Earth Wise

A look at our changing environment.

You are here: Home / Archives for water

water

Mercury In The Amazon Rainforest | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Recent research has found that some of the highest levels of mercury pollution ever recorded are in a patch of pristine Amazonian rainforest.  The international team of researchers discovered that illegal goldmining in the Peruvian Amazon is the source of the pollution.

Illegal miners separate gold particles from river sediments using mercury.  Mercury binds to gold, forming pellets large enough to be caught in a sieve.   The pellets are then burned in open fire ovens, releasing the mercury to the atmosphere, leaving the gold behind.  The mercury smoke ends up being washed into the soil by rainfall, deposited onto the surface of leaves, or directly absorbed into leaf tissues.

Deforested areas had low levels of mercury, while the areas with the largest, densest old-growth trees captured huge volumes of atmospheric mercury, more than any other ecosystem studied in the entire world.  Mercury levels were directly related to leaf area index:  the denser the canopy, the more mercury it holds.  Birds from this area have up to twelve times more mercury in their systems than birds from less polluted areas.  Such high concentrations of mercury could provoke a decline of up to 30% in these birds’ reproductive success.

Small-scale artisanal gold mining is an important livelihood for local communities.  Eliminating it outright may not be a viable solution but coming up with ways to continue to provide a sustainable livelihood while protecting communities from poisonous pollution is essential.

In the meantime, the forests are doing an important service by capturing much of the mercury and preventing it from getting into the general atmosphere and endangering more people and animals.  Burning or harvesting the mercury-ridden trees would release the mercury back into the atmosphere.

**********

Modern Day Gold Rush Turns Pristine Rainforests into Heavily Polluted Mercury Sinks

Photo, posted August 24, 2016, courtesy of Anna and Michal via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Antarctic Ice Collapse | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

In Antarctica, a huge chunk of the Larsen B Ice Shelf collapsed suddenly and spectacularly in January.

The Larsen Ice Shelf is located on the northeastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula on the Weddell Sea.  It was formed over the course of more than 12,000 years.  The Weddell Sea used to be a completely frozen body of water.  The famous Ernest Shackleton expedition in 1915 was trapped in its ice.  But the Antarctic Peninsula has been steadily warming in recent decades.

The Larsen A Ice shelf collapsed in 1995 and the 1,250-square-mile Larsen B Ice Shelf collapsed in 2002.  After that event, a portion of the detached ice shelf refroze in 2011 and was attached to the Scar Inlet Ice Shelf.  The refrozen ice was called the Larsen B embayment.

In January, the embayment broke apart, taking with it a portion of the Scar Inlet Ice Shelf.  It disintegrated within a matter of days.  The combined Larsen Ice Shelves – called A, B, C, and D – once extended along a 1000-mile stretch of the eastern Antarctic Peninsula.  Since 1995, it has shrunk from 33,000 square miles to 26,000 square miles.

These ice shelves float on the ocean, so their loss does not actually increase global sea levels.   However, the shelves act as dams that hold back glaciers located on the land behind them.  The loss of Antarctic ice shelves dramatically increases the rate at which glaciers flow into the sea, and that does increase global sea levels. 

Now that the sea ice from the Larsen B embayment is gone, it is likely that there will be additional inland ice losses from the newly exposed glaciers.

**********

Remnant of Antarctica’s Larsen B Ice Shelf Disintegrates

Photo, posted February 13, 2018, courtesy of NASA/Nathan Kurtz via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Invasive Species On Ships In Antarctica | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

The Southern Ocean around Antarctica is the most isolated marine environment on Earth.  Antarctica’s native species have been isolated for the last 15-30 million years.  As a result, wildlife there has not evolved the ability to tolerate the presence of many groups of species.

New research by the University of Cambridge and the British Antarctic Survey has traced the global movements of all the ships entering Antarctic water and has found that Antarctica is connected to all regions of the globe via ship activity to an extent much greater than previously thought.  Fishing, tourism, research, and supply ships are exposing Antarctica to invasive, non-native species that threaten the existing ecosystems.

