Feature Channels: Environmental Science

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Stony Brook University and Medical Center sponsor initiative to recycle pharmaceuticals.

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The student residents of Wellesley's sustainability co-op housing have made a commitment to buying and cooking locally and sustainably. Also essential to the new model of co-op living on campus is a community-based lifestyle. Nine students currently live in the sustainable housing wing of Simpson Hall on the Wellesley College campus in rooms that share a common living area and kitchen.

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George Washington University experts are available to discuss climate change, Earth Day, and sustainability.

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Drexel University began construction on a $69 million building that will include a "Bio Wall" or living biofilter for energy efficiency and improved indoor air quality. The building will be the first at a university in the United States to include a Bio Wall.

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Richard Alley of Penn State, V. "Ram" Ramanathan of Scripps demonstrated global reach and severity of human impacts on climate; will deliver public lectures at USC on April 23.

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Calling New Orleans "the canary in the global warming coal mine," two Tulane professors say the Crescent City must embrace unconventional thinking in order to recover in a sustainable way from Hurricane Katrina while withstanding a continual threat from rising sea levels, diminishing wetlands and future storms. They stress that the No. 1 priority for Louisiana should be to combat global warming and accelerated sea-level rise.

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An article co-authored by a Tulane scientist examines the role that groundwater plays in eroding the surface of the earth "” a dynamic that could have implications for New Orleans-area levees.

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The loading of carbon dioxide into oceans is a consequence of fossil fuel use that has only begun to be widely recognized as problematic in the past decade. Its subsequent effects on seawater chemistry have the potential to spread ecological disaster to a variety of industries dependent on the seas.

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Advanced materials and new industrial coatings may provide more structurally stable, environmentally sound solutions for manufacturing, shipping and infrastructure.

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During his inaugural address, President Obama spoke plainly about the nation's energy crisis and our reliance on foreign oil: ". . . each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet. Expert believes electric vehicles hold the key to a cleaner, safer, greener future.

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Researchers find great promise in a process that could use solar energy to use hydrogen, the third most abundant element on earth's surface, as the ultimate alternative to fossil fuels. This process increase dramatically the efficiency of titania photoanodes used to convert solar energy into hydrogen in fuel cells.

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New analysis calls into question widespread claims on potential economic, employment and environmental benefits promoted by special interest groups, industry associations and international organizations.

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Salisbury University Physical Plant Director Kevin Mann loves talking trash. That doesn't mean he has any particular opinion about your mother. In fact, if he was to pick a fight, his opener might be, "Your momma's so sustainable"¦ ." The trash Mann enjoys discussing is the kind that ends up in landfills"”and his main interest is keeping what he can out of them.

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Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens, architect of the "Pickens Plan" to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil, is the keynote speaker for a statewide Energy Summit hosted by the University of Missouri's four campuses April 22-23 in Columbia.

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Intensive monitoring of air quality near a major highway intersection could reveal a lot about how the air outside affects the air in our indoor environment.

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In mid-March, drilling by paleoclimatologists to retrieve sediment and meteorite-impact rocks from remotest Siberia reached about 213 feet (65 m), about 1 million years into the past. They hope to retrieve the longest continuous climate data ever collected for the Arctic, over 3.6 million years.

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Alternative energy and sustainable construction experts available for Earth Day related interviews.

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The University of North Carolina Wilmington will complete the campus' first construction project this summer that will meet the U.S. Green Building Council for the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification standards.

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Argonne National Laboratory is involved in a wide array of research and development projects aimed at advancing alternative energy sources and other "green" technologies in an effort to reduce greenhouse gases and ameliorate climate change, as well as to reduce reliance on fossil fuels and promote energy independence for the United States.

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Geoscientists say a small rise in past ocean temperature undercut and melted Antarctic ice, raising global sea levels many feet. New data from modeling and sediment cores converge to show the Western Antarctic Ice Sheet can retreat to near complete collapse much more rapidly than believed possible.

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Two decades after the Exxon Valdez oil spill--and long after predictions said the oil would be gone--a Temple researcher is exploring why there is still oil being found in the beaches of Alaska's Prince William Sound.

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The Catskill Mountains receive some of the highest nitrogen deposition rates in North America due to pollutants drifting, and a recent study in this region demonstrates how some forested watersheds are more capable than others in absorbing nitrogen. While nitrogen is an important nutrient for plant growth, excess levels are capable of acidifying soils and decreasing water quality.

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Renowned leaders in sustainability from the worlds of education, entertainment, politics and business, will discuss the steps needed to become a sustainable society during Dialogue for Change, a lively on-stage discussion Thursday, March 19, at 7:00 p.m. in the Ondaatje Hall, McCain Building at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

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Global warming is expected to cause the sea level along the northeastern U.S. coast to rise almost twice as fast as global sea levels during this century, putting New York City at greater risk for damage from hurricanes and winter storm surge, according to a new study led by a Florida State University researcher.

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New tracking and observing technologies are giving marine conservationists a fish-eye view of conditions, from overfishing to climate change, that are contributing to declining fish populations, according to a new study.

