monitoring
Rebuilding Environmental Protection
It will take years to fully recover from the damage of the Trump era. We will need some new ideas.
After almost four years of Trump, federal environmental protection is in about the same shape as Western Europe at the end of World War II, filled with bomb craters and destruction. If the election turns out in Biden’s favor, he will be faced with the task of rebuilding from the smoking ruins. Here are some …
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CONTINUE READINGAccelerating Cost-Effective Green Stormwater Infrastructure: Learning from Local Implementation
A new Berkeley Law report
California decision makers focused on responding to the current drought might question whether stormwater deserves a slice of their attention right now. Although it might be tempting to relegate stormwater planning, management decisions, and infrastructure improvements to a back burner until drought concerns cool off, doing so would be counterproductive. Below, I explain why stormwater management is relevant …
CONTINUE READINGNot all drones are weapons of war
Scientists promote low-cost aerial drones as conservation tools
Speaking of visualizing environmental problems, they are hidden for different reasons and therefore can be revealed by a variety of different mechanisms. Drones are one tool with a great deal of potential. Aerial drones have gotten a lot of attention as weapons of war or counterterrorism in the U.S. arsenal. Whatever you think about the …
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CONTINUE READINGWhy it’s important that we know that we’re at 400 ppm of CO2
A major (and unfortunate) milestone has been crossed this past week. Measurements of atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide passed 400 parts per million, the highest in millions of years. Others have commented on how worrying this milestone is for the planet. But what I want to focus on here is how important it is that …
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CONTINUE READINGGood environmental data matters for environmental litigation
If you aren’t reading Dave Owen’s blog posts over at Environmental Law Prof Blog, you should be. His most recent post is about a recent Endangered Species Act (ESA) case in Texas: Environmental plaintiffs sued, arguing that the state of Texas had allowed too many water withdrawals upstream from the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, a critical breeding …
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CONTINUE READINGWhy Monitoring Matters
There’s been a lot of discussion here about the failings of the latest Supreme Court environmental decision in Los Angeles County Flood Control District v. NRDC. I don’t really want to pile on with those criticisms – though it is baffling to me that the Court wasted its very limited judicial resources correcting the Ninth …
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CONTINUE READINGGood news for right whales
It’s easy for environmentalists to get depressed, given the amount of bad news about climate change, species losses, and the like. But sometimes there is unexpectedly good news. This morning’s New York Times has one of those stories. The Atlantic right whale, which not long ago was thought by many to be a lost cause, …
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CONTINUE READINGThe California budget squeeze hits Marine Protected Area research
At least two academic projects supporting California’s marine protected areas program have been halted for now by the state’s budget crisis. From Science Insider: Researchers were ordered to stop work immediately, says Rikk Kvitek of California State University, Monterey Bay, a principal investigator on a $20 million sea-floor mapping program funded by the state. . …
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