In all, the research identified over 1,500 ports with links to Antarctica.  From all these places, non-native species including mussels, barnacles, crabs, and algae attach themselves to ships’ hulls.  The process is known as biofouling. 

The greatest concern is the movement of species from pole to pole.  These species are already cold-adapted.  They may come on tourist or research vessels that spend the northern hemisphere summer in the Arctic before traveling south for the Antarctic summer season.

Mussels have no competitors in Antarctica should they be accidentally introduced.  Shallow water crabs would introduce a new form of predation that Antarctic animals have never encountered before.

Current biosecurity measures to protect Antarctica, such as cleaning ships’ hulls, focus on a small group of so-called gateway ports.  The new findings indicate that these measures need to be expanded to protect Antarctic waters from non-native species.

**********

Invasive species ‘hitchhiking’ on ships threaten Antarctica’s unique ecosystems

Photo, posted April 12, 2016, courtesy of NOAA’s National Ocean Service via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

An Arctic Bus | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

People have built vehicles for all sorts of extreme environments.  There are deep-sea exploration vessels and there have been lunar and Mars rovers.  But one thing that hasn’t existed so far are buses to transport groups of people around in extreme conditions in the Arctic.  Engineers at two Russian Universities are developing a passenger bus for riding in the Far North.   The project is being funded by the Russian Federation Ministry of Science and Higher Education and the URAL Automobile Manufacturing Plant.

The requirements for the vehicle are daunting.  The bus must be operable at extreme temperatures – 60 below zero Fahrenheit and lower – and have no difficulties even in challenging off-road conditions.

Current Arctic crew buses are not capable of getting through snow blockages and the all-terrain tracked vehicles that can get through them do not have sufficient passenger capacity. In addition to being able to go through snowbanks, the bus should be able to float on water for an hour.

Apart from its ability to withstand harsh Arctic conditions, the bus will also have a quarters module.  This means that it will have an autonomous life-support system for passengers in case of emergency.  The quarters module will be designed to sustain up to 20 people for up to 24 hours.  The module might also be used to hold medical equipment, thereby enabling practitioners to reach remote settlements and treat patients. 

The first tests of prototypes for the bus will be conducted in the near future.  The project aims to have the new Arctic Bus design complete and ready for manufacture by the end of 2023 and it will go into production in 2024.

**********

“Arctic Bus” Being Readied to Be Tested in the Far North

Photo, posted April 21, 2017, courtesy of Markus Trienke via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Avoiding Blackouts With Renewable Energy | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

There are some people who worry that an electric grid heavily dependent upon intermittent sources like solar and wind power may be more susceptible to blackouts.  According to a new study by Stanford University, these fears are misplaced.

The study, published in the journal Renewable Energy, found that an energy system running on wind, water, and solar, when combined with energy storage, avoids blackouts, and lowers energy requirements and consumer costs.  In addition, implementing such a system would create millions of jobs, improve people’s health, and reduce land requirements.

The study focused on the stability in all U.S. grid regions as well as individual states based on the requirement that all electricity is provided by clean and renewable sources. No fossil fuel use, bioenergy, blue hydrogen, or even nuclear power were included in the modeling.  Critics of such a shift in the energy system point to grid blackouts during extreme weather events in California in 2020 and Texas in 2021 as evidence that renewable sources can’t be trusted.  But in both cases, renewable energy was not found to be any more vulnerable than other sources.

The study looked at the costs of the transition – which would be substantial – but found that it would pay for itself fairly quickly based on energy cost savings alone.

A significant finding of the study was that long-duration batteries were neither necessary nor helpful for grid stability.  That stability could be obtained by linking together currently available short-duration batteries.  Interconnecting larger and larger geographic regions would make the power system smoother and more reliable.  Overall, intelligent management of the electric grid can result in a reliable and clean power system.

