Story Idea #3: 6th WRRC Conference

On April 9th the UMass Water Resources Research Center will host its sixth annual conference titled Water Dependencies In New England: Systems, Stresses, And Responses. Part of the conference will be devoted to climate change adaptations and impacts as well as research being done as a result of global climate change. I’d like to see of what’s presented what implications or connections there are to domestic crisis in California and what can be learned from measures water officials are taking there or on a more local level to the proposed Russell Biomass plant on the Westfield River.
Possible Interviews:
Sarina Ergas (Associate Professor, Civil and Environmental Engineering)
Dr. James F. Manwell (Professor and Director of the Renewable Energy Research Laboratory)
Dr. Chad Nelson (Director of the National Environmental Technology Center in the UMass Environmental Instititute).

Story Idea #2: BID

This is a story from Pittsburgh's Post-Gazette about vacant store fronts that lead me to look into what has been going on with businesses in western Massachusetts in light of consumer confidence lows.
Northampton has a particularly interesting and highly contested campaign to establish a Downtown Northampton Business Improvement District. In theory the town will gather dues from businesses and in turn will provide services to augment shopping with the ultimate goal of drawing in more revenue for the whole town. Based on the support that the BID has received thus far there is indication that the expenditure of an operating budget for bells and/or whistles might be unwelcome by business owners along with the proposed BID compulsive lifetime dues that will supply $675,600 of said $935,500 budget.
It's also evident that the "security" services as well as the anti-panhandling measures the BID includes are in effect a round two for proponents of the anti-panhandling ordinance seemingly resolved earlier this month. There is some speculation that BID might be supported more by non-business entities in the BID (like Smith College) that will receive services but pay no dues. I'd like to look in how this is being received by business owners in Northampton and how the way Hampshire Mall is zoned and serviced by the Hadley community compares and contrasts to the proposed BID. If I pursue this angle I hope to talk to: Doug Kohl (Thornes), Susan Stockman (Executive Director of South Hadley Chamber of Commerce), Suzanne Beck (Executive Director of Northampton Chamber of Commerce), Timothy J. Kelley (Chief Operating Officer of Hampshire Mall Leasing) and James Dostal (Northampton City Council President).
If I pursue BID as round two of anti-panhandling measures I'll forgo some of those officials and professionals and try to speak with some activists from the Poverty Is Not a Crime [PINAC] or the Freedom Center or Arise for Social Justice in Springfield.

Bike Out of the Recession

As Massachusetts prepares to spend its $11.7 billion share of "State and Local Fiscal Relief" provided by the stimulus bill, I'd like to look into the proposed $3,100,000 Manhan Rail Trail project in Northampton. Specifically I'd like to gather local opinions as to whether the shovel-ready proposal, that will create 18 jobs and a 2.4 mile recreational trail, is in keeping with or contrary to the spirit of the stimulus package goals. I hope to interview Stephanie Kraft editor of the Pioneer Valley Advocate, Mayor Clare Higgins of Northampton or Mayor Michael Tautznik of Easthampton, and maybe some people from one or all of these organizations:
Pascommuck Conservation Trust
http://www.ridenoho.com/welcome.html
http://www.nohobikeclub.org/
http://www.massbike.org/

O Hai.

There are otters in the Charles! North American river otters to be exact. It's like squirrels for the river... no wait that's the ducks. There have always been squirrels and ducks (notorious scroungers) but it's been almost a decade since the Charles has had a food system stable enough to support more reclusive wildlife mammals like otters.

UMass and the National Teach-In on Global Warming Solutions

Thursday February 5^th, the University of Massachusetts participated in the National Teach-In on Global Warming Solutions by welcoming a host of UMass researchers, research directors, and Amherst community leaders to talk about Global Warming. Vice Chancellor Paul Kostecki made the introductory remarks on the university-wide research efforts in clean energy. He praised the recent decrease in energy and water consumption on campus. He explained that currently the university pays for the removal of used cooking oil from the Dining Commons but that there are plans to use the cooking oil to create biofuel. The future of this and other projects looks bright according to Kostecki. Many “shovel ready” projects are poised to begin. He said, “I think the stars are in alignment and we finally have a president who gets it”.

His remarks were followed by those of Professor James Manwell, the director of the Renewable Energy Research Laboratory. Manwell spoke on the university’s history with wind turbine research. He also discussed the logistical difficulties in developing turbine technology like transport and permitting. He referred to the Cape Wind project and General Electrics inability to keep up with the demand for turbine production.

Professor Raymond Bradley, Director of Climate System Research Center, took on the question: Is global warming real? His answer was unequivocally yes. He presented NASA data, data gleaned from a weather station on Kilimanjaro, and computer modeled climate scenarios based on that data.

