas prices associated with the US fracking boom have made many existing nuclear plants uncompetitive in the current market. About 90 terawatt hours (TWh) of…

Articles Policy & Strategy

Australia is running out of fuel

Last week, it emerged that Australia was just 43 days away from completely running out of fuel. That would mean people aren’t able to fill up cars, planes won’t be able to fly and many of the emergency services would…

Articles Climate Change Policy & Strategy

Oceania: the politicians fiddle, the Pacific burns

It was a black moment, standing before the Australian parliament clasping a lump of coal in a pose of denunciation. Scott Morrison made headlines with his gesture last February, accusing those who doubted the environmental impacts of coal of being…

Articles Climate Change Nature & Environment Policy & Strategy

The Great Inequity of Climate Change

Climate change is a multifaceted phenomenon but is also iniquitous. It affects the most disadvantaged countries harder. In a papal encyclical letter called “Laudato Si” (“Praised Be”) Pope Francis declared that the Catholic Church views climate change as a moral…

Articles Climate Change

Ice melting is too silent to disturb policy makers’ sleep

In the Paris Climate Agreement, where member states agreed to limit the increase in average global temperature to values significantly lower than 2 degrees Celsius and, if possible, even lower than 1.5 degrees Celsius, there was the goal of meaningfully…

Articles Nature & Environment

Planet or plastic?

Out of sight, out of mind, they say. I’m originally from Finland, a country that prides itself on having the purest air in the world, being the cleanest country in the world. I never really paid any attention to trash…

Articles Nature & Environment

Grass Lawns are an Ecological Catastrophe

Are American lawns beautiful visions of nature? Or ecological calamities? Unfortunately, the grass leaves in our parks leave havoc in their wake. Lawns are extremely costly in many ways, including dollars spent on them, the deadly consequences of fertilizer and…