**********

Web Links

Stanford researchers point the way to avoiding blackouts with clean, renewable energy

Photo, posted October 17, 2016, courtesy of B Sarangi via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Melting Himalayan Glaciers | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

The great mountain ranges of central Asia, including the Himalayas, contain the third-largest deposit of ice and snow in the world, trailing only Antarctica and the Arctic.  The Himalayan range contains about 15,000 glaciers, and is part of a region widely referred to as the Third Pole due to its extraordinary reserves of freshwater.

But in recent years, scientists have observed an increase in the rate of Himalayan glacier loss.  According to a new study led by researchers from the University of Leeds in the UK, the accelerating melting of the Himalayan glaciers threatens the water supply of millions of people in Asia. 

In the study, researchers reconstructed the reach of the Himalayan glaciers during the Little Ice Age, which was the last major glacier expansion 400-700 years ago. They found that these glaciers began losing ice 10 times faster during the modern era.  In fact, the glaciers have shrunk from a peak of nearly 11,000 square miles to around 7,500 square miles today.   

This exceptional acceleration of melting of the Himalayan glaciers could have significant implications.  Hundreds of millions of people rely on Asia’s major river systems for food and energy, and depend on these glaciers to feed rivers during the dry seasons.  These rivers include the Brahmaputra, Ganges, and Indus.  The changing global climate could disastrously impact water resources and livelihoods of the Greater Himalayan region.

According to the research team, people living in these regions have already seen changes that are unlike anything witnessed for centuries.  This study is the latest to confirm that these changes are accelerating and pose a significant threat to entire nations and regions. 

**********

Web Links

Himalayan glaciers melting at ‘exceptional rate’

Photo, posted March 13, 2018, courtesy of Sarunas Burdulis via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Removing Carbon With The Oceans | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

There is increasing concern that reducing carbon emissions alone will not be sufficient to stabilize the climate and that technologies that actively remove carbon dioxide from the air will be needed.  There has been a fair amount of analysis of the efficacy of storing carbon in agricultural soil and in forests, but there has not been comparable studies of the risks, benefits, and trade-offs of ocean-based strategies. 

The oceans currently absorb about a quarter of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions.  There are multiple ways in which oceans could be induced to store much more.  A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine looks at several ocean carbon dioxide removal strategies in terms of efficacy, potential costs, and potential environmental risks.

One approach involves adding nutrients to the ocean surface to increase photosynthesis by phytoplankton.  The approach has a medium to high chance of being effective and has medium environmental risks.

Another approach is large-scale seaweed farming that transports carbon to the deep ocean or into sediments.   It has medium efficacy chances but higher environmental risks.

Protection and restoration of coastal ecosystems including marine wildlife would have the lowest environmental risk but only low to medium efficacy.

Chemically altering ocean water to increase its alkalinity in order to enhance reactions that take up carbon dioxide would be highly effective but a medium environmental risk.

The report describes some other approaches as well.  It recommends a $125 million research program to better understand the technological challenges as well as the potential economic, social, and environmental impacts of increasing the oceans’ absorption of carbon dioxide.

**********

Web Links

Oceans Could Be Harnessed to Remove Carbon From Air, Say U.S. Science Leaders

Photo, posted August 21, 2016, courtesy of Quinn Dombrowski via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Floating Homes In The Netherlands | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

The Netherlands is a country that is largely built on reclaimed land and a third of it remains below sea level.  The Dutch have long experience with dealing with rising waters.  The city of Amsterdam has almost 3,000 houseboats in its canals.

As sea levels continue to rise across the globe, it is no surprise that the Dutch have taken the lead in creating communities composed of floating houses and buildings.

A floating house is a structure fixed to the shore, often resting on steel poles, and usually connected to the local sewer system and power grid.  They are much like ordinary houses except that instead of a basement, they have a concrete hull that acts as a counterweight, allowing them to remain stable in the water.