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A University of Maryland-led team has compiled the first decades-long database of aerosol measurements over land, making possible new research into how air pollution changes affect climate change. The researchers show that clear sky visibility over land has decreased globally, indicative of increases in aerosols, or airborne pollution. Their findings are published in the March 13 issue of Science.

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Long-term exposure to elevated levels of ground ozone"”a major constituent of smog"”significantly raises the risk of dying from lung disease, according to a new nationwide study of cities that evaluated the impact of ozone on respiratory health over an 18-year period.

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Cornell University is turning its biotrash - vegetable oil from dining hall fryers, animal bedding from campus barns, farm waste from university research - into fuels for use on campus.

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A new guide to volunteering names Earthwatch one of the top international wildlife and conservation organizations.

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Effects of climate change projected this century for Oregon's Upper Willamette River Basin, including Eugene-Springfield, will threaten water supplies, buildings, transportation systems, human health, forests, and fish and wildlife, according to a new report.

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New temperature data and numerical climate model simulations contradict the long-held idea that global temperatures were steady in the greenhouse-to-icehouse transition 34 million years ago. This suggests that models in use now to predict climate change may be underestimating future polar warming.

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Two scientists who found warning signs of climate change in the upper atmosphere and in the deepest ice sheets will share the 2009 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, administered by the University of Southern California. The award consists of a $200,000 cash prize and gold medals. Winners lecture at USC on April 23.

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A joint venture between the U and Headwaters Inc. has been created to offer carbon management services to CO2-emitting companies, from carbon storage engineering to risk and liability management. The first project will be to develop and operate a regional CO2 storage site to serve several power plants in central Utah.

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Invasive species"”one of the top causes of biological diversity loss worldwide"”significantly impact cultural diversity as well, according to a review published in the latest issue of the journal Environmental Conservation that has provoked heated debate within the scientific community.

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A dramatic increase in carbon dioxide levels is making the world's ocean more acidic, which may adversely affect the survival of marine life and organisms that depend on them, such as humans.

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An electric car (or plug-in hybrid in electric mode) creates carbon-dioxide emissions, too; how much depends on the grid used to recharge it.

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Faculty, students and staff on Washington University in St. Louis' Danforth, North and West campuses no longer can find bottled water in vending machines or at most campus eateries. Because of concerns about the environmental impact of bottled water, WUSTL ended sales of the product in January, and administrative offices no longer offer bottled water at events and meetings.

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Research and development. Industry partnerships. Recycled shipping containers. The University of Houston Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture is primed to sharpen and green the cutting edge of design and architecture with the new UH Green Building Components (GBC), the college's research initiative to design, develop and implement sustainable, renewable building components for the architecture, engineering and construction industries.

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Expert available to discuss the future of advanced battery tech as it relates to energy efficiency and the economic recovery program.

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The University of North Carolina Wilmington opened ECOteal last fall. It is the first store in the 16 campus UNC system dedicated to selling environmentally friendly products.

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Do you "hope" that everyone will see the light and start living more sustainably to save the environment? if so, you may be doing more harm than good.

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Recycling happens every day at the University of Houston, but for 10 weeks, the campus community will step up its efforts to reduce campus waste. UH is among the universities competing in the national RecycleMania competition, which not only encourages recycling but also emphasizes the benefits of going green every day.

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A GPS collar gives researchers an unusually specific record of the coyote's interstate wandering.

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A group of Dalhousie University mechanical engineering students have built the ultimate fuel-efficient car.

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Earthwatch and Archaeological Institute of America to Host Public Lecture in Boston on Feb. 23rd where Dr. Chris Stevenson will debunk popularly held thoughts about Easter Island, and share this punch-line: yes, the ancient Rapanui people did abuse their environment, but they were also developing sustainable practices"”innovating, experimenting, trying to adapt to a risky environment"”and they would still be here today if it weren't for the diseases introduced by European settlers.

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If nothing is done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Oregon will face some $3.3 billion in annual costs, which translates to about 4 percent of annual household income by 2020, according to a report produced for the University of Oregon's Climate Leadership Initiative's Program on Climate Economics by ECONorthwest.

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If nothing is done to substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Washington is likely to experience some $3.8 billion in associated annual costs -- including $1.3 billion in health related costs alone, according to a report produced for the University of Oregon's Climate Leadership Initiative's Program on Climate Economics by ECONorthwest.

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If nothing is done to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, New Mexico could experience some $3.2 billion in associated costs -- led by wildfires and health-care. This could translate to a tab of 8 percent of annual household income by 2020, according to a report produced for the University of Oregon's Climate Leadership Initiative's Program on Climate Economics by ECONorthwest.

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A University of Arkansas accounting researcher studied corporations with large environmental sanctions over a 10-year period and found that 72 percent of the companies failed to disclose that information to the Securities and Exchange Commission as required by law. SEC regulations require corporations to disclose environmental sanctions of $100,000 or more, regardless of the regulating entity.

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The American Chemical Society Office of Public Affairs Weekly Press Package with reports from 34 major peer-reviewed journals on chemistry, health, medicine, energy, environment, food, nanotechnology and other hot topics.