Bill Gates walking that fine line between poor taste and hilarity

Funny? I don't know? Maybe. Whatever gets it in the news. Gates is better at this than software. Begrudgingly I will admit it: His work is good. His TEDTalk is good, the second half is very good and entirely unexpected. I think Bill Gates missed his calling as a teacher. Ultimately, John Hodgman's is better or at least funnier. Sperm whales. Richard Dreyfuss. Best. TED. Ever.

Africa deserves it's own film... and help. A lot of help.

Opposition is essential. You can't have a debate with out it. The Great Global Warming Swindle serves a purpose, beyond presenting Britain's historic relationship with CO2, it also acts as a catalyst creating dialogues about how the environment is studied, modeled, and prioritized. People draw conclusions from film but a good film does not dictate truth so the bottom line is usually... well... it's complicated. Thank god there is a Facebook status for that one. Everyone knows what's happening between the Earth and us? Yeah, it's complicated.

This usually kills the conversation or romantic interest. But things with The Great Global Warming Swindle are different. Questions are posed, answers are posed, all and all it's pretty ambivalent... until the second half of the film. Somehow a film about the 'faux-climate change' becomes about... the world vs. Africa? Climate change may still be debatable but Sub-Saharan Africa has undeniable problems, big problems. Worse still, monies earmarked for it's problems have constantly been misspent. Along with the neglect there are decades long abuses reaching far back before zealous environmental initiatives. From the progressive environmentally conscious resource development (mentioned in the film) to critical life saving drugs, the people of Africa don't always get what they need. In 2004 $14.5 million of a $80 million USAID budget was spent on malaria drugs. The rest on salaries. The unnecessary inefficient solar panels that the film dwells on are the tip of the iceberg (don't worry this one doesn't appear to be melting).

The film glaringly omits that malaria is such a danger in Sub-Saharan Africa not because of it's tropical location (or even because of the continuous distribution of the ineffective chloroquine) but because 22 million people have HIV/AIDS and are vulnerable to parasitic diseases that flourish is the tropics . Furthermore, according to the U.S. National Debate Topic 2007-2008 Heath Care in Sub-Saharan Africa, because there is a stigma in the developed world, Africans (especially men) are reluctant to find out if they have HIV/AIDS but regardless many suspect they do and so they take doses of their spouses ARV drugs, making the drugs less effective and thus requiring a greater expense to develop new drugs. Like many things on earth, attitudes as well as diseases are interrelated like this recent cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe illustrates. Sure Africa could join the big leagues, burn some coal and spray some DDT, but if you learn anything from the global climate change debate let it be that things are interrelated and very complicated.

Tragic News for Fans of Clownfish

Nemo, and many of his pomacentridae brethren, are actually lost this time. Not like last time when they were merely haphazardly misplaced. Nope. Baby fish -excuse me- sea kittens can not find their respective parents and thus can not learn how or even where to survive. If Disney magic doesn’t make you sympathetic maybe this report by NPR will.

flickr photo credits: Jeff Kubina

A changing climate kills things. No way.

That climate change may be creating oceanic bubbles of death should be unsurprising... manbearpig IS real. Enough said. What really piqued my interest however was a quick reread of the Fourth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change(IPCC), released just two years ago. It seems like the Nobel Prize winning organization failed to catalog increased wind speed as a climate driver for coastal systems. (See Chapter 6 Table 6.2)

Perhaps it was ment to fall under ‘storm intensity’, perhaps no one could have foreseen oxygen deprived expanses of the ocean devastating ecosystems, or maybe the IPCC is really as bad as they say. Joseph Romm, author of Hell and High Water, went so far as to suggest the IPCC’s last report became obsolete shortly after it was published. So when’s the next one due? 2014. If only the ocean could hold its breath until then.

There are how many members in the electoral college?

I selected the award winning political blog FiveThirtyEight which I unfortunately discovered post-election. With the motto “Politics Done Right” the primary blogger Nate Silver and his contributor Sean Quinn analyze electoral data with the best of them but Silver doesn’t stop there. He concerns himself with everything related to the function (or dysfunction) of government and all the imaginable influences on the outcome of re-elections. And when the situation calls for it Silver ventures out into new territory for him and applies his reader friendly statistical analysis to a comparison of the changing economic forecasts of economic professionals and academics. The variety is reminiscent of Real Clear Politics but the Silver personality and the remarkably successful (not to mention transparent) methodology elevate it.

By their nature as analysts of domestic presidential and legislative races, the duo produces no news content themselves. Instead they bring their unique approach to interpreting the data that they collect and catalog. Their blog seems to be geared towards a readership with an awareness of the political news events but that lacks the time to seek out and synthesize the related data.

Silver has a definite appreciation of my favorite aesthetic value: simplicity. His blog features a simple black, white, red, and blue logo and sans-serif font text. He has also carefully tagged all of the entries and presents the tags in an alphabetical list on the bottom of the reader’s right hand column. Overall it’s functionally intuitive and aesthetically pleasing.