The ones in the Netherlands are often prefabricated, square-shaped, three-story townhouses.  Rotterdam, which is 90% below sea level, is home to the world’s largest floating office building as well as a floating farm.

Floating buildings have their challenges, not the least of which are the effects of severe wind and rainstorms, or even the passing of large ships which can make the buildings rock.  Infrastructure like electricity and sewer service is not that simple to implement for the buildings.  But the benefits of floating buildings may outweigh the costs.

For cities facing worsening floods and a shortage of buildable land, floating homes are a potential solution for expanding urban housing in the age of climate change.  Dutch engineers are spearheading floating building projects in Britain, France, and Norway, as well as in threatened island locations like French Polynesia and the Maldives.

**********

Web Links

Embracing a Wetter Future, the Dutch Turn to Floating Homes

Photo, posted May 23, 2007, courtesy of Jeff Hutchison via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The Threat From Thwaites | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

The Thwaites Glacier in Antarctica is the widest glacier in the world. It is about 80 miles across and in places extends to a depth of about 2,600 to 3,900 feet.  The glacier is roughly the size of Florida, and it currently contributes 4% of annual global sea level rise as it continues to retreat from a warming ocean.

The International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration is a team of nearly 100 scientists dedicated to studying the glacier.  According to the scientists, Thwaites has doubled its outflow speed within the last 30 years.  The glacier in its entirety holds enough water to raise global sea levels by over two feet, which would be catastrophic.

A third of the glacier flows more slowly than the rest because it is braced by a floating ice shelf that is held in place by an underwater mountain.  The concern is that the brace of ice slowing the glacier may not last for long.

Beneath the surface, warmer ocean water is attacking the glacier from all angles.  The water is melting the ice directly beneath the glacier causing it to lose its grip on the underwater mountain.  Massive fractures have formed and are growing.

Warm water is also a threat for what is called the grounding zone, which is the area where the glacier lifts off the seabed. There are many possible scenarios under which there could be a major ice loss from the glacier.  It is unclear how quickly it could occur.  It might take decades, or it could be centuries.  The threat is large enough and real enough that continued observation and research is essential.

**********

Web Links

The Threat from Thwaites: The Retreat of Antarctica’s Riskiest Glacier

Photo, posted October 16, 2012, courtesy of J. Yungel / NASA Ice via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

New York’s Polystyrene Foam Ban | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

As of January 1, the state of New York now prohibits any person engaged in the business of selling or distributing prepared food or beverages from selling, offering for sale, or distributing disposable food service containers that contain expanded polystyrene foam in the state.  In addition, no manufacturer will be allowed to sell, offer for sale, or distribute polystyrene loose fill packaging in the state.

In other words, there will be no more Styrofoam bowls, cartons, clamshell containers, lids, plates, trays, or packing peanuts.

There are still some exceptions.  Raw meat, seafood, poultry, or fish sold for the purpose of cooking or preparing off-premises can still be packaged in polystyrene foam.  Prepackaged food filled or sealed prior to receipt by a food service provider can also still be packaged in polystyrene foam.

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation is initially focusing its efforts on outreach and education to achieve compliance rather than on enforcement.   The DEC has provided detailed regulations to assist stakeholders with complying with the law.

Expanded polystyrene foam is a major contributor to environmental litter.  The material breaks apart easily and does not readily biodegrade, causing it to be persistent in the environment and contribute to microplastic pollution.  The foam causes negative impacts to wildlife, waterways, and natural resources.

An estimated 65% of New Yorkers were already living in communities that banned polystyrene foam, notably including New York City and Long Island which imposed a ban in 2019. 

New York becomes the fourth state to impose such a ban after Maine, Maryland, and Vermont.  Colorado and Virginia will follow suit in the next two years.

**********

Web Links

Expanded Polystyrene Foam Container and Polystyrene Loose Fill Packaging Ban

Photo, posted November 16, 2015, courtesy of Karim Ghantous via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Fire And Ice | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

In recent years, there have been countless stories about the effects of the changing climate.  Many of those stories have been about the dwindling sea ice in the Arctic and many others have been about the worsening wildfires in the western United States.   According to a recent study published by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, those two things are very much related.

As sea ice in the Arctic melts from July to October, sunlight warms the surrounding land and sea surfaces.  The resulting differences in air pressure create and strengthens a vortex in the atmosphere above the heated area which spins counterclockwise like a cyclone.

The powerful vortex pushes the polar jet stream out of its typical pattern and diverts moist air away from the western United States.  With the jet stream moved off its usual course, a second vortex, this time spinning clockwise, forms under the ridge of the polar jet stream above the Western U.S.  This second vortex brings with it clear skies and dry conditions:  fire-favorable weather.

Arctic sea ice has continually declined at least since the late 1970s.  It is predicted that there will be periods of entirely iceless Arctic waters before the 2050s.  In turn, conditions in the already fire-ravaged West are likely to be further exacerbated.  More than three million acres have burned across California alone during the 2021 wildfire season.

Climate conditions in one part of the world can, over time, influence climate outcomes thousands of miles away.  The research at Pacific Northwest Laboratory reveals how regional land and sea surface warming caused by Arctic ice melting can trigger hotter and drier conditions in the West later in the year.

**********

Web Links

Fire and Ice: The Puzzling Link Between Western Wildfires and Arctic Sea Ice

Photo, posted July 28, 2018, courtesy of Bob Dass via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Lake Tuz Is Disappearing | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Lake Tuz is Turkey’s second-largest lake and one of the world’s largest hypersaline lakes.  Its high salt content makes it an ideal breeding ground for some migratory bird species, including flamingos, which are often present there in huge numbers in the spring and summer.

Now, Lake Tuz rarely spans an area much larger than a puddle. In some summers, it completely dries up.  It did so this past summer, which resulted in the deaths of thousands of flamingos.

According to experts, Lake Tuz is a victim of climate change-induced drought, which has hit the region hard, and decades of harmful agricultural policies that exhausted the underground water supply.

Water in this region has become increasingly scarce.  The Mediterranean Basin has already seen more frequent and intense droughts, and is considered a climate change hotspot. 

According to new research, which was recently published in the journal Regional Environmental Change, Lake Tuz generally contained enough water in August for the lake to be considered permanent up until 2000.  But between 2001 and 2016, something shifted.  Water spanned less than 20% of the lake in every August except for one, and droughts became more frequent and intense. And in some years, the lake completely dried up.   

What caused this change?  According to the research team, Lake Tuz’s decline coincided with the excessive use of groundwater and surface water resources responsible for feeding the lake.  Some streams were rerouted for agricultural purposes, while others were dammed.  And when surface water sources dwindled, people turned to groundwater that historically fed the springs in Lake Tuz. 

Lake Tuz may be on the brink of extinction. 

**********

Web Links

Impact of climate variability on the surface of Lake Tuz (Turkey), 1985–2016

Disappearing Lake Tuz

Photo, posted August 16, 2021, courtesy of Godot via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Keeping Venice From Flooding | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Since 2003, Venice Italy has been building a system of mobile gates at three inlets to its famous lagoon.  The project is called MOSE, the Italian word for Moses, but is actually an acronym for the Italian words meaning Experimental Electromechanical Module.  

The 78 mobile gates are metal box structures that sit at the bottom of inlet channels.  When a high tide is predicted, compressed air is pumped into the structures.  The air causes the barriers to rise up to the surface and block the flow of the tide, thereby preventing water from flowing into the lagoon.

The system had an important test on November 3 when water levels were predicted to rise four-and-a-half feet above normal at high tide and strong winds were blowing.  Water at that level is enough to flood 60% of the city, including the famous St. Mark’s Square, which is unfortunately the lowest part of the city.

Activating the flood gates proved to be successful.  Even though high tide water levels in fact rose 4.3 feet in the surrounding Adriatic Sea, they only reached 2.7 feet in Venice, which was enough to prevent significant flooding.

Rising sea levels have led to increasingly frequent floods in Venice.  In 2019, before the MOSE system was available for use, there were more than 25 high-water events swamping Venice, including one in November of that year that was the second worst on record.

Some researchers have calculated that the system will need to be closed for as much as 3 weeks a year by the end of the century even if emission reductions are reasonably effective.  If they aren’t, the gates may be closed for at least two months a year by 2080.

After many years of delays, setbacks and controversies, the system is finally operational.

**********

Web Links

Venice Holds Back the Adriatic Sea

Photo, posted October 25, 2014, courtesy of Pedro Szekely via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Solar Canopies | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

There are plenty of solar panels on residential rooftops but there are also increasing numbers of arrays of them on croplands, arid lands, and grasslands. Large solar arrays are mostly built in open spaces like these rather than in developed areas.  The reason is that it is cheaper to build on undeveloped land than on rooftops or construct covered parking lots.

However, building on undeveloped land is not necessarily the smartest idea.   Undeveloped land is a dwindling resource that is needed for many different things:  growing food, sheltering wildlife, storing and purifying water, preventing erosion, and sequestering carbon. 

Putting solar panels on parking lots has the appeal that they are abundant, close to electricity customers, and are on land that already has been stripped of much of its biological value.

Putting a solar canopy over a parking lot can produce large amounts of electricity and has the added benefit that it would provide shade for cars.  For example, a typical Walmart supercenter might have a five-acre parking lot, which is enough to support a 3-megawatt solar array.  If Walmart put solar canopies on all of its 3,500+ super centers, it would provide 11 gigawatts of solar power – as much as a dozen large coal-fired power plants.

Solar canopies are still pretty uncommon, but some examples are ones at four DC Metro rail stations, one at JFK Airport, and a large one at the Rutgers University Piscataway campus.

Building parking lot solar canopies is much more expensive than putting solar arrays on open space, but they do eventually pay for themselves. Despite active opposition by utility and fossil fuel interests, solar canopies may eventually be a common sight.

**********

Web Links

Why Putting Solar Canopies on Parking Lots Is a Smart Green Move

Photo, posted January 10, 2020, courtesy of Tony Webster via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Climate Change And Crops | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

A new NASA study published in the journal Nature Food looks at the impact of global climate change on food crops.  According to the study, declines in global crop yields are likely to become apparent by 2030 if high greenhouse gas emissions continue.

The study used advanced climate and agriculture models to predict the effects of projected increases in temperature, shifts in rainfall patterns, and elevated surface carbon dioxide concentrations from human-caused greenhouse gas emissions.

These climate changes would make it more difficult to grow corn in the tropics but would actually expand wheat’s growing range.  The reduction in corn yields could be as much as 24% by late in the century.   Corn Is grown all over the world and large quantities are produced in countries nearer to the equator.  As temperatures rise in countries such as the US, Brazil, and China, yields are likely to decline because of the increased stress on the plants.

Wheat, which grows best in temperate climates may see a broader area where it can be grown as temperatures rise, but these gains are likely to level off by mid-century.

Rising temperature is not the only factor influencing crop yields.  Rising carbon dioxide levels have a positive effect on photosynthesis and therefore on crop yields, especially for wheat.  But changing rainfall patterns and rising temperatures can affect the length of growing seasons and accelerate crop maturity.  This can result in the production of less grain than in a longer development period.

The changing climate has complicated effects on the growth of breadbasket crops and will be felt worldwide.

**********

Web Links

Global Climate Change Impact on Crops Expected Within 10 Years, NASA Study Finds

Photo, posted September 8, 2004, courtesy of Lynn Ketchum/Oregon State University via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

The Hunt For Marine Plastic | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Estimates are that about 10 million tons of plastic enter the ocean every year.  This is equivalent to a truckload of plastic being dumped into the sea every minute and the stuff is not easy to keep track of.  Some of it ends up in the  infamous ocean garbage patches.  But overall, researchers only know what happens to about 1% of it.

The European Space Agency has decided to find out whether it might be possible to detect and track floating plastic in the oceans using satellite monitoring.  Researchers have a variety of ideas about how best to do this and now the agency is testing some of those ideas.

The ESA maintains something called the Atlantic Basin Facility which is a 7000 square-foot tank equipped to simulate various types of waves and tidal currents.  It is the largest facility of its kind in the world.

Researchers place plastic in the basin consisting of typical items found at sea, such as bags, bottles, marine nets and ropes, plastic cutlery, and Styrofoam balls.  The plastic used in the study included material previously recovered from the sea through ocean cleanup campaigns.  Multiple research groups from European universities used specialized instrumentation to monitor the basin from above.  Techniques included radar remote sensing, something called GNSS reflectometry, and specialized optical instrumentation.

Initial results look promising in that under some circumstances teams received useable signals.  It will take further analysis to determine the ultimate utility of space-based monitoring of plastic entering the ocean.  Marine litter is a large and growing problem.  Figuring out where it all is and where it is going is a necessary part of any solution.

**********

Web Links

Hunting for marine plastic

Photo, posted March 24, 2017, courtesy of Holly Richards/USFWS via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Arctic Communities And Permafrost Thaw | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Permafrost is frozen soil, rock or sediment that can be as much as a few thousand feet thick.  To qualify as permafrost , the material has to have been at or below the freezing point of water for two or more years.  Most of it is located in high latitudes in the Arctic and Antarctic regions.   Permafrost covers nearly a quarter of the exposed land in the Northern Hemisphere.

Permafrost contains enormous amounts of carbon in the form of frozen soil that includes remnants of plants and animals, in some cases that have been there for more than 20,000 years.

The Arctic region has been warming faster than any place else on earth and thawing permafrost is already unleashing methane and carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, adding to the global temperature rise.

Apart from the impact on the global climate, thawing permafrost is making the ground unstable and is causing serious problems for local communities.

Recent research using satellite observations provides an overview of the Arctic to identify communities and infrastructure that will be at risk over the next 30 years.

Using high-resolution data from the Copernicus Sentinel satellite missions along with ground-based data going back to 1997, researchers modeled the permafrost ground temperature trends and extrapolated them out to 2050.  The results were that 55% of the infrastructure currently located on permafrost and within 60 miles of the Arctic coastline – infrastructure on which many communities rely – is likely to be affected.

Most human activity in the Arctic takes place along permafrost coasts.  Permafrost thaw is exposing these coasts to rapid change that threatens biodiversity and puts pressure on communities.

**********

Web Links

Satellites pinpoint communities at risk of permafrost thaw

Photo, posted January 24, 2014, courtesy of Brandt Meixell / USGS via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Whales As Ecosystem Engineers | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Researchers from Stanford University have been studying the role of large whales on ocean ecosystems with some surprising results.

From 1910 to 1970, people killed about 1.5 million baleen whales in the waters surrounding Antarctica.  The whales were hunted for their blubber, baleen, and meat.  Baleen is the filtering fringe that certain whales use instead of teeth to capture food from the ocean.  A primary food source for these whales is krill, small shrimp-like creatures.   One would assume that the decimation of the baleen whale population in the Southern Ocean would have led to a surge in krill populations.  But the new research has found that the opposite is the case.

The precipitous decline of large marine mammals has negatively impacted the health and productivity of ocean ecosystems.

New high-tech tagging devices that attach to whales for brief periods allow researchers to record their movements and activities.  For the first time, it has been possible to accurately determine how much krill whales actually consume, and the answer is that they eat two to three times as much as previously thought.  Interestingly, the same technology shows that fish-eating whales like humpbacks eat somewhat less than previously thought.

Baleen whales are essentially mobile krill processing plants.  They eat the krill, digest it, and produce iron-laden excretions that are needed by phytoplankton, which comprise the bottom of the food chain that nourish krill and other small creatures.  With fewer whales, there is less nourishment for the krill.  In fact, based on the new data, estimates are that the historic abundance of krill in the Southern Ocean had to be about five times what it is today.

Whales are important ecosystem engineers.

**********

Web Links

Stanford researchers find whales are more important ecosystems engineers than previously thought

Photo, posted November 18, 2010, courtesy of Dr. Brandon Southall, NMFS/OPR via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Global Flood Risk From Melting Ice | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

Approximately 10% of the land area on Earth is covered by ice.  This includes glaciers, ice caps, and the ice sheets of Antarctica and Greenland.  Nearly 70% of all fresh water on earth is locked away in ice.  If all this land ice were to melt, global sea levels would rise by more than 200 feet. 

According to new research led by researchers at the University of Leeds in the U.K., global warming is causing extreme ice melting events in Greenland to become more frequent and more intense over the past 40 years, leading to an increased risk of flooding worldwide.   

According to the findings, which were recently published in the journal Nature Communications, approximately 3.85 trillion tons of ice has melted from the surface of Greenland and into the ocean during the past decade alone.  That’s enough melted ice to cover all of New York City with nearly 15,000 feet of water. 

Rising sea levels threaten the lives and livelihoods of those living in coastal communities around the world.  Beyond the obvious risk of flooding in low-lying areas, rising seas also disrupt marine ecosystems that many coastal communities rely on for food and work.       

Rising sea levels can also alter patterns of ocean and atmospheric circulation, which in turn affect weather conditions around the planet.

Estimates from models suggest that melting ice from Greenland will contribute between 1 inch and 9 inches to global sea level rise by 2100. 

These findings are just another reminder of how we need to act urgently to mitigate climate change if we want to prevent the worst-case scenarios from becoming reality. 

**********

Web Links

Increased frequency of extreme ice melting in Greenland raises global flood risk

Photo, posted April 21, 2017, courtesy of Markus Trienke via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

Efficiency Of Offshore Wind | Earth Wise

By Leave a Comment

After many years of debates, delays, and controversies, offshore wind is about to expand in a big way in the United States.  The White House has announced the goal to deploy 30 gigawatts of offshore wind – enough to power 90 million homes – along the East Coast seaboard by 2030.

In New York State, there are now five offshore wind projects in active development.  The state goal is to have nearly a gigawatt of offshore wind by 2035, enough to power over 4 million homes.

These projects involve the use of thousands of physically large, high-capacity wind turbines deployed over large areas at an unprecedented scale.  Such mammoth installations bring with them unique problems.

Low-turbulence conditions over water lead to the fact that individual wind farms will experience each other’s wake (the disturbance of their airflow) even when turbine arrays are 15 to 50 miles apart.  As a result, turbines may fatigue earlier, and groups of turbines may experience up to 30% lower power production due to wake effects.

Industry trends are causing an increased probability of large wake-induced energy losses within individual wind farms and an increasing probability of wake interactions.

These issues have been studied in new research published by researchers at Cornell University.  The research presents simulations that may be helpful to optimize turbine spacing in the ongoing deployments and assist plans for future ones.  Improved understanding of wind turbine and wind-farm wake is essential in ensuring that the financial investments in offshore wind result in electricity-generation goals met at the lowest possible cost.

According to Department of Energy studies, offshore wind resources around the United States could potentially generate more electricity than the entire country currently uses.

**********

Web Links

Scientists bring efficiency to expanding offshore wind energy

Photo, posted August 9, 2016, courtesy of Lars Plougmann via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.

WAMC Northeast Public Radio

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio is a regional public radio network serving parts of seven northeastern states (more...)